Hopes of finding soccer star Emiliano Sala alive were fading on Wednesday, as a recording emerged of a fearful voice message he apparently sent from his stricken plane before it disappeared over the English Channel
Search teams were reviewing satellite imagery and mobile phone data as four aircraft scoured seas off the channel island of Alderney, where unidentified debris was earlier spotted.
But with Cardiff City-bound Sala and his pilot already missing for 40 hours, rescuers said chances of finding either of them alive were almost vanishingly slim.
“We’re up there looking for stuff that we don’t expect to find,” John Fitzgerald, chief officer of the Channel Islands Air Search told Reuters.
“If there was anything on the surface I think we would have found it on the first night because the weather conditions were really good.”
The 28-year-old Argentina-born forward was en route from Nantes in western France to Cardiff for his debut with his Premier League club.
In a chilling voice message sent to friends, which Argentina’s Clarin newspaper said was authenticated by Sala’s father Horacio, the player expressed concerns about the single-engine Piper Malibu aircraft he was flying in.
“I’m in the plane and it looks like it’s going to fall apart,” he said. “Dad, I’m really scared.”