১৮৯ জনকে নিয়ে সাগরে ভেঙে পড়ল ইন্দোনেশীয় বিমান
All 189 aboard crashed Lion Air flight feared dead in Indonesia

October 29: In a shocking incident, an Indonesian airplane operated by budget airline Lion Air crashed shortly after takeoff at Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta airport on Monday, authorities confirmed. The aircraft reportedly crashed just 13 minutes after takeoff, likely into the Java Sea. According to Lion Air, there were a total of 189 people on board, including eight crew members. At least 23 government officials were reportedly among the passengers on the plane, as well as two babies and one older child.

Lion Air said that the aircraft was a passenger plane en route to Pangkal Pinang on a Bangka Island, east of Sumatra. Some 300 people, including police, soldiers and local fishermen are involved in the search. Divers are currently trying to locate the plane’s fuselage which is believed to be lying on the sea floor at a depth of around 35 meters (115 feet). Swedish flight tracking service Flightradar24 reported that the airplane was a Boeing 737 MAX 8 that had been delivered to Lion Air in August. They also wrote on Twitter that “preliminary data show an increase in speed and decrease in altitude at last transmission.”

Captain Bhavye Suneja, a 31-year-old Indian with 6,000 hours of flying experience, was at the controls of the Lion Air jet that crashed into the sea with 189 people on board. He was from Mayur Vihar, Delhi. He was assisted by by co-pilot Harvino. By Monday afternoon, rescuers said it was unlikely that survivors would be found. “I suspect all the passengers are dead,” said Marine Brig. Gen. Bambang Suryo, director of operations for the search and rescue agency.

The crash on Monday also puts a dent in Indonesia’s aviation industry. Its aviation companies had just been cleared by the European Union earlier this year from its blacklist due to the country making sufficient improvements to raise its safety levels. The ban has been in place since 2007 in the wake of two major accidents involving Garuda and now-defunct Adam Air. The U.S. removed Indonesia from a similar list in 2016.

The fatal incident may also rekindle the ongoing concern that low-cost carriers are unsafe. While budget carriers — which have expanded rapidly in Southeast Asia as more people travel — do cut various costs to keep fares low, strict rules on safety regulations set out by relevant authorities mean they cannot compromise on safety.