ངོ་འཕྲད་བདེ་བའི་དྲ་འབྲེལ།

གཟའ་ཕུར་བུ། ༢༠༢༤/༠༣/༢༨

Indonesia Grounds Airplanes After Latest Air Mishap


Indonesia has grounded several airplanes of the low-cost carrier Adam Air after one of the company's Boeing 737-300s broke apart on landing. As Chad Bouchard reports from Jakarta, the incident is the latest in a string of transportation accidents in the country over the last two months.

The Adam Air Boeing 737-300 jolted to a stop at an airport in Surabaya Wednesday, after landing hard enough to bend and crack the midsection of the jetliner's fuselage.

Safety investigator Ertata Lananggalih says all 148 passengers are safe, but some sustained minor injuries. He says the weather was very bad at the time, and the pilot was forced to land in heavy rain. The flight arrived on schedule, but the fuselage gave way after the plane touched down on the tarmac.

The government has ordered an investigation into the causes of the incident, but meanwhile, seven of Adam Air's 737-300s - nearly a third of the company's fleet - have been grounded until each airplane passes a safety inspection.

This is the second serious incident involving an Adam Air jetliner this year, and some Indonesian lawmakers have called for the company to discontinue operations pending a full investigation of its maintenance practices.

An Adam Air jetliner en route from Surabaya to Manado crashed into the sea during bad weather on January 1, killing all 102 people on board. No bodies have been recovered, and search teams have only found a few pieces of wreckage so far.

Officials say the plane damaged this week was manufactured in 1994 and passed safety tests before departure from Jakarta.

Lananggalih says investigators are still compiling data from the country's weather agency and from the air traffic control center in Surabaya. He says members of his team have interviewed the airplane's pilot, which may help to determine the cause of the incident.

Indonesia has also seen maritime disasters over the past two months, including a shipwreck in late December that killed at least 400 people. Another shipwreck Thursday killed at least 15.

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has ordered a special commission to examine the country's transportation safety.

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