This flier issued by the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force on Thursday, April 13, 2023, shows a UH-60JA Black Hawk, like the one that crashed off Miyako Island in Okinawa prefecture on April 6, 2023, and some of the wreckage recovered. (Japan Ground Self-Defense Force)

CAMP FOSTER, Okinawa – A diving unit found five bodies and a portion of a downed Japanese military helicopter 10 days after it went missing in the East China Sea with a lieutenant general aboard.

The bodies and part of the UH-60JA Black Hawk’s fuselage were discovered around 8:30 a.m. Sunday by Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force divers, a Ground Self-Defense Force spokesman told Stars and Stripes by phone Sunday. They were in 350 feet of water north of Irabu Island, southwest of Okinawa.

The divers were “confirming the situation” to see if it would be possible to recover the bodies, according to the spokesman. Nothing has been decided about the fuselage, he said.

The 8th Air Wing aircraft disappeared from radar at 3:56 p.m. April 6 during a reconnaissance flight 11 miles northwest of Miyako Airport. It carried 10 aboard, including four members of the wing, a member of Camp Miyako’s security force and five members of the 8th Division headquarters staff, including division commander Lt. Gen. Yuichi Sakamoto.

Sakamoto, 55, has been division commander less than a month. He previously served as commander of the 12th Brigade.

The wreckage and at least three bodies were first discovered around 10 p.m. Thursday using sonar and underwater cameras, a Ground Self-Defense Force spokeswoman said Friday. A remotely operated underwater vehicle launched that morning from the minesweeper JS Toyoshima revealed “severe” damage to the newly discovered aircraft section.

Rough seas kept divers from the area until Sunday, a Joint Staff spokesman said by phone Sunday.

More than 20 pieces of the helicopter have been found, including portions of the nose, rotor blade and fuel tank, a Ground Self-Defense Force statement said Thursday. The aircraft’s flight recorder has not been found.

Search efforts continued Sunday by six surveillance planes, seven Japanese navy and coast guard vessels and 370 personnel, the Joint Staff spokesman said. Their work was hampered by currents and an abundance of coral blanketing the seafloor.

The red circles indicate where the missing Japanese UH-60JA Black Hawk dropped from radar on April 6, 2023, and the dots show where debris has been recovered as of Thursday, April 13, 2023. (Japan Ground Self-Defense Force)

Gen. Yasunori Morishita, Ground Self-Defense Force chief of staff, pledged Thursday to continue the search until the missing were recovered.

“We dispatched a team to investigate the reason for the accident,” he said in a statement on the service’s website. “The JGSDF will work hard to determine the causes and take preventive steps to ensure that these kinds of accidents will never happen again.”

The Black Hawk had flown to Miyako from its base on Kyushu, the southernmost of Japan’s four main islands, after a brief stop on Okinawa, according to the Ground Self-Defense Force. It crashed 10 minutes after taking off from Miyako Airport.

The crew did not report any in-flight emergencies.

Japanese investigators ruled out interference in the Black Hawk’s flight by five Chinese navy vessels spotted hours earlier in international waters around the Sakishima Islands, Taro Yamato, administrative vice chief to the Joint Staff, said Tuesday. He said the Chinese vessels were under constant surveillance.

Soon after the crash, an aircraft door and an uninflated life raft were recovered northwest of Miyako, a coast guard spokesman said at the time. On April 9, search parties recovered the Black Hawk’s fuel tank and a flight helmet belonging to one of the crew members.

Some government spokespeople in Japan are required to speak to the media only on condition of anonymity.