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Passengers' families to be invited on search operation
AirAsia Indonesia has said it will invite the families of passengers on board the missing QZ8501 to witness the search for the aircraft that lost contact with air traffic control while en route from Surabaya to Singapore on Sunday
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irAsia Indonesia has said it will invite the families of passengers on board the missing QZ8501 to witness the search for the aircraft that lost contact with air traffic control while en route from Surabaya to Singapore on Sunday.
AirAsia Indonesia president director Sunu Widiyatmoko said the airline would ready a 180-seat Airbus 320 for families of the missing AirAsia passengers on Wednesday.
'This is aimed at keeping the families informed in detail about the joint search operation being conducted,' he told journalists at the AirAsia Crisis Center at Terminal II of Juanda International Airport in Surabaya on Tuesday.
'The aircraft carrying the passengers' families will fly around the search location before returning to Surabaya,' he said.
On Tuesday, the Transportation Ministry's acting director general of air transportation, Djoko Murjatmodjo, confirmed that wreckage discovered in Pangkalan Bun, Central Kalimantan, was from AirAsia flight QZ8501.
'It has been confirmed that it is debris from an aircraft bearing red and white colors,' Djoko said, citing that the debris had been found by the ministry's rescue team.
'The recovery process will now be centered on the debris location, in coordination with Basarnas [National Search and Rescue Agency],' he said.
State airport operator PT Angkasa Pura (AP) I president director Tomi Sutomo said the flight transporting the AirAsia passengers' families would be coordinated with Basarnas.
'We don't want to disrupt the ongoing search operation, so we will hand over the technical matters of the flight to Basarnas,' said Tomi. (ebf)(+++)
