“Lost Contact”: AirAsia Flight Missing With 162 Aboard

A search and rescue mission for an AirAsia plane that went missing with 162 people aboard was suspended Sunday in the Java Sea and will resume at 6 a.m. Monday (6 p.m. ET Sunday). AirAsia Indonesia Flight QZ8501 lost contact with air traffic control at around 7:24 a.m. local time on Sunday (7:24 p.m. ET Saturday ) after requesting a course change due to bad weather while en route from Surabaya, Indonesia, to Singapore. Indonesia's acting director general of transportation said there had been no distress signal from the cockpit of the Airbus A320-200. "We don't dare to presume what has happened except that it has lost contact," Djoko Murjatmodjo said. The jet was carrying 155 passengers and seven crewmembers, none of them American, AirAsia confirmed Sunday. The missing flight is the third Malaysia-related air incident this year.

Contact Us