Ice theory for AirAsia jet crash dubious, say experts

Rescue divers on a rubber boat conduct their search operation for the victims of AirAsia flight in the Java Sea, Indonesia. Photo / AP

The first official Indonesian report on the AirAsia crash says the accident was caused by "icing" that damaged the plane's engines - a finding experts immediately doubted.

In a seemingly premature attempt to explain the crash, Indonesia's meteorological agency released a 14-page report blaming the accident on "worrying" weather conditions that froze machinery in the Airbus A320 aircraft.

"Based on data that is provided on the last location of the plane, the weather is the cause of the accident," said the report by Indonesia's Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency.

"The most probable weather phenomenon that caused the plane engines to be damaged is icing. This is only one analysis based on the meteorological data and not the final cause of the incident."

But the findings were called into question by aviation analysts, who said modern commercial aircrafts had resilient anti-icing devices.

Peter Marosszeky, an aviation expert at the University of New South Wales, said Airbus previously had problems with icing but those had been fixed.

"Icing is an unlikely cause of damage or a stall because these modern aircraft can resist the effect of icing. These planes have anti-icing which precludes icing on the wing surface or on the critical parts of the engine. Unless those systems were not working, it would be pretty unlikely that icing was a factor."

The weather improved yesterday and divers were attempting again to locate large objects on the ocean floor believed to be the fuselage of the AirAsia flight.

At least five ships with equipment that can detect the plane's black boxes have been deployed to the area where the suspected plane parts were spotted.

Five large objects - the biggest measuring 18m long and 5.4m wide and believed to be the fuselage - have been detected.

The Indonesian Government has increasingly sought to blame AirAsia for breaching regulations in the lead-up to the crash.

Ignatius Jonan, Indonesia's Transport Minister, has accused the low-cost airline of failing to use official weather reports in pre-flight briefings to the pilots. AirAsia denied the allegations, saying it received briefings four times a day from the meteorological agency and these were immediately passed on to pilots.

Jonan has also accused AirAsia of operating the doomed flight without permission to fly from Surabaya to Singapore on Sundays. The airline has now been banned from operating any flights on that route.

AirAsia has denied the flight was illegal, while Singapore's aviation authority has confirmed that the airline had permission to operate daily flights there. But there are suggestions the airline may have received an improper permit in Indonesia, a nation whose aviation authorities have been plagued by mismanagement.

- AP, AFP