Like other times, Bangladesh Air Force pilot Flight Lieutenant Rumman Tahmid called his parents to seek their best wishes before flying on Monday morning.
He could talk to his mother who had been staying in his maternal aunt’s home in Cox’s Bazar.
But Tahmid could not talk to his father as he was sleeping at his home in Dhaka, said Sajid, one of Tahmid’s cousins.
He then talked to his younger sister and said, “I have a scheduled flight and I am going alone.”
Tahmid remains missing after his F-7MB aircraft crashed into the Bay of Bengal near
Patenga sea beach on Monday morning.
Search and rescue operations for the missing pilot continued for the second day yesterday.
The family members are now anxiously waiting for his safe return.
His parents and three siblings rushed to Chittagong after being informed of the accident by the BAF and were staying in the BAF base Zahurul Hoque yesterday evening.
Tahmid, elder son of retired banker Abdul Kader Chowdhury, hailed from Haildhar of Anwara upazila in Chittagong.
Sajid also said all his three cousins had a fascination for defence jobs after Tahmid joined the BAF in 2010.
His younger brother Salman Tamjid, a former trainee of Bangladesh Army and currently studying chartered accountant in Malaysia, arrived home only three days before the accident.
Tamjid had to leave the force due to his physical problems.
The youngest brother Adnan Towfiq is also a trainee of the army and their eldest sister Lamia Samin recently passed SSC examination.
Rescue operation is underway for Flight Lieutenant Rumman Tahmid, Noor Islam, assistant director of Inter Service Public Relations (ISPR), said yesterday.
The joint teams are also searching for the remains of the jet, the official said. However, no major progress was reported in this connection as of yesterday afternoon.
The F-7MB lost contact with the control room of Zahurul Haque 42 minutes after it took off from the base in Patenga at 10:28am on a training mission, said Noor Islam.
Local boatmen saw parts of the plane floating on the water and the pieces were recovered around 2:00pm on Monday about 6 nautical miles from the base.
The fuselage and the engine of the aircraft could not be located. The BAF has formed a three-member committee to probe the accident.
The aircraft was bought from China three to four years ago.
Source: The Daily Star
