Pakistan’s aviation authorities are searching for a plane that lost its way while en route from Pakistan to Saudi Arabia with a crew of five, after it disappeared off the country’s southern coast.

At 21:21 local time (16:21 GMT) on Tuesday, they lost touch with air traffic controllers while the Boeing 737 was making a quick descent, Pakistan’s airport authority said. The aircraft was on its way to Karachi from Sharjah in the UAE.

The airport authority said it had just minutes before its descent reported a problem with its navigation system.

K2 Airways is a private cargo airline based in Karachi. The company’s website indicates that it was established in 2018.

In a statement on Wednesday, K2 Airways identified the five crew members on board the aircraft and said it was “fully cooperating with the Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority and other government agencies”.

The statement continued, saying they “continue to pray, fervently, for the safety of our colleagues.”

Preliminary data from Flightradar24, a flight tracking platform, show a marked change in altitude before it crashed into a steep descent.

The airport authority said that various agencies, such as the navy and air force, have been deployed in search of the missing plane.

The most significant aviation incident in Pakistan was in 2020, on a domestic passenger flight. In that case, a Pakistan International Airlines aircraft crashed while it was descending to land at the airport in Karachi, killing 99 people except for two.