Shell shocked with the disappearance of yet another flight..This time Air Asia Flight 8501 carrying 162 passengers...With 3 passenger flights from the Malaysian, Indonesian region going missing or shot down in 2014, wondering what ails this region
Sincere condolences to the families of those who travelled in the ill fated aircraft..Air Asia has got clearance to fly in India very recently..
[h=2]Search called off for missing AirAsia plane[/h] 02:26 Mon, 29 Dec 2014
Several hours of searching Indonesian waters turned up no sign of an AirAsia plane that disappeared with 162 people on board in airspace possibly thick with dense storm clouds, strong winds and lightning, officials said.
Aircraft searching for AirAsia Flight 8501 called off the effort for the night and will resume tomorrow morning, said Achmad Toha of Indonesia's search and rescue agency. Some ships were continuing the search overnight, he said.
The plane took off Sunday morning from Surabaya, Indonesia's second-largest city, and was about halfway to its destination, Singapore, when it vanished from radar.
The last communication between the pilot and air traffic control was at 6:13 a.m. (2313 GMT Saturday), when the pilot "asked to avoid clouds by turning left and going higher to 34,000 feet (10,360 meters)." It was last seen on radar at 6:16 a.m., and a minute later was no longer there, Djoko Murjatmodjo, Indonesia's acting director general of transportation, told reporters.
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 major aviation incident involving Malaysia this year: in March, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared with 239 people, and in July, a jet from the same airline was shot down over Ukraine, killing all 298 people aboard.
Indonesia and Singapore launched a search and rescue operation for Flight 8501 near Belitung island in Java Sea, the area where the jetliner lost contact with ground traffic control about 42 minutes after taking off from Surabaya.
Murjatmodjosaid 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.
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.
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," Fernandes tweeted.
Malaysia-based AirAsia, which has a presence in most of Southeast Asia and recently in India, has never lost a plane before and has a good safety track record. Flight 8501 was operated by AirAsia Indonesia, a subsidiary that is 49 percent 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 in a statement.
Among the passengers were three South Koreans, a Malaysian, a British national and his 2-year-old Singaporean daughter. The rest were Indonesians.
AirAsia 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 center 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, Maj. Gen. 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, were dispatched to the area. The Singapore air force and the navy also searched with two C-130 planes. The area continued to receive heavy rain as searchers looked for the lost aircraft.
Airbus said in a statement 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 Nov. 16.
AirAsia, which has dominated cheap travel in the region for years, flies short routes of just a few hours, connecting large cities of Southeast Asia. Recently it has tried to expand into long-distance flying through its sister airline AirAsia X.
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.
Fernandes stirred controversy earlier this year after incorrectly tweeting that Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, now synonymous with one of aviation's enduring mysteries, had landed safely. The wide-bodied Boeing 777 disappeared with 239 people aboard soon after taking off from Kuala Lumpur for Beijing on March 8. It remains missing.
Another Malaysia Airlines flight, also a Boeing 777, was shot down over rebel-controlled eastern Ukraine while on a flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur on July 17. All 298 people on board were killed.
William Waldock, an expert on air crash search and rescue with Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona, cautioned against drawing comparisons to the disappearance of Flight 370.
"I think we have to let this play out," he said. "Hopefully, the airplane will get found, and if that happens, it will probably be in the next few hours. Until then, we have to reserve judgment."
The circumstances bode well for finding the plane since the intended flight time was less than two hours and there is a known position at which the plane disappeared, he said.
Search called off for missing AirAsia plane
Sincere condolences to the families of those who travelled in the ill fated aircraft..Air Asia has got clearance to fly in India very recently..
[h=2]Search called off for missing AirAsia plane[/h] 02:26 Mon, 29 Dec 2014
Several hours of searching Indonesian waters turned up no sign of an AirAsia plane that disappeared with 162 people on board in airspace possibly thick with dense storm clouds, strong winds and lightning, officials said.
Aircraft searching for AirAsia Flight 8501 called off the effort for the night and will resume tomorrow morning, said Achmad Toha of Indonesia's search and rescue agency. Some ships were continuing the search overnight, he said.
The plane took off Sunday morning from Surabaya, Indonesia's second-largest city, and was about halfway to its destination, Singapore, when it vanished from radar.
The last communication between the pilot and air traffic control was at 6:13 a.m. (2313 GMT Saturday), when the pilot "asked to avoid clouds by turning left and going higher to 34,000 feet (10,360 meters)." It was last seen on radar at 6:16 a.m., and a minute later was no longer there, Djoko Murjatmodjo, Indonesia's acting director general of transportation, told reporters.
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 major aviation incident involving Malaysia this year: in March, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared with 239 people, and in July, a jet from the same airline was shot down over Ukraine, killing all 298 people aboard.
Indonesia and Singapore launched a search and rescue operation for Flight 8501 near Belitung island in Java Sea, the area where the jetliner lost contact with ground traffic control about 42 minutes after taking off from Surabaya.
Murjatmodjosaid 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.
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.
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," Fernandes tweeted.
Malaysia-based AirAsia, which has a presence in most of Southeast Asia and recently in India, has never lost a plane before and has a good safety track record. Flight 8501 was operated by AirAsia Indonesia, a subsidiary that is 49 percent 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 in a statement.
Among the passengers were three South Koreans, a Malaysian, a British national and his 2-year-old Singaporean daughter. The rest were Indonesians.
AirAsia 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 center 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, Maj. Gen. 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, were dispatched to the area. The Singapore air force and the navy also searched with two C-130 planes. The area continued to receive heavy rain as searchers looked for the lost aircraft.
Airbus said in a statement 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 Nov. 16.
AirAsia, which has dominated cheap travel in the region for years, flies short routes of just a few hours, connecting large cities of Southeast Asia. Recently it has tried to expand into long-distance flying through its sister airline AirAsia X.
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.
Fernandes stirred controversy earlier this year after incorrectly tweeting that Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, now synonymous with one of aviation's enduring mysteries, had landed safely. The wide-bodied Boeing 777 disappeared with 239 people aboard soon after taking off from Kuala Lumpur for Beijing on March 8. It remains missing.
Another Malaysia Airlines flight, also a Boeing 777, was shot down over rebel-controlled eastern Ukraine while on a flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur on July 17. All 298 people on board were killed.
William Waldock, an expert on air crash search and rescue with Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona, cautioned against drawing comparisons to the disappearance of Flight 370.
"I think we have to let this play out," he said. "Hopefully, the airplane will get found, and if that happens, it will probably be in the next few hours. Until then, we have to reserve judgment."
The circumstances bode well for finding the plane since the intended flight time was less than two hours and there is a known position at which the plane disappeared, he said.
Search called off for missing AirAsia plane
