CARACAS (Reuters) - A Venezuelan commercial plane carrying up to 46 people went missing in the west of the South American nation on Thursday soon after taking off, Venezuelan authorities said.
Local media said the plane crashed in the Andean mountainstate of Merida. The state capital, also named Merida, is 680km southwest of Caracas.
Gladys Herrera of the Venezuelan aviation authority, INAC,said in a telephone interview the agency could not confirm theplane had crashed but that it had registered the aircraft asmissing while it was flying in the state of Merida.
Local television station Globovision said the Santa Barbaraplane was heading from the mountain city of Merida to the mainairport outside the capital Caracas.
A civilian defence official Noel Marquez told the stationthat rescue teams would have to search for the plane indaylight on Friday because the rugged terrain in the regionmade it too difficult to try on Thursday night.
The plane took off from Merida airport before dusk but soonlost contact with air traffic controllers, an airport officialsaid.
(Reporting by Frank Jack Daniel; Writing by Saul Hudson;Editing by Stuart Grudgings)
