Indonesia Dives Deep to Track Down Lion Air’s Mysterious Disappearance
After a brand‑new Boeing b737 MAX crashed just minutes into take‑off, Jakarta’s rescue teams didn’t take a single hint. Instead they rolled out underwater beacons and sonar rigs, hoping to pick up the flight’s black boxes and piece together why the aircraft went belly‑first into the sea.
Wreckage Hunt Begins
- 204 souls aboard JT610, a budget Lion Air flight that disappeared 13 minutes after leaving Jakarta.
- “We’re hoping to spot the wreckage today,” mused Soerjanto Tjahjono, head of the country’s transport safety panel.
- Three brave sonar detectors now churning the waters near Karawang, West Java, while 15 vessels keep watch on the surface.
Unlikely Survivors, Yet We Keep Watching
Yusuf Latif of the national search agency warned that any survivors would be a miracle. The debris recovered—scattered fragments and body parts—gave little clue of rescue prospects.
Local Witnesses Speak Up
“I thought it was thunder, but it was boom—louder than a thunderclap!” exclaims Dadang Hambali, who heard the plane crash from the beach.
Cold Blood, Hot Traces
In the west Java coast, 15 kilometres north‑east of Jakarta, Lion Air said that 24 body sachets were collected during the blackout site sweep.
- The recovered bags were shipped to a hospital for identification.
- At Jakarta’s port, officers fanned out items—oxygen tanks, wallets, phones, cash, backpacks—richly in a list of seized artefacts.
A Mixed Safety Record
Indonesia is booming as a global airline hub, but its safety ratings are a roller coaster. If the crash is confirmed to have involved all passengers, it will be the second worst air tragedy since 1997, experts said.
International Help Arrives
The US’s National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and Boeing are already assisting the investigation.
Not as Far from Disaster, Yet
- Louis Air’s b737 MAX 8 was freshly deployed in August and had accumulated 11,000 hours across the pilot crew.
- The flight, bound for Pangkal Pinang in the Bangka‑Belitung mining region, had requested a return to base shortly after take‑off.
- “We’re still not sure why the RTB was taken but we’re checking it out,” Tjahjono told reporters.
- Instead of distress signals, the emergency transmitter remained silent, according to the agency head.
Past Sporting the Sector?
Last night, a plane from Bali to Jakarta had a technical hiccup that the airline’s crew resolved following protocol. However, the exact nature of that issue has remained under wraps. Lion Air maintained that none of its other b737 MAX 8s exhibited similar troubles and said there were no plans to ground the fleet.
Submarine Search Continues
Divers are scouring depths of 30–35 meters (roughly 100–115 feet) where the plane fell, working ahead of the scheduled 7:20‑am arrival in Pangkal Pinang. Though they stopped for the night, sonar vessels and an underwater drone stay in pursuit, hoping to locate the wreckage and bring closure to the tragedy.
