AirAsia QZ8501: Indonesia plane 'at bottom of sea'

The missing AirAsia Indonesia flight QZ8501 is likely to be at the bottom of the sea, the head of Indonesia's search-and-rescue agency has said.

Bambang Soelistyo said the hypothesis was based on the co-ordinates of the plane when contact with it was lost.
The search is continuing for the aircraft, a day after it disappeared with 162 people on board, but no trace has been found so far.
The Airbus A320-200 was on a flight to Singapore.


The pilots had requested a course change because of bad weather but did not send any distress call before the plane disappeared from radar screens.
"Based on the co-ordinates given to us and evaluation that the estimated crash position is in the sea, the hypothesis is the plane is at the bottom of the sea," Bambang Soelistyo, the head of Indonesia's search and rescue agency, told a news conference in Jakarta.

Flight QZ8501 had left Surabaya in eastern Java at 05:35 on Sunday (22:35 GMT Saturday) and was due to arrive in Singapore at 08:30 (00:30 GMT).
The pilot radioed at 06:24 local time asking permission to climb to 38,000ft (11,000m) to avoid the dense storm clouds.

Suwarto, the father of one of the pilots, says he is trusting in "God's will"

Indonesian officials said the request could not be immediately approved due to traffic, but the plane disappeared from the radar screens before the pilots gave any further response.
AirAsia boss Tony Fernandes said this was his "worst nightmare".
Mr Fernandes flew to Surabaya and later said: "We are very devastated by what's happened, it's unbelievable."

Relatives pored over passenger manifests at both affected airports
 

The Airbus, pictured here on an earlier flight, disappeared about an hour after takeoff

Co-pilot Remi Emmanuel Plesel (left) and Captain Iriyanto

 

A woman leaves the cordoned off area in Changi airport in Singapore

The 

commander of Indonesia's naval search and rescue points to the search area on a map

Oceanographer Simon Boxall told the BBC the plane should not be too difficult to find if it went into the water.
The sea floor is within diver depth, he says, and it would be "likely that they'll get answers within a few days".
Difficult year The AirAsia Indonesia plane was delivered in 2008, has flown 13,600 times, completing 23,000 hours, and underwent its last maintenance in November.
The captain, Iriyanto, had more than 20,500 flight hours, almost 7,000 of them with AirAsia, Mr Fernandes said. The co-pilot is French national Remi Emmanuel Plesel.
The AirAsia group has previously had no fatal accidents involving its aircraft. The airline has set up an emergency line for family or friends of those who may be on board. The number is +622 129 850 801.
Special centres were set up at both Singapore's Changi airport and Juanda international airport in Surabaya.
There were 155 passengers on board, the company said in a statement:

• 137 adults, 17 children and one infant
• Most were Indonesian but also one UK national, a Malaysian, a Singaporean and three South Koreans
• The BBC understands that the British national is Chi-Man Choi
• Two pilots and five crew were also on board - one French, the others Indonesian

This has been a difficult year for aviation in Asia - Malaysia's national carrier Malaysia Airlines has suffered two losses - flights MH370 and MH17.
Flight MH370 disappeared on a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing in March with 239 passengers and crew. The wreckage, thought to be in the southern Indian Ocean, has still not been located.
MH17 was shot down over Ukraine in July, killing all 298 on board.