Jet Carrying 104 Explodes Over Indonesia

PALEMBANG, Indonesia — Divers today located the bulk of the wreckage of a Singapore-operated jet that plunged into a river on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. All 104 people aboard, including five Americans, were feared dead.

Witnesses said the SilkAir Boeing 737 exploded twice in the air and again when it hit the water in a swampy area 35 miles north of Palembang, a rescue official said. The plane was midway on its flight from Jakarta to Singapore.

Television station SCTV said divers found the wreckage in about 35 feet of water and that officials believed most of the victims were still inside. Rescuers recovered body parts and luggage from the river.

“There were no distress signals. There were no adverse weather conditions. There was no mountainous terrain. It is obviously very puzzling,” said Mah Bow Tan, Singapore’s communications minister.

SilkAir, a division of Singapore Airlines, said Flight MI-185 was carrying 97 passengers and seven crew members. However, the head of Indonesian air transportation, Zainuddin Sikado, was quoted by the official Antara news agency as saying 106 people were aboard, including nine crew members.

A police officer said the plane crashed into the Musi River and most of the wreckage sank soon after impact.

The weather at the time of the crash was fine, although it was raining heavily when rescuers arrived in the evening, the officer said.

At Singapore’s Changi Airport, relatives and friends of passengers were summoned to SilkAir’s offices. Some were crying when they arrived. The airport arrivals screen read “Delayed. Ask airline” for Flight MI-185.

In Washington, the National Transportation Safety Board dispatched an investigating team to the crash site, including an explosives technician, said Drucie Andersen, a Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman. She said the investigators were sent to look after U.S. interests but declined to elaborate.

Meanwhile, in northern Greece, a U.S. military plane with high-tech surveillance equipment joined the search Friday for a Ukrainian passenger jet lost in the fog-covered mountains.

The Navy P-3C Orion offered a powerful tool to cut through the harsh weather that has frustrated the search since the chartered Yakovlev-42 disappeared late Wednesday with 70 people aboard.

Rescuers were losing hope of finding survivors Friday, even as more than 3,500 soldiers carried out a ground search through deep snow.

The jet is believed to have crashed in the craggy wilderness around Mt. Olympus, 40 miles southwest of Salonica.