Divers recover debris from site of jetliner crash
JAKARTA, Indonesia — Authorities located the crash site and black boxes of a Boeing 737500 on Sunday, a day after the aircraft crashed into the Java Sea with 62 people on board shortly after taking off from Indonesia’s capital.
The head of Indonesia’s National Search and Rescue Agency, Bagus Puruhito, said officials identified the location of the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder — the black boxes — after emergency signals transmitted by the devices were detected by a navy ship’s sonar system.
“Hopefully we can lift the black boxes in short time to determine the cause of the crash,” said military chief Hadi Tjahjanto.
The cause of the crash is still unknown, and there were no signs of survivors.
Earlier Sunday, search and rescue operations resulted in human remains and parts of the plane being found in the sea at a depth of 75 feet.
“We received reports from the diver team that the visibility in the water is good and clear, allowing the discovery of some parts of the plane,” Tjahjanto said in a statement. “We are sure that is the point where the plane crashed.”
The Sriwijaya Air Flight 182 was en route Saturday from Jakarta to Pontianak, the capital of West Kalimantan province on Indonesia’s Borneo island, a trip that was expected to take around 90 minutes.
Fishermen in the area between Lancang and Laki islands, part of an archipelago around Thousand Islands north of Jakarta’s coast, reported hearing an explosion around 2: 30 p. m. Saturday.
“We heard something explode — we thought it was a bomb or a tsunami since after that we saw a big splash from the water,” Solihin, who goes by one name, said by phone.
“It was raining heavily and the weather was so bad, so it was difficult to see around clearly,” Solihin said. “We were very shocked and saw the plane debris and the fuel around our boat.”
Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi said the flight was delayed for an hour before it took off at 2: 36 p. m. It disappeared from radar four minutes later, after the pilot contacted air traffic control to ascend to an altitude of 29,000 feet, he said.
There were 62 people on board, all of them Indonesian nationals, including three babies and seven other children. The plane was carrying 50 passengers, six working crew members and six other crew for another flight.
Sriwijaya Air president director Jefferson Irwin Jauwena said the plane, which was 26 years old and previously used by airlines in the United States, was airworthy. He said Saturday that the plane had previously flown to Pontianak and Pangkal Pinang city on the same day.