AirAsia crash report won't include black box data

Indonesian soldiers show the cockpit voice recorder of AirAsia QZ8501 at Iskandar airbase in Pangkalan Bun, Central Kalimantan January 13, 2015. [Photo/Agencies]

JAKARTA - A preliminary report into last month's crash of an AirAsia passenger jet that killed 162 people will not include an analysis of the black box flight recorders, an Indonesian investigator said on Tuesday.

The National Transportation Safety Committee will submit its initial findings this week to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) on AirAsia's first fatal crash.

The Airbus AIR.PA A320-200 vanished from radar screens on Dec. 28, less than halfway into a two-hour flight from Surabaya, Indonesia's second-biggest city, to Singapore. There were no survivors.

A multinational search and recovery operation has recovered 70 bodies so far and hoped to find more after locating the fuselage of the plane. But days of rough weather and poor underwater visibility have hampered navy divers' efforts.

The preliminary report, which the ICAO requires within 30 days of the date of the accident, will include "information on the plane, the number of passengers and other information like that", NTSC investigator Suryanto told Reuters.

It will not include analysis from the cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder, both of which were recovered by divers from the bottom of the Java Sea.

Data from radar and the aircraft's two "black box" flight recorders is providing investigators with a clearer picture of what occurred during the final minutes of Flight QZ8501.

Transport Minister Ignasius Jonan told a parliamentary hearing last week that, based on radar data, the plane had climbed faster than normal in its final minutes, and then stalled.

The NTSC will hold an annual media conference this week to talk about the agency's achievements over the past year. The agency is not expected to discuss details of its investigation into the AirAsia crash, said NTSC head Tatang Kurniadi.

The final report on the investigation, which will be made public, must be filed within a year