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By Agustinus Beo Da Costa and Cindy Silviania
JAKARTA (Reuters) – A plane of 189 people on board allegedly sank after crashing into the sea off the Indonesian island of Java shortly after taking off from the capital, en route to the mining center. in the country, officials said.
A spokesman for the Indonesian search and rescue agency said that Lion Air flight JT610 had lost contact 13 minutes after takeoff, adding that a tug leaving the capital's port had seen the Gear.
"It was confirmed that the plane had crashed," spokesman Yusuf Latif said by texting about the fate of the aircraft, that the Flightradar 24 airborne location service identified as a Boeing 737 MAX 8.
Debris supposed to come from the plane, including aircraft seats, was found near a refining facility at sea in the Java Sea, said an energy company official. national Pertamina.
Debris was found near the point where the aircraft lost contact with ground traffic officials, said Muhmmad Syaugi, head of the search and rescue agency.
"We still do not know if there are any survivors," Syaugi said at a press conference, adding that no distress signal had been received from him. Emergency location transmitter of the aircraft.
"We hope, we pray, but we can not confirm."
An Indonesian Transportation and Security Committee official said that he could not confirm the cause of the accident, which should wait for the recovery of the black boxes from the aircraft, given that the Conversation recorder in cockpit and data flight recorder are known.
"We are going to collect all the data from the control tower," said Soerjanto Tjahjono. "The plane is so modern that it transmits data from the plane and we will also look at it, but the most important thing is the black box."
Australia has also not received any signal from the aircraft's emergency locator, he said to Indonesia in response to a question, said the head of Syaugi agency.
Efforts to locate the wreck and recover the black blox will be the second major challenge of Indonesian researchers in deep water recovery after the crash of an AirAsia Airbus aircraft in the Java Sea in December 2015.
According to international rules, the US National Transporation Safety Board will automatically attend Monday's crash investigation, assisted by Boeing technical advisors and US engine builder CFM International, jointly owned by General Electric and Safran.
Boeing is aware of the crash reports and "closely monitors" the situation, a company spokesman told Reuters.
The flight took off from Jakarta around 6:20 am and was scheduled to land at 7:20 am in the capital of the Bangka-Belitung tin mining area, revealed the Flightradar 24 website.
"We can not comment at this time," Edward Sirait, managing director of Lion Air Group, told Reuters, adding that a press conference was scheduled for later on Monday. "We are trying to collect all the information and data."
Preliminary Flightradar24 flight tracking data indicates that the aircraft reached an altitude of approximately 5,000 feet (1,524 m) before losing and regaining altitude before finally falling into the sea.
It was last recorded at 1113 m (3,650 feet) and its speed was 345 knots, according to raw data entered by the respected tracking website, which could not be confirmed immediately. .
His last recorded position was about 15 km north of the Indonesian coast, according to a Google Maps reference of the latest coordinates reported by Flightradar24.
The accident is the first to be reported and concerns the Boeing 737 MAX, widely sold, an updated and more fuel-efficient version of the manufacturer's single-aisle jet. The first Boeing 737 MAXs were commissioned in 2017.
The first ever global delivery was made to Malindo Air, a subsidiary of Lion Air in Malaysia.
Indonesia is one of the fastest growing aviation markets in the world, but its safety performance is uneven.
Founded in 1999, Lion Air's only fatal accident to date dates back to 2004: an MD-82 crashed on landing at Solo City, killing 25 out of 163, according to the airline's aviation safety network. the Flight Safety Foundation.
However, six other Lion Air jet planes, including one that crashed into the water in 2013, near the landing strip of the Indonesian island of Bali, were damaged irreparably in various accidents, according to the aviation safety network.
Lion Air was removed from the European Union's blacklist for aviation safety in June 2016.
The private airline announced in April a firm order for the purchase of 50 Boeing 737 MAX 10s on a $ 6.24 billion train. It is one of the biggest customers of the American planemaker in the world.
(Additional report by Gayatri Suroyo, Jamie Freed in Singapore and Tim Hepher in HONG KONG, written by Ed Davies, edited by Clarence Fernandez)
