All 189 passengers, the Indian pilot and crew aboard a crashed Indonesian Lion Air jet were likely killed in the accident, rescue officials said on Monday, as they announced they had found human remains and would continue the grim search through the night.
The Boeing-737 MAX, which went into service just months ago, vanished from radar 13 minutes after taking off from Jakarta Soekarno Hatta International Airport, plunging into the Java Sea moments after it had asked to return to Jakarta.
Websites that display flight data showed the plane speeding up as it suddenly lost altitude before it disappeared, with authorities saying witnesses saw the jet plunge into the water.
Indian pilot Bhavye Suneja, 31, captained the plane, Indian Embassy here confirmed.
Some 40 divers are part of about 150 personnel at the scene, authorities said, with the plane wreckage some 30 to 40 metres deep in the water.
Earlier, video footage apparently filmed at the scene of the crash showed a slick of fuel on the surface of the water and pictures showed what appeared to be an emergency slide and bits of wreckage bearing Lion Air’s logo.
The carrier acknowledged that the jet had previously been grounded for unspecified repairs. The disaster is a setback for Indonesia’s airline industry, which just emerged from decadelong bans by the European Union and the US Over safety concerns.