DAR ES SALAAM, Dec. 1 (Xinhuanet) -- All three went missing and feared dead in a plane crash off Zanzibar have been confirmed sound and fit in a local hospital, according to reports reaching here on Wednesday.

    The trio of one pilot and two passengers spent the whole Tuesday night floating in the Indian Ocean until they were spottedby fishing boats and sent to the Mnazimmoja Hospital in Zanzibar on Wednesday.

    Pilot Gabriel Allcola told reporters at the hospital that afterhe had reported to the Zanzibar airport control tower about his engine problem, he provided life jackets to his two passengers, Abdulmajid Ali and his wife Aziza Ali Saleh.

    The pilot is a Swiss national while the two passengers are residents of Zanzibar, the tourist haven island off Tanzanian coast.

    The engine failure caused the light plane, owned by the Tropical Air Company Limited, traveling from Dar es Salaam to Zanzibar, to ditch on water some nine kilometers away from the Zanzibar airport.

    After touching the sea, the trio jumped out whereas the plane sank, according to the pilot.

    The pilot and the husband were already discharged from hospitalwhile the wife is still being hospitalized for further check-ups, hospital sources said.

    Efforts to search for the plane and the survivors of the crash were called off. It was the third plane crash scare in the past four months in the country. Two light planes crash landed in central and northern Tanzania respectively last month with crew and passengers unscathed. Enditem