Air Asia was missing and found!

Re: Air Asia was missing

Likely missing somewhere in the Java Sea in between the Bangka-Belitung province (part of Sumatra island cluster) and Western Kalimantan province (part of Kalimantan island). I believe the plane probably went down because of strong turbulence and extremely cloudy that made the pilots made an unusual request to increase altitude to 38.000ft. The bad weather condition might have either killed the engines or rip apart the wings or tail. Some are speculating of possible mid air collision with another plane that might be cruising at that higher altitude. However, so far only 1 plane been reported and known missing, thus this speculation likely baseless.

The area where the plane was last detected is on the equator, and is a known area where turbulence can be felt on most flights routinely passing through the area even on normal weather condition. However, whatever the cause is, the passengers most likely had died, but the search shouldn't be long as the area are heavily populated and the sea too is one of the busiest in South East Asia. Not to mention, major ATC on the plane's route had detected the plane on course as planned before going off radar. The ATCs was monitoring it and had maintain timely communication up to the time it was suddenly loss,, and they immediately react accordingly.

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

Weather was extremely bad. And this time of year, air traffic is at it's peak (Christmas, New Year, school holiday) in the country. The last ATC that had been in contact with the plane was Soekarno-Hatta International Airport. Which is among the busiest in the world, despite some limitation in it's daily operation that it has to sustain. Flights from and to Indonesia - Singapore going through Soekarno-Hatta airport (Jakarta) makes up 70-80% of most of its international schedules . While Juanda airport (Surabaya) is dominated with handling 70-80% domestic flights, it's international service caters flights to Malaysia, Australia, East Timor Leste, Brunei, and Singapore.

The plane suddenly went missing shortly after it requested to deviate it's altitude from 32.000ft to 38.000ft due to thick cloud, turbulence, and bad weather (was raining at the time). Jakarta's ATC tried contacting it, and immediately notify all related parties (airlines company, search rescue, government, etc.). The plane had maintain it's course and timely communication with ground control on it's route, from the time it took off from Surabaya up to the time it request to climb to 38.000ft.

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

Oddly yet again another Malaysian owned plane went down, despite this one flying under Indonesian flag.

Edit 1:

Latest update; search rescue deployed from various local airports and ports around the loss contact areas return empty. Signs and signals couldn't be detected. Indonesian authorities still reluctant to accept assistance from friendly countries wishing to help. There has been wild rumours circulating, all not true.

Edit 2:

Indonesian Vice-President announced he welcome neighboring countries wanting to help in the search (Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, France, United States, and Australia). Initial search effort is scheduled to continue for the next 7 days, and will be extended accordingly. Rescue effort been halted due to deteriorating weather condition in the area, and will re-commence tomorrow at 06:00 A.M. local time. Search focus will still be around the last known radar detected area seconds before it went missing. The VP has told the passengers' family to expect the worst as up to the time of his press conference, he's probably the only realistic person among the authorities' spokesperson involved who commented in the conference, when all others kept telling the families chances of finding them alive is still very likely. When in reality, not a signal can be detected from the various instruments on board the downed plane, let alone any debris around the vicinity of the last known signal. In case you're wondering why the VP gave the press conference instead of the President, that's because the president is in the middle of his national presidential trip, and his last known location is in the jungle somewhere in the middle of West Papua Island.

The plane was estimated to be carrying fuel enough for 3.5 - 4.5 hours of flight time on a scheduled 2.5 hour flight from Surabaya (Juanda airport) to Singapore (Changi airport). It was lost approximately half way through it's journey.

Edit 3:

Tony Fernandez, CEO and owner of Air Asia just finished his press conference in Surabaya. Answered several questions, which is mostly already known. He basically request the media not to speculate on what had happened. But at this time, the most probable cause of the incident was due to bad weather, not likely technical issue. And he further explained that the pilot had had over 20.000 hours experience with 7000 hours of it was as Air Asia's pilot. He also asked the media not to link this incident with what had happened earlier this year with Malaysia Airlines, as his company despite being own by him (a Malaysian), has no relationship with the other airline.

The Surabaya airport authority (Angkasa Pura 1) told the media to stop pestering the search and rescue representatives stationed in Surabaya for information on the rescue effort details, as all that are under the responsibility of their Jakarta headquarter and coordinated from there as well. The crisis center setup in Surabaya only focuses on handling the passengers family.

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

interesting, seems it was operating within its service envelope, although 38000ft is unusually high.

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

It is, because this is the first fatal incident for Air Asia airlines. As for why it requested to climb to an unusually high altitude for a commercial jet, especially one flying a short to mid range trip. That's because of thick storm cloud, it had initially requested to turn left, but then decided to climb up. At that time, communication was still maintained. Only after it reached that height did it began fading from radar and soon after disappeared. As for 38.000ft, according to one pilot interviewed, it's still considered normal since planes heading for Australia/New Zealand (that does not originates from airports in Indonesia) fly at around that altitude or even higher. This time of year, the western part of the country is experiencing stormy weather and strong wind, flood and landslides. And since the country and the destination are situated on the equator, the area is a known turbulence location, with possibilities of vacuum pockets.

What's curious is why it suddenly disappeared once it reached that altitude requested, and couldn't be detected since. Had it fell into the Java Sea (which at the time of reaching that height it was in the middle of the sea), an emergency beacon would have been activated upon hitting sea water, and it's debris relatively easy to find. Or had it fell on land, someone would have seen it since the area on it's flight path is populated, and the sea too is a heavily transverse sea lane by both international and local ships - boats. Had it crash landed somewhere on land, someone would have been able to contact one of the passenger's phone, as in many cases, some passengers often ignore aviation law about switching off their phone. In this current case, no one managed to get any dial tone, as if everyone been obedient enough to switch them off before flying.

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

the service ceiling for that type of aircraft is 39100 or 39800 depending on model, so while unusually high, it was not being operated outside it's design limits.

Not necessarily, AF447 took 2 years to find because the beacon didn't activate, Malayisan 370 is still missing.

if they're destroyed or out of range calls will go straight to voicemail.

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

Claims by family and friends of the passengers interviewed by the reporters said they simply receive operator's message of "phone not active or out of area coverage". None claim of hearing any dial tone. Thus if ever the slightest chance it fell on land with phone in tact, and was on, someone would have got a dial tone. On a side note, they are within the area covered by local phone service signal. As 95% of the passengers are locals, using national phone provider service. I would have to agree the likelihood of the plane totally shattered or maybe under the sea (which I think is the most likely since no ATC along the route detected it for the past 12 hours since disappearing), in which case no phone signal could penetrate is extremely high.

In the case of MH370, the reason it was missing to date is because of the Malaysian authorities being slow, disorganized, paid more attention to hoax and missed leading leads, plane was flying in strange pattern, possible foul play by someone on board, huge search area because they aren't even certain where it went down, and been looking at the wrong places, to a point the critical time for a search to actually be fruitful was lost. While in the case of QZ8501 is accident or sudden technical or structural failure, not likely victim of foul play, flight was flying in it's pre-determined route, the authorities involved are more organized although nearly as slow in it's response, better prepared in separating hoax from truth, search area relatively smaller, and the ATCs though out it's route was monitoring it's every move up to the time it suddenly disappeared.

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

still, the emergency locator beacon did not activate because if it had we'd know where it is. The plane in this case is an A320, which are known for a weird electrical issue resulting in the loss of all communications equipment and almost all flight deck instruments. Which leaves the question of why it disappeared from primary radar.

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

no its a fault condition that's known to happen but hasn't yet been explained and isn't very well understood. It shouldn't be possible but has demonstrably happened on numerous occasions, and following the applicable checklist has had mixed results.

If this fault is involved, it would be the first time it's been involved in the loss of an aircraft.

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

theres breakers in the equipment bay, which is only accessible from outside the plane. There's multiple circuits that are designed to be isolated from each other, but this fault affects several of them at the same time, which is part of what isn't understood, because a failure in one of them should not be able to cause failures in the others, but somehow it does.

When such an event occurs, pilots have a checklist of things to work through, buttons to press and the like. In this particular fault, pressing a certain button in the checklist proceedure has had mixed results. Sometimes it restores everything, sometimes it restores some things, sometimes it does nothing.

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

If so, then the airlines wouldn't have continue buying it until resolved. But they do, Air Asia, JetStar, Lion Air, etc. are some who operates large number of this series.

In any case, search and rescue has been continued, this time involving join efforts with Singapore and Malaysia, and has requested assistance to vessels passing through the area. Local airports along the route of it's last known signal are also involved; West and Central Kalimantan region (Pangkal Ambun, Palangkaraya, and Pontianak), Java region (Jakarta, Bogor, and Bandung), and Sumatra region (Bangka, Belitung, Padang, Riau, Lampung, Medan, and Batam).

The transportation safety and incident bureau (KNKT), Ministry of Transportation, Jakarta airport and Surabaya airport authorities think the possible issue was mainly caused by bad weather, not because of the plane itself. That in turn made the pilots to panic, made wrong decision to climb up against strong gust (potentially cross wind), which resulted to either disorientation, total loss of both engines, pushed downwards and plunged into the sea, or causes structural failure (crack body/loss of wing and or tail function/certain part of the plane tore off). With whatever it might be, the end result was the pilots didn't have the chance to inform Jakarta ATC which was in communication with it at the time on the emergency situation, but on top of that why no distress signals been detected had it crashed or exploded remains a mystery.

Edit 1:

Indonesia's NTSB, airport authorities, Air Asia owner/CEO, and Minister of Transport just finished another round of press conference. Basically they reported that the ELT signal can't be detected, and are going to focus on sea and underwater search. 4 countries (Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea, and Australia) has been granted full access to help in the effort, and are requesting help from UK and France through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The call sign 'QZ 8501' is still in use by Air Asia' 05:30 A.M. flight from Surabaya to Singapore. The unchanged numbering causes psychological unease for it's passengers despite their understanding that the doomed plane went down due to bad weather.

Edit 2:
Plane believed to have loss radio contact and spun inside the cumulus nimbus cloud that it had tried to avoid, and likely disintegrated mid air without chance to contact the ATC, somewhere above the Java Sea or near the Straits of Western Kalimantan.

Edit 3:
Australian P3 Orion claim to have detected an unidentified object in the water near the Pangkal Ambun district of western Kalimantan in the morning. Another signal was said detected in the straits in between Bangka and Belitung islands around afternoon. Also there was an unconfirmed lead is said to have recovered a floating object near the detected area in Pangkal Ambun.

Edit 4:
All signals detected and debris turn out fake. At 20:00hr, 2 men report to local authorities in Pangkal Ambun; a fisherman who has just returned from 2 days fishing some 12 miles offshore south of Kumai district (part of Pangkal Ambun) claimed to have heard loud explosion, but uncertain if he actually saw something white fell into the sea from a distance through bad weather, while a man who is said to be living near the shore of the same area and was on the roof of his house fixing his leaking roof, claim seeing a white-red colored plane flying too low in the direction of the sea away from the Pangkal Ambun airport, he however didn't hear any explosion and said it was in perfect condition despite the unusually low altitude. The second man knows how low a plane normally flies while they are above his home when they are approaching Pangkal Ambun airport, and in his opinion the one he saw was flying too low while going the opposite direction had it intended to land somewhere. Both men claimed, they didn't know about the incident until few hours ago, as their home was on the southern-remote part of the district. Tomorrow, both men will be taken by the search team stationed there to give their full witness report, and will be taken to the site where the fisherman was fishing to find out if his claim has any right to it, or simply trying to seek public attention.

For your information; Pangkal Ambun is a very small district in Central Kalimantan (Central Borneo), most of it is covered by forest and bordered by the Java Sea. In some areas, the population is spares with barely any public transportation network. The residents living there are mostly trans migrants from Java Island, working as lumberjacks, iron ore miners, and fishermen. The commercial civilian airport itself couldn't accommodate planes the size of A320-200, as it's runway is very short, roughly 2-3 soccer field length. The airport building is a 1 story residential house of around 400-500m2. The airport doesn't operate on a daily basis as it only caters to 1 local hopper airline; KalStar Air, a bi-propeller CN-250 plane, and military helicopters. On days when the airlines doesn't have enough passengers heading to or out of the airport, it does not make stops there. Thus passengers are always welcome to refund their tickets. KalStar Air service covers most of the airports in Kalimantan, with irregular flights connecting Banjarmasin Airport with Jakarta's Soekarno-Hatta International Airport and or Makassar International Airport. The 2 closest airports that passengers heading to or leaving the district can alternatively choose to use, that operates on regular basis and able to accommodate planes as large as A320-200 are Sampit Airport (some 6 hours drive across the forest), and Palangkaraya (some 12 hours drive across the same forest).

 

Re: Air Asia was missing

Plane found in the waters of the gulf of Kumai - Java Sea, Pangkal Ambun. Location matches the position told by the fisherman. At least 6 bodies been found, and some plane parts such as the emergency door. The plane itself is at around 25m-30m underwater, some 10km from the last radar signal.