Indonesian searchers locate black box recorders in crashed plane

Indonesian aviation authorities say they have found the location of the cockpit voice and flight data recorders from a crashed Indonesian jet on Sunday, items crucial to understanding what happened to the aircraft that went down with 62 people on board.

Indonesian divers also located parts of the wreckage of a Boeing 737-500 in the Java Sea as rescuers pulled out body parts, pieces of clothing and scraps of metal from the waters where the Siriwijaya Air flight SJ182 carrying 62 people crashed.

“We have located the position of the black boxes, both of them,” said Soerjanto Tjahjono, head of Indonesia’s transport safety agency.

“Divers will start looking for them now and hopefully soon we can lift them up for the National Transportation Safety Committee to investigate and find out the cause of the crash.”

Divers recovered parts of the plane about 23 metres (75 feet) below the water’s surface, the transport ministry said in a statement, citing Indonesia’s military chief.

Indonesian Armed Forces chief Hadi Tjahjanto said the objects recovered included broken pieces of fuselage with aircraft registration parts.

“We are sure that is the point where the plane crashed,” he said in the statement, expressing hope that weather conditions and “the view under the sea are still good so that we can continue the search” on Sunday.

Indonesia’s chequered air safety record is again in the spotlight after the plane went down.

Before the crash, there had been 697 fatalities in Indonesia over the last decade including military and private planes, making it the deadliest aviation market in the world – ahead of Russia, Iran and Pakistan – according to Aviation Safety Network’s database.

The break in the search for Sriwijaya Air flight SJ182 came after sonar equipment on a navy ship detected a signal from the aircraft at a location that fit the coordinates from the last contact made by the pilots before the plane went missing on Saturday.

The plane headed to Pontianak in West Kalimantan crashed shortly after takeoff from the Indonesian capital, Jakarta.

It is still unclear what caused the crash.

“I represent the government and all Indonesians in expressing my deep condolences for this tragedy,” President Joko Widodo said, adding, “We are doing our best to save the victims. We pray together so that the victims can be found.”

The nearly 27-year-old aircraft was much older than Boeing’s problem-plagued 737 MAX model, one of which crashed off Jakarta in late 2018, killing all 189 people on board the Lion Air flight.