AirAsia- Indonesia Jet Lost in Java Sea

Another Malaysia Jet
They lost track of this one only 8 minutes after takeoff, so they should be able to find it. It was an AirAsia jet / Malaysian division(ultra low cost carrier) which has a fleet of 80 Airbus 320's packed with 180 seats per plane (only 25 empty seats).

PK-AXC is just over 6 years old having flown it's first flight on 25. Sep 2008. It's a short haul plane having flown twice round trip from Surabaya (SUB) to Kuala Lumpur (KUL) and once to Jakarta (CGK) the day before (17 hours of operations). This early morning flight from SUB to Singapore was the first of the day.

Almost all passengers were Indonesian. I don't think there were any Americans or Europeans on the flight. The weather was bad.

http://www.flightradar24.com/data/airplanes/pk-axc/#5240449

An A320 was the jet involved in the Miracle on the Hudson six years ago. So there is some hope of another miracle on the Java Sea.

The Java Sea is entirely on the continental shelf and has a mean depth of 150'.

Quote: Pacomartin

Another Malaysia Jet
They lost track of this one only 8 minutes after takeoff,

And reported it five hours later. Even internal notification was delayed about an hour. Any western airline would delay no more than ten minutes.

First Officer is French national, but virtually all Self Loading Freight would be Indonesian.

Most recent maintenance Nov 14th.

Sought to deviate around morning thunderstorm. May have tried to outclimb it (mistake).

Nothing remarkable on load and balance.

Radar box may show plane was slow in Ground Speed possibly due to pilot's focusing on indicated air speed and true airspeed so as to be slow enough to penetrate turbulent air but not too slow. Indicated air speed would be hopping all over the place.

Query as to AoA indicators forcing Flight System in to alternate mode by indicating way too low an airspeed.

Wreckage spotted near Beitilung Island, Indonesia and about 120 miles SW of Borneo.

Quote: Fleastiff

Wreckage spotted near Beitilung Island, Indonesia and about 120 miles SW of Borneo.

There is a 6000' runway on the island, which may have been the destination of the pilots.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.A.S._Hanandjoeddin_Airport

That area of the world, I sell Silk Air instead.

Uh Oh. http://www.cnn.com/2014/12/27/world/asia/airasia-missing-plane/index.html

Quote: Pacomartin

There is a 6000' runway on the island, which may have been the destination of the pilots.

I think whatever happened took place at too high an altitude for there to have been much of a destination at all. Morning thunderstorms develop quickly and climb faster than the plane can. Overflying one is a bad decision particularly in a plane where the Mode can be changed by wildly changing AoA indicators or wildly erratic IAS readings, thus dumping flying tasks onto the crew rather than the computer.

Pitot tubes ice up during flight above a thunderstorm, readings are in error pilots get "overspeed warning" that is false, plane is in an accelerated stall at high altitude and pilots fail to keep the nose at two degrees high as pilots are focused on false speed indications.

AF447 Redux?

NOTE SAR EFFORTS: they had plenty of daylight but visibility was never more than three miles.

Quote: Fleastiff

I think whatever happened took place at too high an altitude for there to have been much of a destination at all.

That was pretty much a WAG. The pilots radioed that they wanted to change course. The island is about halfway on their route and seems to be the nearest landing strip. On the other hand they could have just crashed near the island without any attempt at an emergency landing.

It is now 10:30 at night local time, and the plane left at 5:40 AM. So after 15 hours lucky save seems out of the question.

I would hate to die crowded into a budget airline.

Quote: Pacomartin

I would hate to die crowded into a budget airline.

Wouldn't be much of a thrill in a spacious private jet either.

They deviated both left and right around a storm and then probably found one that had been hidden and opted to climb to avoid heavy weather although there was some traffic conflict briefly.

If it was a high altitude accelerated stall while at the coffin corner that was misinterpreted due to iced pitot tubes, they might well have come down in one piece but if it was supercell versus rivets at high altitude then I would expect a large debris field.

aircraft contacted Jakarta Center at 06:12L (23:12Z) while enroute at FL320 and requested to deviate left of airway M635 and to climb to FL380.
At 06:16L the aircraft was observed normally, radio contact occurred.
At 06:17L radio contact was lost, the transponder (ADS-B) remained available-
at 06:18L the transponder was lost as well, the last recorded position was S3.3708 E109.6911
(about 110nm east southeast of Pulau Belitung).
50 minutes later INCERFA (aircraft position uncertain alert),
70 minutes later ALERTFA (emergency alert)
98 minutes later DETRESFA (distress alert) was declared by ATC.

The 50, 70 and 98 minute delays are utterly disgraceful, but quite understandable for Indonesian culture where the rule is do nothing unusual, hope for the best and hope your shift ends before it hits the fan.

I think we need a third thread devoted to the latest Asian air disaster/mystery.