Three months ago a light aircraft vanished over the Amazon.

Why did the Brazilian authorities not carry out a ground search?

Why was the plane flying secretly?

And what big questions does its disappearance raise.

Join me Tim Hewell for assignment.

Can you hear it?

Listen carefully. that buzz, very faint, is getting a bit louder.

It's coming from a spec in the clear blue Amazon sky of a solid green black wall of vegetation. Now it's clearly visible. A tiny plane coming into land on a

landing strip near the city of Macapah in northern Brazil.

The isolated communities of the world's largest remaining wilderness depend on air taxis like this.

But every time they fly, they take their life into their hands.

You're listening to assignment on the BBC World Service.

I'm Tim Hewell, with the story of a small plane that never came in, that's disappeared

without trace somewhere out there in the jungle.

He said, Paolo, it looks like I've lost a cylinder part of the engine. There's oil leaking

onto the windscreen. I'm going to land an independence. And I said no you can't. There's no

landing strip there anymore. He was abandoned 15 years ago. Aim for the river

instead. He said no no, no, I've decided to land an independence here and then I didn't hear anymore.

He was a really good father. I miss him a lot. He was passionate about his job.

He always said that he didn't know how to explain that passion.

When he was in the plane he felt that freedom to be in the sky.

And he said to me that he would die flying.

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