A plane carrying 162 passengers has been reported missing.
The Air Asia flight allegedly lost lost contact with Indonesian air traffic control early Sunday.
Search operation for the missing AirAsia Flight QZ8501 which begam immediately has been halted for the night, but big ships won’t return to shore and will leave their searchlights on, according to the Indonesian Transportation Ministry.
Flight QZ8501 which was travelling from Surabaya, Indonesia, to Singapore before communication, asked to fly at a higher altitude because of bad weather, officials said.
“The plane has lost contact at 06:17 a.m. local time,” the Indonesian Transportation Ministry’s acting director general for air transportation affairs, Djoko Murdjatmojo, said. The aircraft disappeared from radar observations at 6:18 a.m., and air traffic control officers monitored the presence of the plane until 7:55 a.m, he added.
Of the 162 people on board the budget airline, 155 were passengers including 138 adults, 16 children and one infant.
This is the second time in less than a year that a commercial airline will be reported missing in Southeast Asia