HIS shouts for help were in vain as the nearest village was some 4km away.

Mr Mohd Farid Abdullah, the 21-year-old pilot whose plane crashed in the Terengganu jungles on Wednesday, suffered injuries to his eyes and head and managed to crawl out 8m from the wreck.

But it took 14 hours before help arrived.

He was not aware that his co-pilot had died, reported The Star.

Mr Muhammad Ariff Ahmad Fuad, 20, of Subang Jaya, Selangor, was pinned to the chair in the cockpit and believed to have been killed by the impact of the crash.

The plane hit a tree before smashing into the ground, reported Berita Harian.

The two trainee pilots had flown the two-seater aircraft from the Sultan Mahmud Airport in Terengganu for Langkawi International Airport at 4.40pm.

About 10 minutes later, the police received a call that the aircraft was missing. Immediately, a search and rescue team was formed.

State acting police chief Datuk Jalaluddin Abd Rahmad said 118 rescuers from the Kuala Terengganu police contingent, Fire and Rescue Department and Civil Defence Department were involved in the operation.

Rescuers started combing the jungles in Tepoh near the Bukit Jong quarry after receiving a report at 5.10pm on Wednesday.

Villagers told them they saw the aircraft flying low and suspected that it had crashed into a forested area.

Said SAC Jalaluddin: 'We had to stop the operation at midnight and resume around 6.30am on Thursday.'

With the help of a helicopter, they located the wreckage, about 38km from the airport.

Rescuers found Mr Farid at about 7.15am with a fractured left leg and facial injuries.

The helicopter had to airlift the body and the injured pilot out of the jungle to the hospital.

It is learnt that the pilots failed to report their altitude or respond to the air traffic controller minutes after taking off in their Diamond Star DA40 light aircraft at 4.23pm.

Mr Farid, who is being warded for observation, has not been informed of his co-pilot's death.

Mr Farid's mother, Madam Safiah Omar, 48, said: 'I don't have the heart to tell him the news. He still seems weak and needs a lot of rest.'

She said that her son told her despite fracturing his leg, he crawled out of the plane as soon as it crashed as he feared it would explode.

Meanwhile, the parents of dead co-pilot Ariff, who got his licence two years ago, appeared to have accepted the news of their son's death.

Mrs Zarina Abdul Manan, 45, said: 'At least, he died achieving his dreams of piloting a plane. He had big dreams of flying a jumbo jet.'

Following father's footsteps

She said her son, who is the second of four children, was a top student who wanted to follow in the footsteps of his pilot father.

A villager from the Rhu Tapai village nearby claimed that he saw the plane crash.

Mr Alias Kotay, 43, a farmer, told Harian Metro: 'When the crash happened, I was on my motorcycle travelling towards a vegetable farm nearby.'

He abandoned his plans and headed home to call the police.

One of the officers involved in the search, Lance Corporal Wan Mohd Nasir Wan Ismail, 39, said he was shocked to hear a voice calling out for help somewhere next to the plane wreck.

He said: 'I was helping another officer extricate the body of the dead co-pilot when I heard it and turned around to see another man about some metres from the plane.'

SAC Jalaluddin said the cockpit was so damaged that it was hard to determine who was piloting the plane when it crashed.

This article was first published in The New Paper on August 23, 2008.