In brief: AirAsia radar shows fast climb
JAKARTA, Indonesia – An AirAsia plane that crashed last month with 162 people on board was climbing at an abnormally high rate, then plunged and disappeared from radar, Indonesia’s transport minister said Tuesday.
Ignasius Jonan told Parliament that radar data showed the Airbus A320 was climbing at about 6,000 feet a minute before it disappeared Dec. 28.
“It is not normal to climb like that, it’s very rare for commercial planes, which normally climb just 1,000 to 2,000 feet per minute,” he said. “It can only be done by a fighter jet.”
He said the plane then plunged toward the sea and disappeared.
Jonan did not say what caused the plane to climb so rapidly.
In their last contact with air-traffic controllers, the pilots of AirAsia Flight 8501 asked to climb from 32,000 feet to 38,000 feet to avoid threatening clouds, but were denied permission because of heavy air traffic. Four minutes later, the plane disappeared. No distress signal was received.
An excessively rapid ascent is likely to cause an airplane to go into an aerodynamic stall. In 2009, an Air France Airbus A330 disappeared over the Atlantic Ocean in bad weather while flying from Rio de Janeiro to Paris. Investigators were able to determine from the jet’s “black boxes” that it began a steep climb and then went into a stall from which the pilots were unable to recover.
Airbus spokesman Justin Dubon said Tuesday it was too early to comment on possible similarities between the two crashes.
Kidnapped U.N. worker released
BANGUI, Central African Republic – Armed militia fighters abducted a foreign U.N. staffer near the capital’s airport Tuesday and then released her hours later in the second rare kidnapping of an international aid worker this week.
The U.N. announced the safe release of the Kurdish female U.N. staffer not long after the militia group said it had freed her.
Ugandan rebel in ICC custody
THE HAGUE, Netherlands – A commander from a fearsome Ugandan rebel group known for abducting and torturing children was taken into custody early today at the International Criminal Court, where he faces charges including murder and enslavement, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations said.
Dominic Ongwen was flown out of Africa on Tuesday. His arrival in The Hague marks the first time a member of the Lord’s Resistance Army, led by the notorious warlord Joseph Kony, has faced international justice.
His transfer to The Hague, “is a welcome development in the international community’s campaign to counter the LRA’s dehumanizing violence, and to bring perpetrators to justice after more than two decades of … torture, rape and murder,” Ambassador Samantha Power said.
The court did not immediately confirm Ongwen’s arrival at its detention center near the Dutch North Sea coast, two weeks after he surrendered in the Central African Republic.