In this undated underwater photo released by Indonesia’s National Search And Rescue Agency (BASARNAS) on Wednesday, the part of the wreckage that BASARNAS identified as of the ill-fated AirAsia Flight 8501, is seen in the waters of the Java Sea, Indonesia. (BASARNAS/The Associated Press)
Divers and an unmanned underwater vehicle spotted the tail of the missing AirAsia plane in the Java Sea on Wednesday, the first confirmed sighting of any major wreckage 11 days after Flight 8501 disappeared with 162 people on board, an official said.
Powerful currents and murky water continue to hinder the operation, but searchers managed to get a photograph of the debris after it was detected by an Indonesian survey ship, National Search and Rescue chief Henry Bambang Soelistyo told reporters. One released image appears to show an upside down “A” painted on a piece of metal.
The find is particularly important because the all-important cockpit voice and flight data recorders, or black boxes, are located in the aircraft’s tail. Smaller pieces of the plane, such as seats and an emergency door, had previously been collected from the surface.
“Today we successfully discovered the part of the plane that became the main aim since yesterday,” Soelistyo said. “I can ensure that this is part of the tail with the AirAsia mark on it.”
Another body located Wednesday
He stressed the top priority remains recovering more bodies along with the black boxes. So far, 40 corpses have been found, including an additional one announced Wednesday, but time is running out.
At two weeks, most corpses will sink, said Anton Castilani, head of the country’s disaster identification victim unit, and there are already signs of serious decomposition. Officials are hopeful many of the more than 120 bodies still unaccounted for will be found entombed in the fuselage.
The Airbus A320 went down Dec. 28, halfway through a two-hour flight between Indonesia’s second-largest city of Indonesia and Singapore, killing everyone on board. It is not clear what caused the crash, but bad weather is believed to be a contributing factor……..
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Image : BASARNAS/The Associated Press