Indonesian investigators have said that a faulty part and subsequent “crew action” caused the Air Asia plane crash that killed 162 people.
The Airbus A320 aircraft crashed into the Java Sea on December 28,2014, less than halfway into a two-hour flight from the Indonesia city of Surabaya to Singapore.
According to investigators the system that helps control the plane’s rudder; the Rudder Travel Limiter – had a cracked solder joint that malfunctioned four times during the flight and 23 times the previous year.
What this means according to investigators is that the faulty system sent the pilots on flight QZ8501 repeated warning messages.
The thinking is that they pulled the circuit breaker to reset the system – which also crucially turned off the autopilot and meant they were flying the jet manually, said investigators.
According to Indonesia’s national transport safety committee, “Subsequent flight crew action resulted in inability to control the aircraft causing the aircraft to depart from the normal flight envelope and enter a prolonged stall condition that was beyond the capability of the flight crew to recover.”
Warning alarms were “screaming” as the pilots fought to stabilise the plane.
The black box data recorder showed the jet had soared from 32,000 feet to 37,400 feet in 30 seconds before it lost lift and stalled.
Today’s final report into the disaster said there were no indications bad weather had played a part contradicting suggestions at the time of the crash.
Large chunks of wreckage were recovered from the sea in January following a massive international search involving dozens of planes and ships.
Among the victims was British-born businessman Chi Man Choi and his two-year-old daughter Zoe, who were flying to Singapore for New Year’s Eve celebrations.
Recalled that On 28, 2014, the aircraft operating the route, an Airbus A320-216, crashed into the Java Sea during bad weather, killing all 156 passengers and seven crew on board.
Two days after the crash, debris from the aircraft and human remains were found floating in the Java Sea.
