By Jörg Vogelsänger

Anchorage - An airplane with ten people on board is missing in the US state of Alaska . The plane disappeared on Thursday (local time) on its way from Unalakleet to Nome, around 250 kilometers away, according to police and firefighters.

Nine passengers and the pilot were on board the Cessna Caravan. The identities of the occupants were initially unknown.

The authorities were trying to determine the last known coordinates of the plane. It had disappeared from radar around 20 kilometers off the coast. At the same time, a search is underway on the ground and from the air, in which the coast guard is also involved with an aircraft . However, the bad weather has made the search difficult.

"We hope the plane is on land," the fire chief of White Mountain told a local radio station. "The worst-case scenario would be if it's on the water," he added.

Just a few days ago, the USA was rocked by two plane crashes in quick succession .

On January 29, an American Airlines passenger plane collided with a military helicopter on its approach to the capital, Washington. The 64 people on board the plane and the 3 occupants of the helicopter were killed .

Two days later, a medical transport jet crashed in the middle of a busy area in Philadelphia.

All six people on board died , another person was killed on the ground and many others were injured.