AirAsia crash caused by equipment and pilot error, investigators say

Faulty equipment and the crew's "inability to control the aircraft" led an AirAsia A320 to crash into the Java Sea last year, killing all 162 people onboard, a report said on Tuesday.

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AirAsia plane crash caused by faulty component, crew action

Jakarta, Dec 1, 2015, AFP – Faulty equipment and the crew's "inability to control the aircraft" led an AirAsia A320 to crash into the Java Sea last year, killing all 162 people onboard, a report said on Tuesday.

Flight QZ8501 went down in stormy weather on December 28, during what was supposed to be a short flight from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore.

In their final report into the accident released Tuesday, Indonesia's official National Transportation Safety Committee said a major factor was a fault with a system that helps control the rudder's movement.

Cracked soldering in the component caused it to malfunction and send repeated warning messages to the pilots.

When they received the fourth warning, the pilots pulled circuit breakers on one of the aircraft's computers, removing power from the faulty system in a bid to reset it. But in doing so, they also turned off the plane's autopilot.

In this file photograph taken on January 12, 2015, foreign investigators (L) examine the recovered tail of the AirAsia flight QZ8501 in Kumai. A fault with the rudder control system was a major factor in the AirAsia plane crash into the Java Sea. AFP PHOTO

"Subsequent flight crew action resulted in inability to control the aircraft," said the report. The plane went into a "prolonged stall condition that was beyond the capability of the crew to recover", it said.

It added the flight data recorders did not indicate the weather had affected the aircraft.

The report said the faulty component, the Rudder Travel Limiter, had suffered 23 problems in the past 12 months, citing maintenance records.

The crash of the Airbus A320-200 triggered a huge international search, with ships and aircraft from several nations involved in a lengthy hunt that was hampered by strong currents and bad weather. The bodies of 56 victims were never recovered.

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