Data recorder recovered from crashed Lion Air flight

By November 2, 2018 January 16th, 2020 General News

Indonesia’s National Transport Safety Committee (NTSC) has recovered the flight data recorder from the Lion Air Boeing 737 MAX 8 that crashed on 29 October shortly after taking off from Jakarta International Airport.

Divers recovered the device from the seabed floor on 1 November, with NTSC chief Soerjanto Tjahjono reported as saying it is expected to take up to two weeks to download the data from the unit. The investigator has also held co-ordination meetings with representatives of Boeing, General Electric, the US National Transport Safety Bureau and the US Federal Aviation Administration, all of whom will be involved in the crash investigation.

The process of recovering the bodies of the victims continues. A total of 189 passengers and crew were killed in the accident involving flight JT610. The search is still ongoing for the cockpit voice recorder.

Indonesia’s directorate general of civil aviation asked Lion Air earlier this week to suspend the quality control and flight maintenance management manager, in addition to the temporary suspension of the carrier’s technical director and the engineers that had released the aircraft for its last flight, so that they can fully assist with the investigation.

The MAX 8, registered PK-LPQ, was flying from Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta International airport to Pangkal Pinang when it crashed.

Investigators say a preliminary report could be released within the next month but that the complete process will take the several months to carry out the full necessary investigation.