Report: AirAsia crash down to rudder issue, pilot acts

By Ainur Rohmah

JAKARTA

Indonesian officials revealed Tuesday that the AirAsia flight that crashed into the Java Sea last year had suffered from problems with its rudder system, to which the pilots responded by resetting a circuit breaker.

Flight QZ8501 disappeared Dec. 28 with 162 people on board, with radar data showing the Airbus A320 climbing at an abnormally high rate before the accident.

An official from the National Transportation Safety Committee said that analysis of the flight data recorder showed that warning signs had popped up four times due to disturbances in the rudder control system after the plane departed for the two-hour flight.

Nurcahyo Utomo told reporters that the pilots had responded by resetting a circuit breaker and cutting off power to the rudder system so they could manually control the plane, which then stalled.

"This [scenario] is already beyond the ability of the pilots," state news agency Antara quoted the head of the safety committee’s Sub-Committee on Flights Transportation Accident Investigation as saying.

"Disturbances in the RTL [Rudder Travel Limiter] system are in fact not dangerous," he added.

Tony Fernandes, CEO of AirAsia, has expressed his gratitude to the investigative team in a statement to Anadolu Agency.

“My thoughts are to the families and my crew who are still our top priority,” he said Tuesday. “These are scars that are left on me forever but I remain committed to make Airasia the very best. We owe it to the families and my crew.”

Fernandes stressed that aviation authorities would “not leave any stone unturned” in ensuring that lessons would be learned from the tragedy.

“There is much to be learned here for Airasia, the manufacturer and the aviation industry,” he said.

The flight had been traveling from Surabaya, Indonesia’s second largest city, to Singapore when the pilot requested to divert around bad weather – which the investigation has ruled out as a factor in the crash.

The plane's two "black box" flight recorders revealed several "screaming" alarms that drowned out the sound of the pilots’ voices.

Of the 155 passengers and seven crew on board, the bodies of 106 have been found.