A passenger plane from Boeing Co. with 62 people crashed into the Java Sea on Saturday, the Indonesian authorities said.
The Sriwijaya Air jet lost contact with air traffic controllers and disappeared from radar minutes after taking off from the country’s capital, Jakarta, Ministry of Transport officials said. It was on a 90-minute route from Jakarta to Pontianak, the capital of West Kalimantan province on the Indonesian island of Borneo, and went missing at 2:40 p.m. local time, a ministry spokeswoman Adita Irawati said.
The aircraft in question was a 26-year-old Boeing 737-500, according to Theodora Erika, a spokeswoman for Sriwijaya Air, an Indonesian airline. Sriwijaya flight SJ182 took off at 2:36 pm local time, climbed to a maximum altitude of 10,900 feet about four minutes later, and then began a steep descent, according to aviation data provider Flightradar24. The last data signal from the plane was at an altitude of 75 meters, Flightradar24 said.
Boeing said in a statement on Saturday that it is aware of the reports from Jakarta and is closely monitoring the situation. CFM International, which made the aircraft’s engines, said it provided technical assistance to authorities and the airline. CFM is a joint venture between General Electric Co. and Safran SA.
The Boeing plane is not the 737 MAX, the latest version of the company’s single-aisle jet family, which was grounded almost two years ago after two fatal crashes.