The U.S. will shortly fly in one Chinook helicopter to replace that which recently crashed in the central Philippines, affecting by a few days the timetable for the joint exercises in the ongoing joint Philippine-U.S. war games, said National Security Adviser Roilo Golez.

The ill-fated chopper was one of three used by American special forces in the six-month war game.

"The war games timetable will be delayed by about two to three days because of the crash," said Golez in a news conference with senior security officials inside the military's southern command. The war games were scheduled to start on February 16.

War games co-director, Brig. Gen. Donald Wurster, said the incident would not hamper the war games.

Meanwhile, President Gloria Arroyo remained worried that the delay in the scheduled war games would further hamper the rescue operation for kidnapped Filipina nurse, Deborah Yap, and U.S.Christian missionaries, Martin and Gracia Burnham, from the Abu Sayyaf lair in the hinterlands of Basilan.

"The President is very conscious about this joint exercise," Golez observed.

The 660-strong U.S. force involved in the war games will help train members of the Army's Light Reaction Company (LRC), an anti-terrorist group, who are now in Basilan to fight the Abu Sayyaf Group.

The military had earlier deployed 7,500 soldiers to rescue the hostages from an estimated 60 to 70 Abu Sayyaf members.

"The LRC is one of the most important processes of the war games. I came here to oversee its training," Golez noted.

The training to be given to the soldiers fighting the Abu Sayyaf rebels is good enough for us, admitted Southern Command chief, Lt. Gen. Roy Cimatu.

Our Manila Bureau Chief adds: Philippine military forces continued to search for the bodies of seven missing crewmen, even if the U.S. recently announced the termination of the search-and-rescue operation, Brig. Gen. Marcial Ilagan, Philippine Air Force tactical operations head, said in a radio interview that reached Manila.

"We will continue the rescue operation, because we know that U.S. soldiers were trained to survive at sea for seven days," noted Brig. Gen. Ilagan.

"We are hopeful," he added. He did not say how long they will look for survivors and bodies from the ill-fated chopper. "So far, we have seen no traces of life, but the search and recovery operations still continue in central and southern Philippines."

Three days after the mishap, the U.S. gave up hope of finding a survivor. Only three bodies were recovered after the crash.

The rescue operation, however, has resulted in the recovery of the wreckage left by the helicopter crash, admitted Ilagan.

Most of the wreckage of the ill-fated plane was swept away to distant Zamboanga del Norte province in western Mindanao. A part of the helicopter was reportedly found in the Sulu Sea.

"There are efforts to recover these things and we are searching for debris and bodies of missing crewmen," Brig. Gen. Ilagan said.

BRP San Juan of the Philippine Coast Guard brought in tons of debris from the ill-fated MH-47 Chinook helicopter to Dum-aguete City, central Philippines, past midnight of Sunday.

The wreckage was dumped in the compound of the coast guard headquarters in Dumaguete City. Ten American soldiers were aboard an MH-47 Chinook helicopter that crashed in the Bohol Strait, a few kilometres from Zamboanguita town.