2014 has proven to be an especially tragic year for air travel in Southeast Asia, and in the last 24 hours it has been compounded by the loss of another plane. AirAsia Flight 8501 vanished over the Indonesian Sea Sunday, Dec. 28, and as of now there is no trace of the craft. The flight, carrying 162 people, departed Surabaya for Singapore, but not long into the trip the pilot asked to change his course. At 6:13 a.m., Flight 8501 was reportedly in the middle of dense fog and thunderstorm and the pilot asked to gain speed and altitude in an attempt to fly over the clouds. The flight was last seen on the radar at 6:16 a.m., and after several hours of searching efforts to find the missing plane have been halted until daylight.
The Airbus A320 took off from Surabaya, Indonesia's second largest airport, with an Indonesian captain and a French co-pilot, five cabin crew members and 155 passengers, including 16 children and one infant. According to an official statement by AirAsia, most of the passengers were Indonesians. There were also three South Koreans, a Malaysian, a British national and his 2-year-old Singaporean daughter. The captain reportedly has more than 20,000 flying hours and the first officer has 2,275 flying hours.
At Surabaya airport, families were gathered together in a small room, attempting to comfort each other as they await word on the fate of the flight. AirAsia is 49 percent owned by Malaysia, which makes this the third ill-fated flight of this calendar year for that country.
Currently, 239 people are still missing from Flight 370, the fate of which still remains a mystery. Then in the summer, 298 people died on Flight 17 when it was shot down over Ukraine. It is the kind of catastrophe that has not only hurt business, but also put a smear on air travel in Southeast Asia in general.
Supposedly, night fall combined with dense fog is what prompted searchers to stop looking for Flight 8501 for the next several hours.
Why do you think this part of the world has had such a disastrous year? Is it simply bad luck or is there more to it than that? Comment below.
