AirAsia flight from Indonesia to Singapore missing

[xxMATTGxx]

An AirAsia flight travelling from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore has lost contact with air traffic control, the company has said.

Indonesian media say 162 people were on board.

The aircraft, flight number QZ8501, lost contact with air traffic control just after 07:00am local time, AirAsia tweeted.

The company said that search and rescue operations were under way for the missing plane.

An official with the transport ministry, Hadi Mustofa, told local media the plane lost contact over the Java sea, which lies between Surabaya and Singapore.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-30614627

Oh god, not good news at all at the moment.

[Matt]

AN Air Asia jet has lost contact with air traffic control.

The jet was travelling from Indonesia to Singapore when contact was lost.
Sky News reports there are 155 passengers and six crew on-board Flight QZ8501.
The network quoted Transport Ministry official Hadi Mustofa as saying the aircraft lost contact with the Jakarta air traffic control tower at 6.17 am local time.


He said the plane, an Airbus A320-200, had asked for an unusual route before it lost contact.

The flight was due in Singapore three hours ago.
In a statement Air Asia said a search was underway.“At this time, search and rescue operations are in progress and AirAsia is cooperating fully and assisting the rescue service. ”It said it had “no further information”.


An Emergency Call Centre has been set up for family or friends of those on board the aircraft.

SBS is reporting there are no Australians onboard.

Air Asia is Malaysian low-cost airline based in near Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
The airline operates domestic and international flights to 100 destinations in 22 countries.
More to come ...



A developing story coming from most media channels this morning in Australia, no doubt in the Uk too when you all wake up. I really hope this isn't another mysterious disappearance that goes unsolved. "He said the plane, an Airbus A320-200, had asked for an unusual route before it lost contact." - sounds a bit suspicious too. I hope they're all ok </3

[Drew]

Following this on CNN, hope we hear some good news soon :(

[Bloop]

apparently it crashed into the water? idk :S my twitter is exploding

as someone from sg... this hits even closer to home

[e5]

They say it's unusual to ask to fly higher due to bad weather? I wouldn't have thought that was unusual!

[xxMATTGxx]

They say it's unusual to ask to fly higher due to bad weather? I wouldn't have thought that was unusual!

Take it with a pinch of salt. Airliners often have route changes to get around bad weather but all weather is different so you may fly higher, lower, go off route a bit etc etc. Then again it depends on what was the person you are quoting actually said.

[e5]

Take it with a pinch of salt. Airliners often have route changes to get around bad weather but all weather is different so you may fly higher, lower, go off route a bit etc etc. Then again it depends on what was the person you are quoting actually said.
I read somewhere in a news article like 'the airline went missing after the Crew asked to take an usual route by asking to fly higher to avoid the bad weather'. I just didn't see how that would be unusual haha

[xxMATTGxx]

I read somewhere in a news article like 'the airline went missing after the Crew asked to take an usual route by asking to fly higher to avoid the bad weather'. I just didn't see how that would be unusual haha

I wouldn't personally call it unusual, it happens all the time. Although it all does depend on the actual bad weather. As the storm clouds or the bad weather could be quite high as it often is in that area of the world so climbing might have been a bad idea. But all flights have different circumstances - Hopefully when it is daylight again the search can continue and we get some answers. As we don't want another MH370.

[Calum0812]

I read somewhere in a news article
These are probably the same news articles that get names or aircrafts wrong, stats wrong and facts wrong wrong wrong

[karter]

search and rescue suspended :(

[Bloop]

******* HELL THRS A ******* 2 YEAR OLD ON BOARD THAT ******* FLIGHT

[Jssy]

Drew told me this early this morning, not another one, hope the flight returns safe

[Hannah]

Seems far too suspicious with the planes magically disappearing into thin air, if you ask me.
I really hope there isn't anything sinister behind it and they do in fact, get found.

[Sian]

I heard they had seen a wreckage just before suspending the search, but with this one I'm thinking more likely accident. Certainly hoping

[Jurv]

so scary! i hope they end up finding some answers unlike with the other flight that went missing

[-:Undertaker:-]

It goes to show with these planes disappearing and not being found, the world is a lot bigger than we think: and we're capable of a lot less than we think.

I do hope it is found though, certainly put me off flying to the Orient anytime soon....... dodgy.

[xxMATTGxx]

AirAsia’s fleet of short-haul jets was already being upgraded to make them easier to track, but the airline hadn’t yet modified the aircraft that lost contact with air-traffic controllers over the weekend and remains missing.

The budget airline is an early adopter of a dedicated tracking service, pre-empting an industry push to comprehensively follow planes in flight.

Source: WSJ

Damn, bit of bad luck I suppose.

[AgnesIO]

A real shame, and a bad end to an already terrible year for commercial flight incidents. Hope they find the wreck at the very least.

As a side note, if anyone hasn't had the displeasure of flying this airline let me give you some of my notable experiences;
- Sickeningly cheesy/sexual American-voiced pre-flight messages. For example; "To get a flight attendants attention, please ring the bell... or give them a wink".
- Tragically bad meals
- Leg room which measured the same width as an iPad
- Terrible departure lounge (not normally an airlines responsibility; when they are the only airline to use a terminal, it probably is)

Still, for the ridiculously cheap flights, I guess you cannot complain too much!

[xxMATTGxx]

It's now being turned into a recovery mission as debris has been found and also a body I believe. There is reports that the rescue teams can see a shadow under the water that look like a plane.

Edit: Multiple bodies have been recovered.

[lemons]

Absolutely awful but hopefully they can be given a proper funeral unlike the ones from the other missing plane

[xxMATTGxx]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B6GSLGgCIAAWlQp.png:large

[Matt]

So they've said it was likely that it stalled after trying to climb to avoid a storm. But it would've transmitted a sudden drop of altitude before it crashed, wouldnt it?! Then they said because it just stopped transmitting they think it was a mid air explosion.

They also said there were 2 other planes in the area at the time, I wonder if they reported a storm or uneasy weather conditions.

When it's at this stage with investigators trying to separate the facts from the truth, it's so tense! I hope they find out soon. I'm flying over that exact area in less than 2 weeks, talk about being paranoid eugh.

[xxMATTGxx]

So they've said it was likely that it stalled after trying to climb to avoid a storm. But it would've transmitted a sudden drop of altitude before it crashed, wouldnt it?! Then they said because it just stopped transmitting they think it was a mid air explosion.

They also said there were 2 other planes in the area at the time, I wonder if they reported a storm or uneasy weather conditions.

When it's at this stage with investigators trying to separate the facts from the truth, it's so tense! I hope they find out soon. I'm flying over that exact area in less than 2 weeks, talk about being paranoid eugh.

Normally you would see the plane doing a sudden drop in altitude on the ATC screens in normal circumstances.

[Jssy]

It apparently wasn't on original routes due to weather though, so sad :(

[Lewis]

How horrible, is there any chance of survivors? At least it's been found and not just disappeared completely like the last one. There seems to have been so many plane accidents this year :(.

I've never been on a plane before and after everything that's happened this year...I'll probably be put off ever going on one, despite how rare it is!

[xxMATTGxx]

How horrible, is there any chance of survivors? At least it's been found and not just disappeared completely like the last one. There seems to have been so many plane accidents this year :(.

I've never been on a plane before and after everything that's happened this year...I'll probably be put off ever going on one, despite how rare it is!

The chance of anyone surviving this is going to be low I would imagine. I think the whole event happened very quickly as the bodies that they have recovered so far weren't wearing any life jackets. Meaning they probably didn't know it was about to happen or have any pre-warning.

In terms of accidents, there was more in 2013 than there has been in 2014.

[Kimmy]

Have they found it yet???

[xxMATTGxx]

Have they found it yet???

They have found bodies and debris which has been confirmed it's from this flight. Some reports said they could see a shadow under the water which appeared to be in a shape of a plane but I don't believe this is 100% confirmed. They are currently doing a 24 hour search operation in this specific area and divers will start working again when it becomes day light. We will probably have more information again when they have light again.

[Kimmy]

They have found bodies and debris which has been confirmed it's from this flight. Some reports said they could see a shadow under the water which appeared to be in a shape of a plane but I don't believe this is 100% confirmed. They are currently doing a 24 hour search operation in this specific area and divers will start working again when it becomes day light. We will probably have more information again when they have light again.

This is so, so horrible. Do they have any explanations as to why?

[xxMATTGxx]

This is so, so horrible. Do they have any explanations as to why?

It's all speculation at this moment in time - Until the blackboxes are found then we won't know for sure.

[Kimmy]

It's all speculation at this moment in time - Until the blackboxes are found then we won't know for sure.

The blackboxes?

[Metric1]

The blackboxes?

Flight data recorders.

[Stephen]

i hate dm and all but why is everyone getting so pissy about the daily mail showing the uncensored pic of the guy with his pants on dead in the water

doesn't even look much different to the censored version tbh

but yeah rip to all who died

[xxMATTGxx]

The blackboxes?

The aircraft contains a flight data recorder and a cockpit voice recorder these are known as the "blackboxes". Once they have those they will be able to get the information from them, read it/investigate and hopefully find why this accident has taken place.

- - - Updated - - -


i hate dm and all but why is everyone getting so pissy about the daily mail showing the uncensored pic of the guy with his pants on dead in the water

doesn't even look much different to the censored version tbh

but yeah rip to all who died

As it's normally classed as disrespectful showing something like that - It would get lots of complaints if that was to happen on live TV. Which it did in certain countries and a lot of people complained about that on social media.

[xxMATTGxx]

Latest reports is that they have found a body with a life jacket on and that they also have a sonar image of object under the water that looks like an aircraft. These reports may change as we know what the media/officials are like.

[Matt]

The body wearing a life jacket part is quite an interesting piece of information. Maybe they had time to put it on whilst they were descending/before they made impact?

[xxMATTGxx]

The body wearing a life jacket part is quite an interesting piece of information. Maybe they had time to put it on whilst they were descending/before they made impact?

Could be possible. Although I did just read somewhere that report is now incorrect and that the jacket was found near the body - Although, I've only seen that mentioned at one place while other places are still reporting the body to be wearing it instead. Bad weather is now causing the operation to go slow.

[AgnesIO]

As it's normally classed as disrespectful showing something like that - It would get lots of complaints if that was to happen on live TV. Which it did in certain countries and a lot of people complained about that on social media.

Common place in a lot of countries to show such imagery.

I remember my amazement the first time I was in Asia, reading a newspaper with the victim of some kind of murder pictured. Just read a FB post from a friend in the Philippines complaining about videos of 'bloated bodies' on the news.

[buttons]

i wonder what happened to the half naked guy who was shown as there are reports that other victims have their clothes on, suggesting the plane was intact when it hit the water. how terrifying.

[Jurv]

how can your clothes just come off anyway idgi

[lemons]

maybe he was trying to swim to find land/safety?? and took them off so it would be easier to swim

[-:Undertaker:-]

Apparently bodies were found holding hands together, suggesting they knew they were going to crash.

The worse thing about plane crashes, is knowing you are going to crash rather than the crash itself which usually means instant death.

[AgnesIO]

Apparently bodies were found holding hands together, suggesting they knew they were going to crash.

The worse thing about plane crashes, is knowing you are going to crash rather than the crash itself which usually means instant death.

I'd question the legitimacy of the holding hands thing; I'd have thought if you were dead in the water for more than a day, your hands would not still be connected (nobody is applying pressure to hold the hands together, but the water will be applying pressure which one would have thought would separate them).

Of course, I may be wrong there - it is difficult at the moment to get the facts from the fiction, given the vast amount of details coming out. I do think that they knew they were going to crash, though.

[karter]

Yeah, at that sort of impact your bones and joints don't remain intact so I highly doubt the holding hands thing too. Heartbreaking if it did happen though :(

[xxMATTGxx]

If the leaked data from the radar is correct then they had pretty much 0 chance of surviving. It supposedly climbed at 9000ft per minute then slammed into a dive at 24,000ft per minute - Now this isn't confirmed and is still speculation coming from "leaked" documents.

[Jssy]

I don't agree with the media showing images of the bodies, no compassion at all. I'm sure we all know what a body looks like

[AgnesIO]

I don't agree with the media showing images of the bodies, no compassion at all. I'm sure we all know what a body looks like

Whilst in this instance I agree, sometimes horrific images are so important.

Example: Rwandan Genocide.

[scottish]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-30706298


Part of the tail of crashed AirAsia flight QZ8501 has been found in the Java Sea, Indonesian searchers say.

The tail houses the "black boxes" - the voice and flight data recorders - which could give investigators clues as to the cause of the crash.

It was found in a secondary search area, lending weight to theories that strong currents have moved the debris.

The plane was lost en route from Surabaya, Indonesia, to Singapore on 28 December, with 162 people aboard.

No survivors have been found.

Buried in mud
Part of the tail of the Airbus A320-200 was spotted by teams involving divers and unmanned underwater vehicles, search and rescue chief Bambang Soelistyo said in Jakarta.

It is the first significant piece of wreckage from the crash to be identified and was found in an area some 30km (19 miles) from the initial search area.

The part found has the AirAsia mark on it, Mr Soelistyo said. It is buried in mud, in water 30m (98ft)deep, and is believed to be upside down.

Despite powerful sea currents and murky water, searchers managed to take photographs, he said. On one piece, the letter A appears to be painted.

Only 40 bodies have been recovered so far but the authorities believe many of the passengers may still be strapped inside the main body of the plane.

The BBC's Karishma Vaswani in Jakarta says the tail was not found in the area search teams previously focussed upon, but in the expanded search area. This could add weight to that theory, she adds.

A huge international operation with aerial searches and more than 30 ships involved has been repeatedly hampered by poor weather.

"The seas haven't been very friendly but the black boxes have a 30-day life and they will be able to find them," Peter Marosszeky, a senior aviation research fellow at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, told Reuters news agency.

"It's the weather that is causing the delay."

Some wreckage, including seats and a door, was found floating on the sea.

At the weekend search officials said sonar had detected what they thought were five large parts of the plane.

The cause of the crash is not known but the plane was flying through stormy weather at the time and had requested permission to change course.

Fortieth body
Investigators said they had found another body on Wednesday, bringing the total recovered to date to 40.

Most of the people aboard the plane were Indonesian: 137 adult passengers, 17 children and one infant, along with two pilots and five crew.

Anton Castilani, head of Indonesia's Disaster Victims Identification Unit, said identification would become more difficult because the bodies being found were increasingly decomposed.

"That makes it harder to do quick identification of the bodies," he said, quoted by the Straits Times. "We can still do DNA testing but that takes one to two weeks."

After two weeks, most corpses will sink, he was also quoted as saying by the Associated Press news agency.

AirAsia previously had an excellent safety record, with no fatal accidents involving its aircraft.

AirAsia chief executive Tony Fernandes said on Twitter: "We need to find all parts soon so we can find all our guests to ease the pain of our families. That still is our priority."

[xxMATTGxx]

If the tail/back end section is still in good shape then it may be possible the black boxes are still there hopefully. I know they haven't actually got the tail out of the water yet I don't think?

[scottish]

I've not seen anything implying they found black boxes yet, last I seen was that they found the tail.

So not sure what's going on with that.

[xxMATTGxx]

I've not seen anything implying they found black boxes yet, last I seen was that they found the tail.

So not sure what's going on with that.

From what I saw before they haven't got the tail section out of the water yet.

[xxMATTGxx]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ATg1APGVYM&feature=youtu.be

Tail of the aircraft has been lifted to the surface:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B6-Q6iKCMAAYC4f.jpg

[xxMATTGxx]

554278960285372417

[xxMATTGxx]

Indonesian divers have retrieved the flight data recorder of crashed AirAsia Flight QZ8501, say officials.

The head of Indonesia's search and rescue agency, Bambang Soelistyo, said teams were still looking for the second device, its cockpit voice recorder.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-30773782


Now that these recorders are being found they will get a better idea on what the hell happened to this flight.

[Matt]

So glad they've managed to discover the flight recorder. Maybe now we can get some answers! I had visions of it being another MH 370 where nothing gets answered. Let's hope they can find the information we are all after.

[xxMATTGxx]

Fuselage from crashed AirAsia plane located in Java Sea - Singapore defence minister

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B7TVMfLCUAApZHL.jpg:large

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B7TU-uGCIAA0EMq.jpg:large

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B7TT7dBCcAAjVIz.jpg:large

[AgnesIO]

Fuselage from crashed AirAsia plane located in Java Sea - Singapore defence minister

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B7TVMfLCUAApZHL.jpg:large

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B7TU-uGCIAA0EMq.jpg:large

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B7TT7dBCcAAjVIz.jpg:large

Is the bottom number (302, 306 etc) the depth?

err edit: seems to deep to be the depth for the javan sea..
EDIT 2: Seen the depth now - would sure make for an interesting dive.

[xxMATTGxx]

Is the bottom number (302, 306 etc) the depth?

err edit: seems to deep to be the depth for the javan sea..
EDIT 2: Seen the depth now - would sure make for an interesting dive.

Not sure, but seems you have figured it out. How deep is it? I know it's not a very deep waters part of the world unlike where MH370 went missing so has made it a bit easier for them.

[AgnesIO]

Not sure, but seems you have figured it out. How deep is it? I know it's not a very deep waters part of the world unlike where MH370 went missing so has made it a bit easier for them.

Top left hand corner indicates it is a tad below 27 metres. The 27m is presumably the depth of the transport thing that is recorded it, which seems to be just above.

Basically, anyone with an advanced padi diving certificate could potentially reach the depth, well - others without it could, just not by the rule book :P