New details about the crashed Lion Air's jet previous flight have cast more doubt on the Indonesian airline's claim to have fixed technical problems as hundreds of personnel searched the sea a fifth day Friday for victims and the plane's fuselage.
The brand new Boeing 737 MAX 8 plane plunged into the Java Sea early Monday, just minutes after taking off from the Indonesian capital Jakarta, killing all 189 people on board.
Herson, head of Bali-Nusa Tenggara Airport Authority, said the pilot on the plane's previous flight on Sunday from Bali requested to return to the airport not long after takeoff but then reported the problem had been resolved.
Several passengers have described the problem as a terrifying loss of altitude.
Lion Air has said the unspecified problem was fixed after Sunday's flight, but the fatal flight's pilots also made a "return to base" request not long after takeoff.
"Shortly after requesting RTB, the pilot then contacted the control tower again to inform that the plane had run normally and would not return" to Bali's Ngurah Rai airport, said Herson, who uses a single name.
"The captain said the problem was resolved and he decided to continue the trip to Jakarta."
"We will prove more technical problems with data recorded in the black box."
One of them, Diah Mardani, told a current affairs television program earlier this week that after takeoff "the plane suddenly fell, then rose, then fell again harder and shook."
"The atmosphere was very tense."
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