Missing flight prognosis 'not good'; 162 people on board
There is slim chance of finding survivors on board missing flight AirAsia flight QZ8501, a leading aviation safety expert has said.
The flight carrying 162 passengers lost contact with traffic control shortly before 00.30 Irish time today on its journey from Surabaya to Singapore.
David Learmount, Flight Global’s operations and safety editor, said it was “routine” for pilots to request diversions when approaching stormy conditions, as was the case with the Airbus A320-200.
He said: “We’re not just talking about thunder and lightning here. Storms can be very, very powerful indeed and rip a medium-sized aeroplane completely apart - that’s why a pilot will routinely ask to divert around them.
“The plane could not still be airborne – it was a short-haul flight, there would be no fuel for staying in the air for quite as long as this.”
Mr Learmount, who is a pilot, also ruled out the likelihood of passengers surviving a sea landing.
He added: “The pilots were talking to air traffic control right until the last minute. Something distracted their attention so they were no longer able to keep talking. We don’t know what happened at the moment, and it doesn’t appear to be a deliberate act.
“We can speculate ad infinitum when the only thing we can go on is that it is missing. But I think the prognosis is not good.”
More than 12 hours later, shocked family members huddled at the Surabaya airport from where the Airbus A320 had taken off, awaiting any news of the jetliner, operated by an airline whose parent company is based in Malaysia.
It is the third incident involving Malaysia this year following two of the worst aviation tragedies that hit Malaysia Airlines – in March Flight 370 disappeared with 239 people and in July Flight 17 was shot down over Ukraine, killing all 298 people on it.
Indonesia and Singapore launched a search and rescue operation for Flight 8501 near Belitung island in Java Sea over which the jetliner lost contact with ground traffic control, about 42 minutes after taking off from Surabaya, Indonesia’s second largest city. The flight had completed a little less than half of its journey time to Singapore.
The air search for the missing AirAsia jet was later suspended due to nightfall and will resume in the morning.
An official with Indonesia’s search and rescue agency said the planes involved in the search returned to their base but that some ships were still in the area where the plane lost contact with air traffic control.
Speaking 10 hours after the plane lost contact, Indonesia vice president Jusuf Kalla expressed deep concern.
“It is most possible that it has experienced an accident,” he said.
The last communication between the pilot and air traffic control came when the pilot “asked to avoid clouds by turning left and going higher to 34,000 feet".
It was last seen on radar at 6.16am local time, and a minute later was no longer there, Djoko Murjatmodjo, Indonesia’s acting director general of transportation, told reporters.
He said there was no distress signal from the cockpit of the twin-engine, single-aisle plane.
“We hope we can find the location of the plane as soon as possible, and we hope that God will give us guidance to find it,” he said.
AirAsia, a regional low-cost carrier founded in 2001 by Malaysian businessman Tony Fernandes, said in a statement that the plane was on the submitted flight plan route. However, it had requested deviation due to weather before communication with the aircraft was lost while it was still under the control of Indonesian Air Traffic Control.
“This is my worst nightmare,” Mr Fernandes tweeted.
Malaysia-based AirAsia, which has a presence in most of south-east Asia and recently in India, has never lost a plane before and has a good safety record. Flight 8501 was operated by AirAsia Indonesia, a subsidiary that is 49% owned by AirAsia Malaysia.
Sunardi, a weather forecaster at the Indonesia’s Meteorology and Geophysics Agency, said dense storm clouds were detected up to 44,000 feet in the same area at the time the plane was reported to have 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.
The plane had an Indonesian captain and a French co-pilot, five cabin crew and 155 passengers, including 16 children and one infant, AirAsia Indonesia said. Among the passengers were three South Koreans and one each from Singapore, Malaysia and the United Kingdom. The rest were Indonesians.
It said the captain had a total of 6,100 flying hours, a substantial number, and the first officer a total of 2,275 flying hours.
At Surabaya airport, dozens of relatives sat in a room, many of them talking on mobile phones and crying. Some looked dazed. As word spread, more and more family members were arriving at the crisis centre to await word.
Transport Minister Ignasius Jonan told reporters in Surabaya that search and rescue efforts now involved the Indonesian army, the national Search and Rescue Agency as well as Singapore and Malaysia.
The Search and Rescue Agency’s operation chief, Major General Tatang Zaenudin, said 200 rescuers had been deployed to the east side of Belitung island.
Air Force spokesman Hadi Tjahjanto said three aircraft, including a surveillance plane, had been dispatched to the area. The Singapore air force and the navy also were searching with two C-130 planes.
Airbus said that the missing aircraft was delivered to AirAsia in October 2008, which would make it six years old. It said the plane had accumulated about 23,000 flight hours in some 13,600 flights.
AirAsia said the aircraft had last undergone scheduled maintenance on November 16.
AirAsia, which has dominated cheap travel in the region for years, flies short routes of just a few hours, connecting large cities of south-east Asia. However, recently it has tried to expand into long-distance flying through its sister airline AirAsia X.
Mr Fernandes, who is the face of AirAsia and an active Twitter user, sent out an earlier tweet saying: “Thank you for all your thoughts and prays. We must stay strong.” He tweeted later that he was heading to Surabaya.
