One of the five survivors of the plane crash in Romania on Monday said he had given his GPS coordinates to the authorities when making the first phone call, at 16.30.

However, it took the authorities up to 7 hours to locate the crashed plane, during which time two of the seven people, a pilot and a medical student, had died because of their wounds and the cold after they had survived the crash.

Doctor Radu Zamfir, who together with a team of other doctors was on his way to Oradea to harvest organs for a transplant, when the crash happened, used Google Maps on a smartphone to send his coordinates to the authorities.

The authorities however gave the teams of rescuers different coordinates, which were 14 kilometers away from when the crash actually took place, in Romania's Apuseni mountains.

A second location was given on Monday evening (January 20), also far from the crash spot, and the wrong information sent the rescuer teams searching all across the mountains, covered by a 30-centimeter layer of snow.

In the end, it was a local who found the crash site, almost by accident. The authorities are looking into the search operation, to establish who caused the delay.

Meanwhile, Romanian media tested the coordinates sent by the doctor and they proved to be correct, leading the team of journalist to the exact place of the crash.

The crash, which was apparently caused by fog and ice on the small plane, which lost both engines, left most of the doctors injured. Radu Zamfir was the least wounded of them, and soon after being taken to a hospital in Cluj, he choose to be discharged and flew back to Bucharest.

Immediately after crash, he tried to help the pilot, Adrian Iovan, a senior with over 16,000 hours of flight time, who was trapped inside the torn metal. The pilot was alive and conscious after the crash, but soon lost conscience and died because of the internal bleeding and the cold.

Zamfir also tried to give first aid to the 23-year old medical student who was on the plane with them, but could not save her. The victims had to wait for about five to seven hours until they were found by a villager, and until they received proper medical care.

The Britten Norman 2 plane was carrying doctors from Sf. Maria, Fundeni and Elias hospitals in Bucharest, as well as from a hospital in Oradea, together with a medical student. The cabin crew was made of a pilot and co-pilot.

The Britten Norman 2 can reach a speed of 200 kilometers an hour – cruise speed - and can carry eight passengers.

According to Romanian media, the plane was an old generation one, and meanwhile, newer, better planes are sitting in a hangar. The pilot had warned that the plane needed some checking and repairs, and even suggested to delay the flight which led to his death, according to local media.

editor@romania-insider.com