Indonesian divers find parts of plane wreckage
JAKARTA, Indonesia — Authorities said they determined the location of the crash site and black boxes of a Boeing 737-500 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 believe they identified the location of the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder — the so-called black boxes — because 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,” military chief Hadi Tjahjanto said.
Earlier Sunday, search and rescue operations resulted in parts of the plane being found in the sea at a depth of 75 feet, leading rescuers to continue searching the area.
“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.”
He said the objects found included broken pieces of fuselage with aircraft registration parts.
Earlier, rescuers pulled out body parts, pieces of children’s clothing and scraps of metal from the surface.
The break in the search for Sriwijaya Air Flight 182 came after the navy ship’s sonar equipment detected a signal from the aircraft at a location that fit the coordinates from the last contact made by the pilots before the plane disappeared Saturday afternoon, Tjahjanto said.
The plane was en route from Jakarta to Pontianak, the capital of West Kalimantan province on Indonesia’s Borneo island, on a flight that was expected to take around 90 minutes.
It was still unclear what caused it to crash. There was no sign of survivors.
“I represent the government and all Indonesians in expressing my deep condolences for this tragedy,” Indonesian President Joko Widodo said.
“We are doing our best to save the victims. We pray together so that the victims can be found,” he said, adding that he had asked the National Transport Safety Committee to conduct an investigation.
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.
“But we saw the splash and a big wave after the loud sound. We were very shocked and saw the plane debris and the fuel around our boat.”