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Indonesia's top rescue official told CNN that authorities believe the missing AirAsia jet is likely at "the bottom of the sea", based on the radar data from the plane's last contact. "(Because) the coordinate that was given to us and the evolution from the calculation point of the flight track is at sea, our early conjecture is that the plane is in the bottom of the sea," Marsdya Tni Hendry Bambang, head of Indonesia's national search and rescues said.
AirAsia says air traffic controllers lost contact with the aircraft at 7:24 a.m. Sunday Singapore time. There were 162 passengers aboard the flight. Helicopters, ships, and airplanes were sent to search a wide area that was determined by those final coordinates.
Before the plane lost contact with air traffic controllers, one of the pilots asked to fly at a higher altitude because of bad weather, CNN reports.
[via CNN]
