Relatives
dissatisfied with lack of information
Reuters. Dec 23, 1997.
SOME Singaporean relatives of the SilkAir crash victims said Monday
they were dissatisfied with the information they were being given by their
government and SilkAir, the regional arm of Singapore Airlines.
One man, who refused to give his name, said at the crash site: "It's all crap. We come here only to find the airline staff crying when we ask them what had happened. They don't tell me anything."
A senior Indonesian official, who asked not to be identified, said the plane might have broken up in the air, but added there had been no claims of sabotage.
Some witnesses reported one or two explosions before the plane plunged into the river at a point three hours by boat from the nearest major town, the South Sumatran provincial capital of Palembang.
"There were 104 people aboard, but we don't see any intact bodies. We don't even see the remains of fuel, so I think it could have completely disintegrated and something must have happened while it was still in the air," he said.
An official at the rescue control center in Palembang said a group of US aviation experts, including representatives of Seattle-based aircraft maker Boeing, had gone to the site to help determine the cause of the disaster.
SilkAir officials have said they were mystified as to why the fairly new jet flown by an experienced pilot in good weather should have crashed.