Jayapura: The bodies of 17 of the 54 people killed when a plane went down in eastern Indonesia were yesterday physically carried from the remote crash site as bad weather hampered efforts to airlift them.
The bodies of 17 people who died when the Trigana Air plane crashed during a short flight in bad weather last Sunday were taken by hundreds of locals and rescuers through jungle and over mountains in Papua province.
The bodies arrived at the settlement of Oksibil, the intended destination of the ATR 42-300 plane, after a gruelling, hours-long journey.
Four bodies were flown on to Papua’s capital Jayapura while the other 13 are still in the local hospital, transport ministry spokesman J A Barata said.
The recovery effort was halted at nightfall and will resume again today.
Authorities had initially hoped to use helicopters to airlift the bodies from the site, but bad weather made it too dangerous to fly in the area yesterday.
“The current conditions make it impossible for us to use helicopters, so we have to do it via land,” said local military spokesman Pudji Teguh Rahardjo.
The tragedy was just the latest air accident in Indonesia, which has a poor aviation safety record and has suffered major disasters in recent months, including the crash of an AirAsia plane in December with the loss of 162 lives. It took rescuers two days to reach the site, about 15 kilometres from Oksibil, after initial efforts were hindered by the rough terrain and bad weather.
They found the twin-turboprop aircraft in pieces scattered across a fire-blackened clearing, and the bodies of the 49 passengers and five crew who were aboard.
They also recovered the plane’s black box flight data recorders, and some of the 6.5bn rupiah ($470,000) in government social assistance funds that was being transported for distribution to poor families.
A portion of the currency was burnt. A team of three investigators from France’s BEA agency, which probes air accidents, and four technical advisors from ATR, a European plane maker based in France, is heading to Indonesia to look into the accident.
The plane had set off from Jayapura on what was supposed to be a 45-minute flight to Oksibil.
It lost contact 10 minutes before landing as it sought to descend in heavy cloud and rain.
The airline has said the accident was most likely caused by bad weather.
AFP
