PANGKALAN BUN, Indonesia — Bad weather hindered efforts to recover victims of AirAsia Flight 8501 Wednesday, and sent wreckage drifting far from the crash site, as grieving relatives “surrounded in darkness” gathered in an airport and prayed for the strength to move forward.
The massive hunt for 162 people who vanished Sunday aboard the Airbus A320 from Surabaya, Indonesia to Singapore, was severely limited due to heavy rain, wind and thick clouds. Seven bodies, including a flight attendant still wearing her red AirAsia uniform, have been recovered, said Indonesia’s Search and Rescue Agency chief Henry Bambang Soelistyo.
The weather prevented divers from retrieving bodies in the Java Sea on Wednesday, and helicopters were largely grounded, but ships were still scouring the area.
Sonar images identified what appeared to be large parts of the plane, but strong currents were moving the wreckage.
“It seems all the wreckage found has drifted more than 50 kilometers from yesterday’s location,” said Vice Air Marshal Sunarbowo Sandi, search and rescue coordinator in Pangkalan Bun on Borneo island, the closest town to the site. “We are expecting those bodies will end up on beaches.”