Australia offers Indonesia more air crash help

CANBERRA, Mar 8 (Reuters) Australia has offered Indonesia more medical aid in the wake of a Garuda Indonesia passenger jet crash in which five Australians have gone missing, feared dead.

Australia's Jakarta Embassy contacted the office of Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono with an offer of more medical help, Prime Minister John Howard said as one of Australia's top burns specialists flew in to assist victims.

''The Indonesians have indicated that they will be very ready to take that up if it is needed,'' Howard told Australian television today.

Twenty-three people were confirmed dead after a Garuda jet overshot the runway and burst into flames yesterday as it landed in the cultural capital of Yogyakarta, in central Java.

More than 140 people on board survived, but Australia is still searching local hospitals for five of its citizens, who are missing feared dead. They included two federal police officers, aid official Allison Sudrajat, journalist Morgan Mellish and the Jakarta Embassy spokeswoman, Liz O'Neill.

Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty said there was no evidence the crash was anything other than an accident and AFP disaster victim identification experts were helping their Indonesian counterparts at the crash site.

''Unfortunately we are once again working on another tragedy in Indonesia,'' an emotional Keelty said, admitting hopes were fading for two missing AFP officers, Brice Steele and Mark Scott, missing in the crash.

Steele was one of Australia's two most senior overseas-based counter-terrorism officers, said Keelty.

Australia's Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer, who visited crash victims yesterday, said two Australian air force officers who survived told him the plane had been travelling too fast.

''The aircraft came in way too fast, was unable to stop in time and then ploughed across the end of the runway through a road,'' Downer told Australian television.

Crash survivor Kyle Quinlan, a member of the Australian military on board, said the plane had bounced heavily on landing.

''I looked out on the right and side and saw how fast we were coming in, that's when we hit the ground,'' he said.

Australia flew an emergency medical team to Indonesia overnight by a Defence Force C-130 transport. Top burns expert Dr Fiona Wood, who developed an artificial skin used in the wake of extremist bombings in Bali in 2002 and 2005, was expected to arrive in Yogyakarta today.

''You could not get a better person to assist,'' Howard said.

An Australian journalist, Cynthia Banham, suffered severe burns in the crash and was flown from Yogyakarta to hospital in Perth, where doctors described her condition as stable. Another Australian man was flown to care in Singapore.

Howard said embassy officials were combing Indonesian hospitals for crash survivors and now was not the time to pressure Indonesia on its poor air safety record.

Indonesia has suffered a string of transport accidents in recent months, including an Adam Air plane that disappeared in January with 102 passengers and crew on board, and a ferry sinking in late December in which hundreds died.

Reuters SRS VP0540