Indonesian Transportation Ministry To Tighten License For Airline Operations

Jakarta, Jan 6 (Antara) - The Transportation Ministry will tighten the issuance of licenses for airline operations in Indonesia to ensure the safety of passengers, the ministry's spokesman, J.A. Barata, stated here on Tuesday. "Currently, the issuance of licenses for airline operations is handled by the Transportation Ministry's Directorate General for Air Transportation. In the future, it will be handled directly by the minister," Barata revealed. He explained that the administrative issue was not directly related to the safety of passengers, but it played an important role in regulating all airline operations. Transportation Ministry's Acting Director General for Air Transportation Djoko Murdjatmojo earlier said that the low-cost carrier Indonesia AirAsia had violated an agreed flight schedule from Surabaya (East Java province) to Singapore. "Based on our observation, AirAsia does not fly in accordance with the schedule agreed with the government," Djoko stated at a press conference. According to the Foreign Flight Permit Letter No AU/008/30/6/DRJU/DAU issued for the year of 2014/2015, AirAsia's flight services on the Surabaya to Singapore route are supposed to be on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. However, the ill-fated AirAsia flight QZ 8501 carrying 162 people flew on Sunday morning, he pointed out. Djoko remarked that if AirAsia wanted to change its flight schedule, it should have sent an official proposal to the Directorate General for Air Transportation. "We never received any official letter from AirAsia requesting a change in its flight schedule," Djoko emphasized. He noted that the Transportation Ministry will soon audit the related authorities who were involved in AirAsia's scheduling. Djoko emphasized that he will revoke the flight permits of airlines that violate the agreed flying schedule. Earlier, Head of the National Search and Rescue Agency (Basarnas) Vice Marshal F. Henry Bambang Soelistyo stated that at least 31 bodies of the AirAsia crash victims have been recovered and evacuated so far. "Until now, the number of corpses that have been confirmed is 31. Of this, 30 have been evacuated to Surabaya while one is still aboard a ship and will be transported to Pangkalan Bun first," Soelistyo explained. Besides this, a section of the ill-fated plane has been found by a joint team deployed in the search for the missing AirAsia flight QZ8501. The search and rescue operations and the evacuation of the bodies of the victims have been hindered by bad weather conditions such as heavy rains, strong winds, and huge waves reaching up to four meters in height. An underwater search for the plane's fuselage has been stopped due to bad weather conditions, he noted. "The operation has been halted until the weather improves," he added. In the meantime, nine ships are ready with divers to locate the fuselage. The AirAsia flight QZ8501 disappeared on Dec. 28, en route from Surabaya in East Java to Singapore, with 162 people on board. They comprised 155 Indonesians, three South Koreans, a British, a Singaporean, a French, and a Malaysian. The plane is believed to have crashed in the Java Sea near the Karimata Strait, some 95 nautical miles from Pangkalan Bun, Central Kalimantan. The search is being coordinated by Basarnas and also involves the military, police, and transportation ministry, besides teams from several foreign countries such as Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, the United States, Japan, China, South Korea, India, and Russia.