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Antony Annan. - Source: Facebook -
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Searchers have found the bodies of a New Zealander and two Australians on board a helicopter which crashed in Papua New Guinea over a week ago, Newstalk ZB has reported.
The wreckage of the Bell 206 chopper was sighted from the air after a villager found pieces of plastic nearby.
New Zealander Antony Annan, 49, was one of the three crew on board. The Australians have been named as Russell Aitken, 42 and Emmett Fynn, 36.
Yesterday Hevilift, the helicopter operator, said it found plastic pieces of a "fly away" container - a plastic container that holds items like oil, rags and grease guns - belonging to the chopper.
"Regrettably these broken pieces of container would most likely indicate that there has been a hard landing and the aircraft has broken up," Hevilift spokesman Ian McBeath said.
Heavy rain in the area most likely flushed the plastic items out of the bush and into one of the dozens of rivulets which run into Gipi Creek and on into the Purari River, he said.
Rescuers were alerted to the pieces of the container, which is usually held on the boot of the helicopter, by a villager about 13 kilometres from Umasia Village on the Purari River.
"We knew then that the area where we had been searching was correct and we concentrated the ground search teams upstream of the location of where the debris was found," said group managing director Paul Booij in a statement to AAP.
"Unfortunately our worst fears were realised this morning."