Jakarta, Indonesia (BBN)-Indonesian rescuers have found the bodies of all 54 people who were onboard a Trigana Air plane that crashed in the western Papua region.
The head of the search and rescue agency said his team had found the aircraft completely destroyed and partially burnt, reports BBC.
The plane came down on Sunday in dense forest in a mountainous area, close to its destination of Oksibil.
It was carrying 44 adult passengers, five children, and five crew members.
The plane was also said to be carrying about 6.5 billion rupiah ($486,000; £300,000) in cash, which was due to be distributed to poor families in the area.
Officials have not said whether this has been located.
Members of the rescue team – made up of about 100 police, military and civilians – began reaching the site on Tuesday morning.
Bambang Soelistyo, head of Indonesia’s search and rescue agency, told reporters: “The plane was totally destroyed and all the bodies were burned and difficult to identify.”
A spokesman for the transport ministry said bad weather was hampering efforts to remove the bodies but they would eventually be taken to the provincial capital for formal identification.
Soelisyo said rescuers were now hunting for the plane’s flight data recorders, known as black boxes, which should shed light on what caused the accident.
The ATR42-300 twin turboprop plane took off from Sentani airport in Jayapura at 14:21 local time on Sunday, but lost contact with air traffic controllers half an hour later.
Bad weather is believed to have been a possible reason for the crash.
A search plane was forced to turn back on Sunday because of dangerous flying conditions.
Oksibil, which is about 280km south of Jayapura, is a remote, mountainous region, which is extremely difficult to navigate.
Trigana Air has had 14 serious incidents since it began operations in 1991, losing 10 aircraft in the process, according to the Aviation Safety Network.
It has been on a European Union blacklist of banned carriers since 2007.
All but four of Indonesia’s certified airlines are on the list.
Indonesia has suffered two major air disasters in the past year.
Last December, an AirAsia plane crashed in the Java Sea, killing all 192 people on board – and in July a military transport plane crashed in a residential area of Medan, Sumatra, claiming 140 lives.
BBN/SK/AD