A personal locator beacon registered to the Suleman crew has been retrieved by the AS Department of Homeland Security and the item has been turned over to the Dept. of Public Safety where it will be secured and kept as evidence in the ongoing search and rescue operation to locate the body of Babar Suleman, and the rest of the aircraft pieces.

At close to 6 p.m. on Sunday evening, Department of Homeland Security Director Iuniasolua Savusa and two members from Lt. Governor Lemanu Peleti Mauga’s staff were in Laulii, trying to find the personal locator beacon that was activated and detected by the Air Force Rescue Center located in Panama City, late Sunday afternoon.

The GPS coordinates placed the device in the village of Laulii. At 8:15 p.m. Sunday night, the ASDHS/TEMCO issued an urgent bulletin asking the public’s assistance in locating the missing beacon.

Savusa led the search for the missing beacon on Sunday night, driving through Laulii and going as far back as the end of the road and up towards a mountainous area where the beacon was suspected to be.

The search for the beacon ended on Sunday after 9 p.m. with no positive results but Savusa assumes that village people who were questioned that night started asking around, and this resulted in the ASDHS receiving a call yesterday morning from Laulii resident, Pataua Lemautu, who informed Savusa that he had possession of the beacon, which was found by his son John Joseph while walking along a row of coconut trees on the beach next to the main road.

During the heavy rainfall over the weekend, a pile of debris and trash had washed ashore in Laulii, blocking the road. Savusa said the boy who found the beacon told his father that he was walking on the road when he saw a black bag — badly damaged — with an antenna sticking out.

The boy then took the beacon out of the bag and took it home. Savusa said the black bag — and other contents, if any — is yet to be recovered. At around 3 p.m. Sunday afternoon, the beacon was activated, hence the Air Force Rescue Center in Panama City picked up the signal.

The older Lemautu, according to Savusa, managed to turn off the signal before the ASDHS officials retrieved it yesterday.

To date, Savusa said some pieces of the crashed Suleman aircraft have been found and have been turned over to the DPS.

On his way to the DPS central station yesterday, Savusa contacted Cyrus Suleman, the oldest son of still missing Babar Suleman to inform him of what they had found.

“Cyrus was very thankful for this piece of information and said he was appreciative of the American Samoa Government’s efforts in trying to locate the rest of the aircraft and the body of his father, Babar,” Savusa said.

Last month, 17-year-old Haris Suleman, accompanied by his father Babar, attempted to make a record-breaking trip around the world. If successful, Haris would have been the youngest pilot to ever circle the globe in thirty days in a single engine aircraft.

The trip was also to raise money for the Citizens Foundation, a nonprofit organization that builds schools in Pakistan. Their fundraiser, according to family friend Azher Khan, reached the $1 million goal last week.

Tragedy struck when the father and son team crashed after taking off from the Tafuna International Airport. Since then, only Haris’s body has been recovered. The search is still on for any sign of Babar.

According to weather.com/news, Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor in Los Angeles said the single-engine Hawker Beechcraft plane crashed into the ocean “under unknown circumstances.”

However, "Relatively strong surface winds, especially the overnight gusty conditions, coupled with airflow turbulence created by the American Samoa mountains, may have been enough to create hazardous flying conditions," weather.com meteorologist Chrissy Warrilow said.

Haris Suleman’s body was flown to Indiana last week Monday, after a memorial service at sea was held in American Samoa, the day before.  He was buried in his hometown of Plainfield, Ind. this past Thursday.