Air Asia flight reportedly ‘at the Bottom of the Sea’ as search effort continues

Head of the search and rescue team for the missing Indonesia AirAsia flight 8501 which vanished a day earlier, Bambang Soelistyo, has told reporters in Jakarta that "the hypothesis is the plane is at the bottom of the sea." The chief of the search effort also added that this is "the preliminary suspicion and it can develop based on the evaluation of the result of our search."

The AirAsia flight bound to Singapore from Indonesia had 162 people, including children and an infant on board. It disappeared from air traffic radar early Sunday and authorities are still scrambling to locate its whereabouts.

A statement released by Sunu Widyatmoko, CEO of AirAsia Indonesia, said that AirAsia was "deeply shocked and saddened by this incident. We are cooperating with the relevant authorities to the fullest extent to determine the cause of this incident. In the meantime, our main priority is keeping the families of our passengers and colleagues informed on the latest developments."


"We will release further information as soon as it becomes available and our thoughts and prayers are with those on board QZ8501," he said.

Meanwhile the CEO of AirAsia, Tony Fernandes, has stated that "Until today we have never lost a life. But I think any airline CEO who says that he can guarantee that his airline is 100 percent safe is not accurate. There are so many factors." "And right now we cannot speculate as to what was the cause of the accident."