• Divers Find Black Boxes from AirAsia Flight 8501

    Investigators in charge of finding out what caused the demise of AirAsia Flight 8501 a little more than two weeks ago have just retrieved a major piece to the puzzle. On Monday, Jan. 12, divers recovered the flight data recorder from beneath a wing at the bottom of the Java Sea. They also have located the cockpit voice recorder about 105 feet below the water, buried beneath wreckage. Divers are reportedly working to free that second black box from beneath heavy wreckage. Flight 8501 left Surabaya for Singapore two Sundays ago only to find itself caught in horrible weather. The pilot had asked for permission to climb to a higher altitude and, by the time that permission was granted a few minutes later, all contact had already been lost with the craft. Indonesian officials have speculated that icing may have built up, causing the engine to stall out and leading to the plane plummeting into the sea. Everything at this point is sheer speculation, but two things are certain, though. There were six other planes flying in exactly the same storm as Flight 8501 and they made it safely to their destinations, so this flight should not have even been in the air. AirAsia is permitted to run the Surabaya-to-Singapore route four days a week, and Sunday is not one of those days, so if they had been following their legal guidelines this plane would never have been in the air, let alone lost. Investigators are hopeful that they will get answers about what happened from these boxes.

  • Tail Has Been Found for Missing AirAsia Plane

    Finally, conditions for the search and recovery of lost AirAsia Flight 8501 have improved enough for divers to spot the tail of the plane. It has been located about 20 miles from the craft's last known location and resting at the bottom of the Java Sea. This is particularly promising news because if it is the right side of the tail, then the black box will likely be recovered with it. That recovery is crucial in helping investigators understand exactly what happened in the final moments of the doomed flight. "We've found the tail that has been our main target," Fransiskus Bambang Soelistyo, head of the search and rescue agency, said at a news conference in Jakarta. The tail was identified by divers after it was spotted by an underwater machine using a sonar scan, Soelistyo said. He displayed underwater photographs showing partial lettering on the sunken object compared with a picture of an intact Airbus A320-200 in AirAsia livery. "I can confirm that what we found was the tail part from the pictures," he said, adding that the team "now is still desperately trying to locate the black box," according to a report by Reuters. So far, monsoon-like rain and minimal visibility has made recovering the bodies of the 162 passengers on board difficult, and divers have been frustrated to know that they are so close yet have not been able to fully do their job.

  • Gwyneth Paltrow: Staying Married May Have Been Easier Than 'Uncoupling'

    Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin grabbed headlines earlier this year, not only for announcing that they were ending their marriage, but also for making the phrase "conscious uncoupling" a thing. Sometimes it is said with seriousness, other times it has a sarcastic tone, but one thing is for sure: Everyone out there has heard it. In the months that have followed their formal split, Paltrow and Martin have actually seemed closer and tighter than ever. There has been speculation about a reconciliation and there were rumors that she single-handedly imploded Martin's brief fling with Jennifer Lawrence. Paltrow is tackling all the topics in her new interview in the February issue of "Harper's Bazaar UK." Ironically, the actress is the first to admit that she often contemplates whether or not they should still be married. "It's painful, it's difficult, it might be easier to say, 'I never want to see you again,' but what good does that do anyone? We've made a lot of mistakes, and we've had good days and bad days, but I have to say, I'm proud of us for working through so much stuff together — and not blaming and shaming. Of course, there are times when I think it would have been better if we had stayed married, which is always what your children want. But we have been able to solidify this friendship, so that we're really close," said Paltrow.

  • Melissa Rivers Hires Powerhouse Law Firm to File Multimillion-Dollar Wrongful Death Suit on Behalf of Joan Rivers Estate

    All of that speculation about Melissa Rivers filing a wrongful death lawsuit has now become reality, as it was announced that Joan Rivers's daughter has retained the Manhattan powerhouse law firm of Gair, Gair, Conason, Steigman, Maloof, Bloom and Rubinowitz. This comes as simply the first step in filing a multimillion-dollar wrongful death suit against the Yorkville Clinic, where Joan's routine endoscopic procedure resulted in a coma the comedienne never came out of. It is possible a formal suit could be filed as early as today in New York City.
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