Panaji, March 26:

The body of Lt. Kiran Shekhawat, who was one of the three Indian Navy crew of the Dornier-228 maritime surveillance aircraft which crashed into the Arabian Sea near Goa, was recovered on Thursday, navy officials said.

Pic Courtesy: www.ibtimes.co.in Pic Courtesy: www.ibtimes.co.in

The body was recovered from the fuselage of the crashed aircraft. The commander was rescued from the sea soon after the crash, but the third crew member of the ill-fated plane is still missing, officials said.

"The body is being taken to Goa," a navy official said.

The fuselage of the crashed Dornier-228 was located in the vicinity of its last known position and a team of divers was sent.

The Dornier-228 with three crew on board went down in the Arabian Sea off the coast of Goa on Tuesday night. Commander Nikhil Kuldip Joshi was rescued by a passing boat from a fishermen's hamlet off Karwar and transferred to a naval fast interceptor craft.

Navy sources earlier on Thursday said one of the vessels deployed in the search and rescue operation detected a large metallic object suspected to be the fuselage.

The INS Makar, a naval hydrographic vessel, detected the metallic object, using its side scan sonar. The INS Matanga with naval divers also embarked for the area. IANS