SAR Team Difficult To Find Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 This Morning, Waves Up To 2.5 Meters

One of the ships that helped evacuate Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 (Angga Nugraha / VOI)

JAKARTA - Basarnas Operations Director, Brig. Gen. Rasman, said that the operation to find victims and materials for the Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 plane this morning was hampered by the harsh weather.

Rasman said strong winds around the waters of the Thousand Islands resulted in the appearance of high waves. Thus, making it difficult for the SAR team to search.

"Today the weather conditions are very unfriendly. It is very unfavorable for diving. The last data I received in the field, wave height of 1.5 meters to 2.5 meters with wind speeds of around 31 knots," said Rasman at the JICT II Integrated Command Post. , North Jakarta, Tuesday, January 19.

Rasman admitted that the high wave conditions with strong winds would endanger the safety of the diver team conducting searches under the sea.

"Therefore, until now no one has disembarked and is still on board. The ship is also now taking shelter behind the island so that it is not swayed by the high waves," he said.

If the weather is no longer bad, Rasman continued, the joint SAR team will carry out operations by shrinking the search area. Reduction of this area is carried out by a team of divers on a search below sea level.

The SAR team's initial operations were divided into six sectors, now it is divided into four sectors. Meanwhile, monitoring of findings in the air sector remains mapped in the same area as yesterday.

Rasman said the reason the SAR team reduced the search sector was due to the increasing number of search results being found. Thus, there are a number of points in the last known position (LKP) or the location of the crash that has been cleared of victims and material.

"For Sriwijaya's handling on the eleventh day, our operations are in principle the same as yesterday's operations. Only because there are fewer search objects below, we will also narrow down and focus more on the sectors where so far we can get many search objects. So, we no longer spread too far, "he explained.

As for today's search, the joint SAR team is still searching for aircraft victims, aircraft engine parts, and black boxes with the cockpit voice recorder (CVR) type.

Yesterday, the SAR team found the CVR black box casing. However, the casing was detached from the core material that could dismantle the cause of the crash, namely the memory section.

To date, the total search findings for Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 are 310 body bags containing body parts. Then, there are 115 aircraft materials, with details of 60 small bags containing aircraft debris and 55 large aircraft pieces. Then, one black box with the type of flight data recorder (FDR).