A transport plane which crashed in eastern Indonesia found “completely destroyed” with the bodies of all 54 people, who had been on board, in the middle of the wreckage in a fire-blackened clearing at a remote site in dense jungle. Rescuers finally reached the debris of the Trigana Air plane, which went down Sunday during a short flight in bad weather, after being forced to abandon search efforts a day earlier due to the mountainous terrain and bad weather.
“The plane has crashed, it is completely destroyed,” search and rescue chief Bambang Soelistyo said of the ATR 42-300 after rescue teams reached the site in Papua province at 9:30 am (0030 GMT). The plane’s “black boxes”, consisting of a flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder, were also found, the transport ministry said. The devices should provide clues about what caused the crash, which officials believe were likely due to the weather.
Officials said there was no immediate news on the fate of 6.5 billion rupiah ($470,000) that were being transported by the plane in cash, intended for distribution to poor families as social assistance funds. The plane had set off from Papua’s capital Jayapura on what was supposed to be a 45-minute flight to Oksibil, a remote settlement in the mountains.
But it lost contact with air traffic control about 10 minutes before reaching its destination, soon after the crew requested permission to start descending in heavy cloud and rain to land. Trigana Air’s Sumaryanto said “unpredictable weather and mountainous terrain” had likely caused the accident, adding that the plane was in good condition and the pilot experienced.
The aviation sector in Indonesia is expanding fast but airlines are struggling to find enough well-trained personnel to keep up with the rapid growth in the archipelago of more than 17,000 islands.