Pubdate: Sun, 06 Oct 2013 Source: Dallas Morning News (TX) Copyright: 2013 The Associated Press Contact: http://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/send-a-letter/ Website: http://www.dallasnews.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/117 Author: Vivian Sequera, The Associated Press Page: 16A Colombia 4 KILLED IN PLANE CRASH 3 Americans Die, 2 Others Seriously Injured in Counter-Drug Flight BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) - A small plane on a U.S. counterdrug mission crashed Saturday in a remote region of northern Colombia, killing three Americans and a Panamanian National Guardsman and seriously injuring the other two Americans aboard. The Havilland Dash 8 was flying over the western Caribbean when it lost radio contact with the U.S.-sponsored multinational task force in Key West, Fla., that runs drug interdiction in the region, the U.S. military said. Such planes typically track speedboats that smuggle cocaine from Colombia north into Central America and the Caribbean, but a U.S. Southern Command spokesman, Lt. Cmdr. Ron Flanders, said he did not have details on the mission. It was not immediately clear if the Americans aboard were all military contractors, although Southcom said that the plane was contracted by the U.S. government. The twin-engine turboprop went down near the city of Capurgana, close to the border with Panama. The two injured Americans were rescued by Colombian soldiers and taken to a hospital in the capital, Bogota, with multiple bone fractures and burns, officials said. The names of the Americans were withheld pending notification of relatives. Gen. Nicasio de Jesus Martinez, commander of the Colombian army's Brigade IV, whose troops traveled to the accident scene, ruled out the possibility that the plane was shot down by rebels. "There was no aggression, no impact," said Martinez, adding that it was too soon to know if the crash was caused by mechanical failure, human error or the weather. The region where it crashed is mountainous jungle, and rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, operate there along with drug traffickers. The plane was contracted to monitor drug trafficking routes as part of Operation Martillo, Southcom said. Operation Martillo (Hammer) is part of the $165 million, U.S.-led regional security initiative that focuses on the seas off Central America, key shipping routes for 90 percent of the cocaine headed to the U.S. Fourteen countries participate. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom