Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 Search Operation Continued With Bright Spot Of Black Box Existence

JAKARTA - Today is the third day for the joint SAR team consisting of Basarnas, TNI, Polri, and volunteers who are again looking for plane debris and victims of Sriwijaya Air SJ-182.

Today, the search rescue unit (SRU) is adding to the focus of the search, namely the search for aircraft black boxes. The marine SRU is concentrating its search in the underwater area to find the position of the black box and body parts of the victims.

"For under the surface, maybe we will concentrate more on searching or evacuating victims, as well as parts of the aircraft. On the other hand, we also continue to search for black boxes," said the Head of the National SAR Agency (Basarnas) Marsyda Bagus Puruhito at the JICT Integrated Command Post. II, Sunday, January 10 evening.

Then, the marine SRU also expanded the search area above the water surface according to the drift from the victim's body parts and plane fragments. SRU Laut also carries out sweeping in the coastal area according to the search area as far as 25 NM.

Then, the special marine SRU divers concentrated on dives around the area where the body parts and aircraft debris were found. The air SRU carried out a search in the mapped area.

In today's operation, there are six sectors of the search operation with a total of 53 vessels, ranging from marine warships or KRI to fisheries surveillance vessels.

"As for our plan, we are still operating in the same area, using the method below and at sea level, by slightly widening the search area and increasing searches on the coast because of the current from the sea to the coast," explained Bagus.

From yesterday's search operation until 19.20 WIB, the joint search team had obtained 16 bags containing fragments or pieces of the fuselage, 10 body bags containing parts of the victims, and 5 pieces of clothing.

TNI Commander Marshal Hadi Tjahjanto said that the black box signal of the Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 aircraft had been monitored by the joint search team. When the black box signal has been caught by radar, Hadi hopes that the two black boxes of the plane that crashed in the waters of the Thousand Islands can be found immediately.

"Evidently, the two signals issued by the black box can continue to be monitored and can now be marked. Hopefully, in the not too distant future it can be picked up," said Hadi.

The black box installed on an airplane is divided into two parts, namely the Flight Data Recorder (FDR) and the Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR). FDR is responsible for storing flight parameters for 25 hours before being overwritten with a new record. This information includes speed, altitude, time, and direction of the aircraft.

Meanwhile, CVR keeps conversations between the pilot and his crew or the control tower. The recording period is two hours, after which it will continue to re-record itself and overwrite the previous data.

"Until now, we continue to strive to obtain black boxes, so that they can become materials for the National Transportation Safety Committee to find out the cause of the accident," explained Hadi.

Basarnas has prepared a scheme to search for black boxes and victims of the Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 plane that crashed in the Thousand Islands. Divers will be divided into the search to be carried out Monday, January 11 morning.

"From Basarnas, there are 30 divers and assisted by the Navy, Kopaska, Marines, Denjaka, a total of 150 personnel are assisted by volunteers. (So) there are approximately 200 in the field, ”said Basarnas Deputy for Operations, Relief and Preparedness, Bambang Suryo Aji.

It is planned that the dive operation for the search for black box and victims of the Sriwijaya Air plane for the Jakarta-Pontianak route which crashed on Saturday, January 9 afternoon will start around 07.00-08.00 WIB.