Lion Air to begin new search for flight JT610’s missing victims
- Dozens of family members whose loved ones were killed in the crash protested in Jakarta last week, demanding the search continue
- The preliminary crash report from Indonesia’s transport safety agency suggested that pilots struggled to control the plane’s anti-stalling system
A new multimillion-dollar search for the missing victims of the doomed Lion Air flight JT-610 is expected to begin on Wednesday.
The Boeing 737 MAX vanished from radar 13 minutes after taking off from Jakarta on October 29, crashing into waters off the north coast of Indonesia’s Java Island and killing all 189 people onboard.
The first search for victims of the crash was called off last month, with only 125 people officially identified after tests on human remains that filled some 200 body bags. The remains of a further 64 people have not yet been found.
Following requests from victims’ families, Lion Air said it had allocated 38 billion rupiah (US$2.6 million) to hire a Dutch company to search for the second black box and missing victims with its ship the MPV Everest.
“The search operation will focus on the latest coordinates of the crash … with an operational time of 10 consecutive days in December,” the airline said.
The MPV Everest, a 142-metre long vessel with state-of-the-art remotely operated vehicles, will arrive near the crash site on Wednesday.
The search operation will focus on the latest coordinates of the crash