Search resumes for missing plane By Jethro Mullen and Susanna Capelouto, CNN updated 6:51 PM EST 12.28.14 Video: AirAsia jet vanishes during flight (CNN) - The search for missing AirAsia Flight QZ8501 resumed in Indonesia on Monday, a journalist embedded on a military search plane for Indonesias tvOne network reports. Planes are once again hovering above the water, tvOne reported, a day after the plane disappeared in Indonesian airspace with 162 people aboard. Seven ships and two helicopters were also set to start searching for the plane at daybreak, Indonesias National Rescue Agency said. Its unclear if weather played a role in the aircrafts disappearance, but rescuers say it could be a factor that influences how quickly they find the plane. Large waves and clouds hampered the search for the plane on Sunday, the agency said. Authorities say they plan to divide what they called a very broad search area into four sections of 120 by 240 nautical miles. AirAsia says it lost contact with the aircraft at 7:24 a.m. Sunday Singapore time (6:24 a.m. in Indonesia). The missing plane, flying from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore, went missing as it flew over the Java Sea between the islands of Belitung and Borneo -- a heavily traveled shipping channel with shallow waters, according to Indonesian authorities, who are leading the search and rescue operations. Before the plane lost contact with air traffic controllers, one of the pilots asked to fly at a higher altitude because of bad weather, officials said. AirAsia statement on missing airliner Now that a day has passed since the plane went missing, investigators should have more data to help them find it, said Peter Goelz, former managing director of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board. Theyve had a full 24 hours now to gather all of the available radar data from all of the available sources, he said. They should be able to put that together, along with any satellite data, and have a more precise location on where to target their search. Waiting and weeping Loved ones waited at the airport in Surabaya for any word on the passengers aboard the missing plane. Some took cell phone pictures of a flight manifest posted on a wall. The black-and-white papers showed every passengers name and seat number, but not their fate. Others simply sat and dabbed tears from their eyes. Our concern right now is for the the relatives and the next of kin, AirAsia CEO Tony Fernandes said during a news conference in Surabaya. He confirmed that storm clouds caused the pilot to ask for a change in flight plan, but added, We dont want to speculate whether weather was a factor. We really dont know. Once the aircraft is found, there will be a proper investigation, Fernandes said. Of the people on board the Airbus A320-200, 155 are Indonesian, three are South Korean, one is British, one is French, one is Malaysian and one is Singaporean, the airline said. Eighteen children, including one infant, are among the passengers, the carrier said. Seven of the people on board are crew members. Families of AirAsia flight passengers given support through the nightmare Heavy thunderstorms in area Flight 8501 was requesting deviation due to en route weather before communication with the aircraft was lost, the airline said. The flights captain asked permission to climb to a higher altitude, the Indonesian Transportation Ministrys acting director general for air transportation affairs, Djoko Murdjatmojo, said, according to the national news agency. According to flight tracking websites, almost the entire flight path of the plane was over the sea. What role did weather play? CNN aviation analyst Mary Schiavo said that if there was an onboard emergency, the pilots should have issued a mayday call or a pan-pan call. Mayday means youre immediately in danger of losing the flight; pan-pan means that it is urgent but that you can continue the flight and request an alternate route or an alternate airport, said Schiavo, a former inspector general for the U.S. Department of Transportation. Its disconcerting in that the standard procedures for an emergency dont seem to have been deployed, she said. But Alan Diehl, a former Air Force and NTSB accident investigator, said pilots dont always make mayday calls in an emergency. You know that the controllers cant really help you, he told CNN. You and your co-pilot are going to have to solve this. Its too soon to know what happened to the missing plane, he said. Details released so far show some similarities, Diehl said, with an Air Algerie flight that disintegrated and crashed in July after changing its flight path because of bad weather. But theres also a chance that the AirAsia flight didnt crash after losing contact with air traffic control, he said. The Airbus A320 is equipped with a ditching switch, Diehl said, that essentially turns the planes fuselage into a boat. If they got the aircraft down on the water safely, he said, it should be floating. Very good safety reputation As word spread of the missing plane, the airline changed the color of its logo on its website and social media accounts from red to gray. Indonesias President Joko Widodo said his nation was praying for the safety of those on board. Pope Francis also prayed for the missing, according to Vatican Radio. AirAsia is a Malaysia-based airline that is popular in the region as a budget carrier. It travels to about 100 destinations, with affiliate companies in several Asian countries. The missing plane is operated by AirAsias Indonesian affiliate, in which the Malaysian company holds a 48.9% stake, according to its website. AirAsia has a very good reputation for safety, CNN aviation correspondent Richard Quest said. Flight 8501s captain has a total of 20,537 flying hours, with 6,100 of them with AirAsia Indonesia on the Airbus A320, the airline said. The first officer has a total of 2,275 flying hours, AirAsia said. The planes last scheduled maintenance was on November 16, it said. The French Foreign Ministry said the first officer is the French citizen who is on the plane. A state-run company in Indonesia that manages airports identified the first officer as Remi Emmanuel Plesel. Airbus said the plane had accumulated approximately 23,000 flight hours in some 13,600 flights. The aircraft manufacturer said it would provide full assistance to authorities in charge of investigating the missing plane. The loss of contact with the AirAsia plane comes nearly 10 months after the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, which dropped off radar over Southeast Asia on March 8 with 239 people on board. The Malaysia Airlines plane, a Boeing 777-200ER, lost contact with air traffic control over the South China Sea between Malaysia and Vietnam. Searchers have yet to find any debris from Flight 370, which officials believe crashed in the southern Indian Ocean after veering dramatically off course. But some aviation experts dont think the search for Flight 8501 will be as grueling as the search for MH370. We are not talking about the deep Indian Ocean here, Quest said. We are talking about congested airspace around Southeast Asia. There will be much better radar coverage. Theres certainly better air traffic control coverage. CNNs Holly Yan, Yousuf Basil, Steve Almasy, Radina Gigova, Paula Hancocks, Joe Sutton, Euan McKirdy, Larry Register, Martin Savidge and Catherine E. Shoichet contributed to this report. Journalist Chan Kok Leong and Archicco Guilianno also contributed to this report.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Dec 2014 01:07:09 +0000
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