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

[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