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11/02/2024 03:30:00 pm

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AirAsia Flight 8501 Black Boxes Found -Indonesian Searchers

AirAsia 8501 Tail Recovered

(Photo : Reuters) A section of the tail of AirAsia QZ8501 is lifted off the deck of the ship Crest Onyx, the day after it was removed from the seabed, in Indonesia's Kumai Port on January 11, 2015.

Divers will try to raise the black boxes of AirAsia flight 9501 from the bottom of the sea on Monday after investigators believe they have zeroed in on their signal, an Indonesian search coordinator said on Sunday.

A statement from Tonny Budiono, the team officer of Indonesia's Directorate of Sea Transport, said navy divers have succeeded in finding the black boxes through pings from the boxes about a hundred feet below the surface of the Java Sea.

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He adds the boxes apparently rest beneath debris from the AirAsia plane and are around 18 meters apart. Crews will try to bring them to the surface on Monday either by inflating balloons below sea to raise the wreckage or pulling pieces of the jet below the surface, said Budiono. Balloons were used to push the tail of the doomed plane to the surface on Saturday.

Powerful waves, strong winds and torrential rains have bogged down the search. Divers said, even when seas are calm, they can only see no more than three feet in the water.

On Sunday, divers stepped up search efforts with favorable sea conditions. Detection equipment pointed to a huge object near the pings and searchers initially believed it to be the body of the Airbus A320. The divers later confirmed it was a wing and engine debris.

AirAsia said in a statement on Saturday, the recovered tail was moved to Pangkalan Bun and then turned over to Indonesia's aviation safety investigators.

Searchers hoped the tail would have the black boxes, but they apparently got detached during the crash. Their beacons send out signals for about a month until the batteries die, which leaves divers about two weeks before the boxes go silent.

Rescuers have recovered some 48 bodies so far. AirAsia said 32 of the remains have been identified.

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