An Indonesian Lion Air Boeing passenger plane carrying 189 people, flown by Indian captain Bhavye Suneja crashed into the Java Sea on Monday, shortly after taking off from here, with authorities saying they have found no survivor.
The Boeing 737, JT 610, disappeared from the radar 13 minutes after take off from Jakarta airport at around 6 in the morning while heading for Pangkal Pinang on the Indonesian island Bangka. Flight data showed it made a sudden, sharp dive into the sea.
The aircraft, manufactured this year, was commanded by Captain Bhavye Suneja, with co-pilot Harvino.
Bhavye Suneja, the pilot of the crashed plane was from New Delhi and was living in Jakarta with his wife. The deceased was a student of Ahlcon Public School in Delhi till 2005. Sources in the school, situated in Mayur Vihar in east Delhi, confirmed that he was an alumnus but did not share further details.
According to Suneja’s LinkedIn profile, he received his pilot’s licence from the US-based Bel Air International in 2009.
Suneja was associated with Lion Air as an airline pilot since March 2011. Prior to that, he served as a trainee pilot with Emirates for three months in 2010, the profile said.
According to the reports, Suneja’s parents learned of the disaster in the morning and were booked to fly to Jakarta on Monday night.
“He loved his job, he was very much interested in it,” said Kapish Gandhi, the cousin of the pilot. “We saw it on the television this morning and didn’t know whether to believe it.”
According to the airline spokesman, Suneja had clocked more than 6,000 flight hours while his co-pilot had more than 5,000 flight hours to his credit.
Lion Air chief executive Edward Sirait said the plane reported a technical problem during its previous flight from Denpasar to Jakarta on Sunday night, but that was resolved before it took off on Monday morning.
“The weather was also good, everything was clear before the incident,” he added.
