Indonesia resumes search for missing airliner

Makassar (Indonesia), Jan 3: Indonesian rescuers launched a new search today for a missing plane with 102 people aboard after initial reports of its wreckage had been found turned out to be false.

Senior government officials have apologised for erroneously saying the Boeing 737-400, operated by budget carrier Adam Air, had been spotted in the mountains of Indonesia's eastern Sulawesi island, where it had disappeared in heavy rain.

Transport Minister Hatta Radjasa also denied reports coming the airline and government officials that 12 people who were on board the ill-fated plane had survived.

After a day filled with confusing information, rescuers resumed the search using military planes in areas around the western coast of rugged Sulawesi island where the plane that went missing on Monday gave out distress signals.

''Today, we will focus the search ... at two spots between Majene and Toraja,'' Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Firdaus Syamsudin told Reuters. Majene is a coastal town and Toraja a mountainous area popular with tourists.

The search began at daybreak amid heavy rain and strong winds and was coordinated from Makassar, Sulawesi's largest city, located some 1,400 km east of Jakarta.

The plane was carrying 96 passengers and six crew. A copy of its manifest showed three passengers as non-Indonesians. The United States embassy in Jakarta said they were Americans.

Syamsudin said the mistaken information about the plane came from reports from a local village that police then relayed to agencies.

ANXIOUS RELATIVES

The confusion over the missing plane highlighted the logistial difficulties of dealing with disasters from earthquakes and volcanoes to landslides, floods and forest fires in an archipelago that stretches about as wide as the United States.

Relatives of passengers anxiously awaiting news in Makassar reacted with shock and dismay to the apologetic explanations.

Sopiana de Fretes, 49, related to an army official on the plane, said: ''Since I got here, the news has been conflicting.

It's like we don't get the news that we are supposed to get.'' Joseph Umar Hadi, a member of the Indonesian parliament's transport commission from the opposition Indonesian Democratic Party Struggle, said Jakarta should be held accountable for the mix-up.

''We understand that everybody wants to find it as soon as possible and any news would be welcome. But we question the government for not double-checking the data before they spread the information on discovery to the public,'' he said.

The plane lost contact with the ground on Monday about an hour before it was due to land in Manado in North Sulawesi.

The plane went missing just two days after a ferry carrying more than 600 people sank in bad weather off the main island of Java. At least 200 were saved and rescuers were still finding survivors on Tuesday, but some 400 were still unaccounted for.

Transport officials have insisted the Boeing was airworthy and had no record of trouble.

The transport ministry said it had last evaluated the plane in December 2005, when it had passed all service checks. The 17-year-old aircraft was due to be checked again in late January.

The Boeing had 45,371 flying hours and, according to Adam Air, was powered by General Electric CFM56-3C1 engines.

Air travel in Indonesia, home to 220 million people, has grown substantially since the liberalisation of the airline industry after the Asian financial crisis in the late 1990s, which enabled privately owned budget airlines to operate.

REUTERS

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