Probe into SilkAir crash to continnue

Probe into SilkAir crash to continnue

SINGAPORE (AFP): An investigation into the crash of a
Singapore plane that killed all 104 on board in Indonesia more
than a year ago will continue throughout 1999, Communications
Minister Mah Bow Tan said Wednesday.

The Indonesian Aircraft Accident Investigation Commission
(AAIC) "expects that the investigation is likely to continue well
into 1999," Mah said in a written reply to members of parliament.

"As I have explained to the House previously, investigation is
progressing very slowly because of the high degree of destruction
to the aircraft and the lack of useful information from the
flight data and cockpit voice recorders," he said.

SilkAir MI I85 crashed in Palembang on the Indonesian island
of Sumatra on Dec. 19, 1997.

Oetarjo Diran, head of the AAIC in Indonesia, told relatives
of victims at a private briefing here last month that
investigators had ruled out terrorism, weather, aircraft
maintenance, hazardous materials and air traffic control problems
as possible causes of the accident.

There has been speculation about suicide by one of the pilots
as a likely cause of the crash and the investigators reiterated
they could not dismiss any possibility until proven invalid.

Although investigators had managed to pick up 73 percent of
the wreckage or 35 tons in weight, most of it was just fragments.

The investigation is also being supported by the United States
National Transportation Safety Board, the Civil Aviation
Authority of Singapore, and the Australian Bureau of Air Safety
Investigation.