A military plane belonging to Chile has gone missing with 38 people on board, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has reported.
The reports about the missing plane have been confirmed by the Chilean military.
Passengers included 17 crew members and 21 passengers, a told of 38 people on board, Aljazeera reported.
The plane is reportedly a C-130 Hercules transport aircraft and took off from Punta Arenas at 16:55 local time (19:55 GMT) and was headed to Antarctica on a logistical support mission.
It lost radio contact at 18:13 (21:13).
The military assured in a statement that a search and rescue efforts were underway.
“The Airforce continues the search in the sector where communication with the aircraft was lost, in order to rescue potential survivors,” the military's statement said as quoted by the Independent newspaper.
Chile's president Sebastian Pinera confirmed that the plane was missing and said that he would travel along with the country's interior minister Gonzalo Blumel to Puntas Arena so as to monitor the search and rescue mission.
General Eduardo Mosqueira of the Fourth Air Brigade told members of the Chilean press that the pilot of the missing plane had a wealth of experience.
He added that the plane was halfway to its destination when it suddenly lost radio contact.