{"id":29314,"date":"2026-04-11T19:02:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T23:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/?p=29314"},"modified":"2026-04-11T19:02:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T23:02:15","slug":"gdf-special-forces-praised-for-herculean-effort-during-intense-rescue-operation-for-asl-pilot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/gdf-special-forces-praised-for-herculean-effort-during-intense-rescue-operation-for-asl-pilot\/","title":{"rendered":"GDF Special Forces praised for Herculean effort during intense rescue operation for ASL pilot"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n\n<p>Efforts to rescue the pilot of the downed Air Services Limited\u00a0(ASL) plane that crashed during a Hinteland flight on Friday continued throughout much of today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The pilot has been identified as Captain Ray de Castillo,\u00a0with a multi-agency effort undertaken to bring him home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Captain Castillo, a Nicaraguan national with decades of flying experience,\u00a0had been employed with ASL for several years and was well regarded within the aviation sector.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>His aircraft was reported missing during a domestic flight over Guyana&#8217;s hinterland on Friday.\u00a0This prompted an immediate multi-agency response involving the GDF,\u00a0the Guyana Civil Aviation Authority, and other emergency services.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In a Saturday morning update, the Guyana Defence Force had indicated\u00a0that the wreckage had been spotted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A ground team from the GDF Special Forces Squadron\u00a0was inserted into the area to access the site. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Speaking with NCN News,\u00a0Director General of the Guyana Civil Aviation Authority, Lieutenant-Colonel Retired Egbert\u00a0Field praised the GDF&#8217;s efforts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He described the operation as a Herculean task under extremely\u00a0challenging conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;The GDF is really making a fantastic effort,\u00a0really a fantastic effort in moving towards the site. I must say the trek through the terrain\u00a0is full of hazards such as rocks and steep slopes, but it&#8217;s a Herculean\u00a0effort that is being done at this time to get to the crash site,&#8221; he said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u00a0Further details surrounding the circumstances of the crash are expected as investigations continue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Efforts to rescue the pilot of the downed Air Services Limited\u00a0(ASL) plane that crashed during a Hinteland flight on Friday continued throughout much of today. The pilot has been identified&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29315,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[693,350],"tags":[488,370,412,405],"class_list":["post-29314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aviation","category-news","tag-488","tag-guyana","tag-ncn-guyana","tag-ncn-news"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29314"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29314\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29316,"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29314\/revisions\/29316"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ncnguyana.com\/2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}