AirAsia Flight 8501 Plane Crash Update: Indonesian government ends search operations; Families of passengers left devastated

By Staff Writer

Mar 02, 2015 07:07 AM EST

The Air Asia QZ 8501 search and retrieval operation has officially come to an end as officials of the retrieval operation announced this February 28. The flight from Indonesia to Singapore crashed last December 28, 2014 together with 162 people, both passengers and crew of the said flight. A total of 103 bodies have been found after the maximum efforts have been already applied to search and retrieve the bodies inside the crashed plane.

Meeting with the devastated relatives of the passengers and the crew are set to be schedules as part of the closure of the operation. Singapore, Malaysia, China, USA, Australia, Japan, South Korea and Australia are also part of the search operations but have not given any comments about their own retrieval operations.

Several attempts to lift the fuselage of the crashed Air Asia have been performed in the past months. The last attempt was another failure last January 25, Sunday. The fuselage sank back after the rope that connects the wreckage to the lifting balloon broke.

"We could not fight against nature." This is the statement given by Manahan Simorangkir, Navy spokesman of the retrieval operations. The strong currents have always been the main obstacle the group had to face during the retrieval operations. They have long hoped for a better weather that could possibly allow them to do the retrieval process even better but they have failed up until the announcement of the end of the search. Another body was found during that last attempt to lift the wreckage. Even the retrieval of the bodies was a hurdle because of the unforgiving weather in the area.

Transportation officials denied that there was a sabotage that caused the crash. The crash was suspected to be caused by bad weather. Pilots of the Air Asia 8501 disappeared after not being allowed to go to a higher altitude during that unfaithful day.

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