NEW DELHI, July 21 (Xinhua) -- A dead body of an Indian Air Force (IAF) personnel and remains of an IAF plane which crashed more than 50 years ago have been found in the northern state of Himachal Pradesh, official sources said Saturday.
According to the sources, the IAF plane had crashed at the same spot in February 1968, where the remains have been found.
The remains were found when a team of mountaineers was on a cleanliness drive on the "Chandrabhaga-13" peak, and suddenly came across the frozen dead body and the crashed plane's remains.
The AN-12 aircraft, built by the erstwhile Soviet Union, had gone missing on Feb. 7, 1968, after the pilot had decided to retreat while on way to Leh from Chandigarh because of inclement weather.
The plane was reportedly over "Rohtang Pass" in Himachal Pradesh when it lost radio contact, said the defence sources.
"We were somewhat taken aback to come upon something we had not expected when we found the remains of the wrecked aircraft as well as the decayed body of a soldier at Dhaka Glacier located at an altitude of around 18,000 feet above sea level," English daily Hindustan Times quoted the team leader Rajiv Rawat as saying.
He reportedly said: "First we stumbled upon parts of the wrecked aircraft which was followed by the discovery of the frozen body of a soldier lying with its head down. The hand and hair were almost intact despite 50 years of the crash."
The clean-up expedition was organised jointly by the Indian Mountaineering Foundation and the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) to collect garbage left in high altitudes by tourists and climbers.