TransAsia Airways Flight # 235 Rescue Teams resumed the search for the missing, who include the two Pilots

A Pilot of the TransAsia Airways Flight 235 said "mayday, mayday, engine flameout" moments before the propjet banked sharply and crashed into a river, Taiwan aviation officials said Thursday as the death toll grew to 31 with 12 people still missing.

Rescue teams resumed the search for the missing, who include the two Pilots.

The twin-engine propjet had 58 people aboard, many of them travelers from China, when it banked sharply on its side Wednesday, clipped a highway bridge and careened into the Keelung River. Rescuers in rubber rafts pulled 15 people alive from the wreckage during daylight.

Video images of the Air Plane's final moments in the Air captured on car dashboard cameras do not appear to show flames as it turned sharply, with its wings going vertical and clipping a highway bridge before plunging into the Keelung River Wednesday,

Taiwan's Civil Aeronautics Administration said 31 people were confirmed dead, 15 were rescued with injuries and 12 were still missing. It said two people on the ground were hurt. The agency released a bits of audio recordings including the Pilot's mayday call.

Taiwanese rescuers used a massive crane to hoist the French-built ATR 72-600 Air Plane from the shallow, murky river after survivors were brought to safety on rubber rafts or scrambled to the river bank on their own. One injured person was reportedly found in a park along the river, Taiwan News reported.

Wu Jun-Hong, a Taipei Fire Department official coordinating the rescue, said he was not "too optimistic" that more survivors would be found.

Dramatic dashcam footage from vehicles on an elevated highway clearly shows the Air Plane's tragic crash. Some Taiwanese paid homage to the Pilot, saying he made a desperate, deliberate choice to avoid the additional casualties likely if the Air Plane had hit nearby apartment buildings, high schools and roads.

Taiwan's Liberty Times newspaper quoted online comments thanking and praising the Pilot's actions, although aviation authorities could not immediately confirm such an effort took place. The fate of Pilot Liao Jianzong, who reportedly had nearly 5,000 hours of Flying experience, was not immediately known.

USA Aviation News