INDONESIA EXTENDS SEARCH
Three more days to search for bodies, second black box from crashed jet
AUTHORITIES yesterday extended by three days the search for victims and a black box from the wreckage of a Lion Air passenger jet that crashed near here last week, killing all 189 people on board.
“We decided to extend it three days”, beginning today, searchand-rescue agency chief Muhammad Syaugi said.
The decision was based on an evaluation and observations of the crash site, he said, noting that many victims’ remains had not been recovered.
As of yesterday, 105 body bags, few containing intact remains, had been recovered and handed to police for forensic identification. Only 14 victims had been identified.
“I’m sure the total will increase,” Muhammad said.
The agency is prioritising recovering remains of victims and the cockpit voice recorder, the second of two black boxes from the Boeing Co 737 Max that crashed into the sea last week, 13 minutes after it took off from here.
The head of Indonesia’s transportation safety committee said 69 hours of recorded data from 19 flights, including the one that crashed, had been downloaded successfully from a partly damaged flight data recorder recovered on Thursday.
“We are choosing which parameters we need. From here, we will analyse what happened to that flight,” Nurcahyo Utomo said.
Analysis of the data and a recovered aircraft landing gear and engine would begin today and information would be passed to police if needed, Nurcahyo said.
“Of course, this won’t be completed in one or two days.”
Meanwhile, divers searching for the cockpit voice recorder have been homing in on ping signals.
“Yesterday, there was a fairly strong signal. Today, (a search) dive was conducted, there was a signal but it was weak, quite possibly because of the mud,” Nurcahyo said.
He noted that the flight data recorder had been found buried in half a metre of mud.