MANILA, Feb 19 (AFP) - A small plane with four people on board has crashed in the central Philippines where rescuers were searching for survivors on Sunday, an aviation official said.

The Cessna 340 aircraft went missing early Saturday morning shortly after departing for Manila from Bicol International Airport, south of the capital, the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) said in a statement.

The plane was carrying two passengers, a pilot and a crew member, the aviation regulator added.

A local search and rescue team has identified a possible crash site near the airport, CAAP spokesperson Eric Apolonio told AFP.

“The problem is the weather is bad and it hampers the visibility of the ground search,” he added.

The incident comes less than a month after another Cessna plane went missing on Jan 24 in the northern province of Isabela.

A search for that plane’s wreckage is still ongoing, Mr Apolonio said.

In a separate incident, two Philippine airforce aviators were also killed in a training exercise last month when their SF260 Marchetti plane plummeted onto a rice paddy in Bataan province, near Manila.