U.S. HELP SOUGHT
The State Department said Monday that Indonesia has asked the United States for help in locating a missing AirAsia jet, and the Pentagon said it could include detection equipment deployed by air, surface and sub-surface. The jet carrying 162 people is believed to have crashed into Indonesia’s Java Sea. State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke says the U.S. is identifying how best to help, but that it will take some time to review the request. The Pentagon’s press secretary, Rear Adm. John Kirby, said in a brief statement that while details are being coordinated, the assistance “could include air, surface and sub-surface detection capabilities.” “We stand ready to assist in any way possible,” Kirby said.
— Associated Press
Minutes later, the jet carrying 162 people was gone from the radar without ever issuing a distress signal. The plane is believed to have crashed Sunday into Indonesia’s Java Sea, but broad aerial surveys on Monday turned up no firm evidence of the missing Airbus A320-200.
Searchers spotted two oily patches and floating objects in separate locations, but it was not known if any of it was related to the plane that vanished halfway into what should have been a two-hour hop from Surabaya, Indonesia, to Singapore. Officials saw little reason to believe the flight met anything but a grim fate.
Based on the plane’s last known coordinates, the aircraft probably crashed into the water and “is at the bottom of the sea,” Indonesia search-and-rescue chief Henry Bambang Soelistyo said. Still, searchers planned to expand their efforts onto land on Tuesday.
The last communication from the cockpit to air traffic control was a request by one of the pilots to climb to 38,000 feet from 32,000 feet because of the weather. The tower was not able to immediately comply because of the other planes, said Bambang Tjahjono, director of the state-owned company in charge of air traffic control.
The twin-engine, single-aisle plane was last seen on radar four minutes after the final communication.
A storm alone isn’t going to bring down a modern plane designed to withstand severe weather. But weather paired with a pilot error or a mechanical failure could be disastrous.
The air search resumed this morning, said Indonesia’s Search and Rescue Agency chief Henry Bambang Soelistyo.
He said at least 30 ships, 15 aircraft and seven helicopters were looking for the jet. Most of the craft were Indonesian but Singapore, Malaysia and Australia contributed to the effort. Aircraft from Thailand planned to join Tuesday’s search.
The search area has been widened, with four military helicopters dispatched just after sunrise near Pangkalan Bun on the western part of Borneo island and to smaller islands of Bangka and Belitung, Bambang Soelistyo said.
“Until now, we have not yet found any signal or indication of the plane’s whereabouts,” Soelistyo told The Associated Press, adding fishermen from Belitung island were also helping.
The U.S. Navy said it had agreed to an Indonesian request for help by sending the USS Sampson, a destroyer. It was already on an independent deployment in the Western Pacific and will arrive in the area later Tuesday.
Jakarta’s air force base commander, Rear Marshal Dwi Putranto, said an Australian Orion aircraft had detected “suspicious” objects near an island about 100 miles off central Kalimantan. That’s about 700 miles (1,120 kilometers) from where the plane lost contact, but within Monday’s greatly expanded search area.
“However, we cannot be sure whether it is part of the missing AirAsia plane,” Putranto said. “We are now moving in that direction.”
Rear Marshal Hadi Tjahnanto, an air force spokesman, told MetroTV that an Indonesian helicopter spotted two oil patches in the Java Sea east of Belitung island, much closer to where the plane lost contact. He said oil samples would be collected and analyzed.
The suspected crash caps an astonishingly tragic year for air travel in Southeast Asia, and Malaysia in particular. Malaysia-based AirAsia’s loss comes on top of the still-unexplained disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 in March with 239 people aboard, and the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 in July over Ukraine, which killed all 298 passengers and crew.
“Until today, we have never lost a life,” AirAsia group CEO Tony Fernandes told reporters. “But I think that any airline CEO who says he can guarantee that his airline is 100 percent safe is not accurate.”
Nearly all the passengers and crew of the most recent flights are Indonesians, who frequently visit Singapore, particularly on holidays.
Ruth Natalia Puspitasari, who would have turned 26 on Monday, was among them. Her father, Suyanto, sat with his wife near the family crisis center at Surabaya’s airport.
“I don’t want to experience the same thing with what was happened with Malaysia Airlines,” he said as his wife wept. “It could be a long suffering.”
But few believe this search will be as perplexing as the ongoing one for Flight 370, where what happened onboard remains a total mystery.
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