Explosion in Colombia kills 15

BOGOTA, Colombia -- A massive explosion rocked the southern city of Neiva today as police searched a house for explosives. Fifteen people died and about 30 were wounded, authorities said.

Sandra Tatiana de Serrato, an official with the state governor's office, said nine police officers and an investigator from the prosecutor's officer were among the dead.

Five houses were destroyed and 30 were severely damaged in the blast, which occurred in a residential neighborhood near the city's airport.

President Alvaro Uribe, who has survived several rebel assassination attempts, was scheduled to visit Neiva on Saturday. Hernando de Valenzuela, chief of the local prosecutor's office, said he believed the rebels had planned to detonate the bomb as the president's plane passed overhead at a low altitude to blow it out of the sky.

Other authorities theorized that the rebels had called the police, pretending to be civilian informants. The theory held that the rebels told police of the explosives cache and then detonated it when officers were inside the building.

"We don't know if the detonation was caused by remote control or in what circumstances," police Col. Luis Alfredo Gomez told RCN radio.

Leftist rebels, who have been battling the government for almost four decades, often use explosives in their attacks.

Meanwhile, the United States searched for four Americans and a Colombian who were reportedly on an intelligence mission when their U.S.-government plane crashed in a southern region swarming with leftist rebels.

A U.S. Embassy spokesman said the single-engine Cessna Caravan went down Thursday morning while trying to make an emergency landing in Florencia, near an area dotted with fields that produce coca, the main ingredient of cocaine.

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