Two people were missing today after a helicopter carrying three passengers and a pilot crashed in Sarawak, officials said.

"Shortly after noon, search and rescue personnel spotted two survivors," district police chief Johar Ahmad told AFP.

The two attracted the attention of a rescue helicopter by waving a torch. The fate of the other two onboard was still unknown, he said.

He said the Bell helicopter of state-owned Hornbill Skyways crashed in hilly terrain on the Sarawak border with Indonesia's Kalimantan province on Monday after the pilot attempted an emergency landing at a helipad amid heavy winds.

The burnt wreckage was found some 500 feet from the peak of the 6,336 foot mountain, Johar said, adding it was potentially a difficult operation as rescue personnel would have to rappel down into the wreckage.

It was the fourth helicopter crash in the last year in Malaysia's largest state, and the third involving an aircraft owned by Hornbill.

In September, a privately-chartered Bell helicopter owned by Hornbill Skyways crashed 15 minutes after take-off, killing four people.

On July 12, another Bell chopper owned by Hornbill crashed in the Sarawak highlands, killing all seven people on board.

It took rescuers 17 days to find the helicopter in the dense jungles. In August, three people were killed while seven others survived when a Malaysian air force helicopter crashed.