AirAsia search updates: Indonesia search chief says three bodies retrieved in AirAsia hunt

Navy spokesperson Manahan Simorangkir says earlier report of 40 bodies recovered was a miscommunication by his staff

JAKARTA: A day after the search for AirAsia flight QZ8501 was halted, red and white debris sighted off Indonesia’s Kalimantan coast was confirmed to be part of the AirAsia, a transportation ministry official confirmed on Tuesday.



5:05pm

Indonesia's National Search and Rescue Agency chief said Tuesday that just three bodies had been recovered so far in the search for the AirAsia plane which crashed in the Java Sea, after another official said 40 had been found.

"Today we evacuated three bodies and they are now in the warship Bung Tomo," Bambang Soelistyo told a news conference in Jakarta, adding that they were two females and one male.

Navy spokesperson Manahan Simorangkir told AFP earlier that according to naval radio a warship had recovered more than 40 bodies from the sea. But he later said that report was a miscommunication by his staff.

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 3:52pm

Indonesian people pray for passengers of the missing AirAsia flight QZ8501 in Malang, East Java on December 30, 2014. The hunt for a missing AirAsia passenger plane appeared over on December 30 as wreckage and dozens of bodies were spotted at sea off Indonesia, prompting raw scenes of emotion from sobbing relatives of the 162 people aboard. PHOTO: AFP

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3:28pm

 

Members of the Indonesian air force show items retrieved from the Java sea during search and rescue operations for the missing AirAsia flight QZ8501, in Pangkalan Bun, Central Kalimantan. PHOTO: AFP

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2:53pm

As the first body was shown floating in the water on rolling television news, relatives burst into tears and hugged one another amid cries for more ambulances, said an AFP reporter at the scene.

PHOTO: AFP

"My heart will be totally crushed if it's true. I will lose a son," 60-year-old Dwijanto, who like many Indonesians goes by one name, told AFP.

A female AirAsia officer shouted at the television media for showing footage of a floating body, while about 200 journalists were barred from the room holding the families, the windows of which were boarded up.

"Is it possible for you not to show a picture of the dead? Please do not show a picture of a dead body," said the officer. "That's crazy."

Munif, a 50-year-old whose younger brother Siti Rahmah was on the plane, said he had been trying hard to keep the other families calm.

"But the atmosphere was very different after the footage of a dead body was shown. Families became hysterical," he said.

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2:28pm

More than 40 bodies retrieved in AirAsia search, says Indonesian navy.

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1:35pm

An air force plane Tuesday spotted a "shadow" on the seabed believed to be the missing AirAsia jet, Indonesia's National Search and Rescue Agency chief said.

"God blessed us today," Bambang Soelistyo told a press conference.

"At 12:50 the air force Hercules found an object described as a shadow at the bottom of the sea in the form of a plane," he said.

"All elements in the areas and search and rescue personnel will be moved to the location," he said.

"Their job is to find and evacuate all objects or passengers' bodies," he said.

"I will make sure that all of them will be brought to Pangkalan Bun, the closest airstrip from the object's location," he said.

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1:30pm 

Relatives of the 162 people missing on the plane hugged each other and burst into tears in Surabaya, where the plane departed from, as they watched footage showing a body floating in the sea on a television feed of Bambang Soelistyo's press conference in Jakarta.

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1:25pm

A body was found in the sea Tuesday during the search for missing AirAsia flight QZ8501, Indonesia's National Search and Rescue Agency chief said at a press conference.

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1:15pm

Debris spotted Tuesday during an aerial search for AirAsia flight QZ8501 is from the missing plane, Indonesia's director general of civil aviation told AFP.

This aerial view taken from an Indonesian search and rescue aircraft over the Java Sea shows floating debris spotted in the same area as other items being investigated by Indonesian authorities as possible objects from missing AirAsia flight QZ8501 on December 30, 2014.  Items resembling an emergency slide, plane door and other objects were spotted during a aerial search on December 30 for the missing AirAsia plane, according to information from the flight on which AFP was aboard. PHOTO: AFP

"For the time being it can be confirmed that it's the AirAsia plane and the transport minister will depart soon to Pangkalan Bun," Djoko Murjatmodjo said.

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