After the search and rescue — which has become a grim recovery mission — investigators will try to solve the mystery of the crash of Lion Air flight 610. 189 people are presumed dead after the crash. The craft itself was new, with only 800 hours of flight time, according to the National Transport Safety Committee in Indonesia. The fuselage and flight recorders are yet to be recovered, although the water at the crash site is shallow, barely 135 feet deep.
One clue may be a malfunction reported on its previous flight. In the maintenance logs, they note “IA5 or ALT DISAGREE SHOWN AFTER TAKEOFF.” The airspeed and altitude indications disagreed after takeoff. Maintenance did sign off on the issue before the flight. (Source AirTrafficVisualized)
“The captain, Bhavye Suneja had 6,000 hours of flight experience, and his copilot had more than 5,000,” said a spokesperson from Lion Air. Lion Air has 11 more 737 Max 8 planes in their fleet. All of these craft are subject to ministry inspection in Indonesia.
Why does a new, state-of-the-art plane crash without an apparent pilot — or weather — issue? Was it birds, as happened with the famous Flight 1549 on the Hudson? Failure due to maintenance issues? Or a fault in that particular craft? Investigators will move quickly to identify a cause.
Daniel Putut Adi Kuncoro, managing director at Lion Air group, confirmed that the ministry is currently examining the remaining 737 Max 8s in the fleet. “We are waiting for their results.”
Meanwhile, Boeing will be participating in the fuller investigation to discover the cause of the crash. To ascertain cause, will almost certainly require both the fuselage and flight data recorders. So far, debris and search teams recovered some bodies.
Details
- Boeing 737-8 MAX
- Age: 3 months
- Hours in service: approximately 800
- First flight: July 30, 2018
- Line number: 37058
- Power plant: CFMI LEAP-1B
What we do know
- 189 people died (or are presumed to have died)
- there were maintenance issues the night before the flight after an issue was reported (no more details)
- the craft went down at 6:30 am Monday, Oct 29
- the flight departed from Jakarta, with a destination of Pangkal Pinang
- after takeoff, the flight climbed to approximately 5500 feet
- disappeared from radar 12 minutes into the flight
- 182 passengers, two pilots and five cabin crew on board
- Some bodies recovered
About Boeing 737 Max
The Boeing 737 MAX is a narrow-body aircraft from Boeing Commercial Airplanes, and is the fourth generation of the 737:
- First flight in service Jan 29,2016
- FAA certification March 8, 2017
- First delivery May 6, 2017, to Milindo Air
- Powerplant: CFM International Leap-IB powerplant, designed to maximize efficiency
- As of September 2018, 219 in service
- Cost varies from US$96 million to 129.9 million.