Indonesian
authorities say rescuers searching the Java Sea for a missing AirAsia airliner
have halted their operation at nightfall. The plane was carrying 162 people,
most of them from Indonesia.
Deutsche Welle, 28 Dec 2014
 |
| An official from Indonesia's national search and rescue agency in Medan, North Sumatra points at his computer screen to the position where AirAsia flight QZ8501 went missing off the waters of Indonesia on December 28, 2014. Sutanta Aditya/AFP/Getty Images) |
A search
and rescue operation in the Java Sea for an AirAsia passenger plane missing
since the early morning on Sunday has been suspended at fall of darkness,
Indonesian authorities said.
"We
ended at 5:30 pm (1030 UTC) because it was getting dark. The weather was also
not too good as it was getting really cloudy," transport ministry official
Hadi Mustofa told AFP news agency, adding that the operation would resume early
on Monday.
AirAsia
Flight QZ8501 last communicated with Indonesian air traffic control about 42
minutes after taking off from Indonesia's Surabaya airport at 5:20 local time
(2220 UTC) en route to Singapore, a flight that normally takes just more than
two hours.
The airline
said in a statement that Indonesian air traffic controllers lost contact with
the plane, an Airbus 320-200, shortly after its pilots had requested permission to ascend to avoid bad weather - a standard maneuver in such circumstances.
Reports said
the plane issued no distress signal before disappearing.
Stormy
conditions
The plane
was carrying 162 people on board, mostly Indonesians. The airline said three
South Koreans and one person each from Singapore, Malaysia, and France were
also among the passengers and crew. Britain later said one of its nationals was
also on board.
Search and
rescue operations have focused on waters around the islands of Bangka and
Belitung in the Java Sea, near Kalimanten island, which is where the plane was
situated when contact was lost. Singapore and Malaysia are aiding Indonesia in
its search efforts, which have so far yielded no results.
AirAsia, a
regional low-cost carrier founded in 2001, has never had a fatal accident.
A weather
forecaster at Indonesia's Meteorology and Geophysics Agency said dense storm
clouds were detected at flying altitude in the area where the plane lost
contact.
"There
could have been turbulence, lightning and vertical as well as horizontal strong
winds within such clouds," said Sunardi, who, like many Indonesians, uses
only one name .
Bad
aviation year for Asia
Sunday's
incident comes in the wake of two disasters this year that struck another Asian
carrier, Malaysia Airlines, which lost two aircraft in the past ten months.
Flight MH370 went missing on March 8 while flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with
239 people on board. It has still not been found, despite a massive search
operation by several countries.
Another
Malaysia Airlines flight, MH17, was allegedly shot down over territory held by
pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine in mid-July. All 298
passengers and crew lost their lives.
tj/bk (AFP, AP)
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