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Sunday, 20 May, 2001, 17:41 GMT 18:41 UK
Spy plane might not fly home
![]() Civilian engineers said the plane could be repaired
The US spy plane held in China since a collision with a Chinese fighter jet may have to return home in crates, US Vice-President Dick Cheney has said.
"My guess is that it may well have to be crated out, partly because it's in bad shape," he told NBC television's Meet the Press programme.
Mr Cheney said he had no doubt that China would hand the plane back to Washington. "The airplane will be returned. There have been negotiations under way," he said. Collision The EP-3 surveillance plane has been detained on Hainan Island since a mid-air collision with a Chinese fighter jet on 1 April. The US State Department is currently in talks with the Chinese over the return of the spy plane.
But Beijing insists that the plane will not be allowed to fly from its territory, but should be dismantled and removed from the island by sea. A UK-based company has said it is in talks with the US to charter a giant cargo plane to take the grounded surveillance plane from China to Okinawa, Japan, the site of a US military base. The US has flown at least one reconnaissance flight off the Chinese coast since the incident, prompting an angry reaction from China.
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