French judge to probe Air Asia QZ8501 crash

Posted on 1 February 2015 - 06:16pm
Last updated on 1 February 2015 - 08:52pm

Print

PARIS: France has opened a formal criminal investigation into the crash of QZ8501 in the Java Sea last month while a French co-pilot was at the controls, a judicial source said on Friday.

A judge will investigate possible manslaughter in connection with the crash that killed all 162 people on board.

Flight QZ8501 went down in stormy weather on Dec 28 in the Java Sea during what was supposed to be a short trip from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore.

Only 72 bodies have so far been recovered.

Last Thursday, Indonesia's National Transportation Safety Committee, which has been analysing the plane's black boxes, said that prior to the crash, the aircraft had climbed fast in an area packed with huge storm clouds, and the stall alarms started going off.

They also revealed that the Airbus A320-200's less experienced French co-pilot, Remi Plesel, was flying the plane before it went down, rather than Captain Iriyanto, a former fighter pilot who had around 20,000 hours of flying time.

Plesel's family in France separately filed charges against AirAsia Indonesia for "endangering the life of others" as the airline did not have permission to carry out the flight between Surabaya and Singapore on the day of the crash.

"Remi Plesel's family are delighted at this criminal investigation which, we hope, will reveal the truth," said their lawyer Eddy Arneton.

"It will allow us to finally ask the right questions."

Meanwhile, in JAKARTA, Indonesian rescuers today resumed their search for 86 victims still missing from the crash, an official said.

National search and rescue agency chief Bambang Soelistyo last week said search teams were being given two days' break after weeks searching in inhospitable conditions.

"Search operations have resumed. Our focus now is to find bodies that could be trapped in the fuselage, or buried in mud," S. B. Supriyadi, a search and rescue agency official who has been coordinating the hunt, said.

The search mission has been expanded to the island of Sulawesi after fishermen found bodies with identity documents matching the passengers on the ill-fated flight.

The Indonesian military, which has provided the bulk of personnel and equipment for the operation, withdrew from the search last Tuesday. – AFP