Indonesia to review ageing air force fleet; plane crash toll 142

Medan, July 1

Indonesia’s President promised a review of the country’s ageing air force fleet and a defence modernisation drive on Wednesday, as the death toll from the crash of a military transport plane in the north of the country climbed to 142.

The Hercules C-130B aircraft, which went into service half a century ago, was carrying 122 people when it ploughed into a residential area in the city of Medan shortly after taking off from an airbase. The incident throws a renewed spotlight on Indonesia’s woeful air safety record.

Many of those on board the flight to an island off Sumatra were believed to be servicemen and women and their families. The air force has said no one survived the crash.

It is unclear how many people died on the ground, but a steady stream of bodies has been arriving at a Medan hospital as rescuers pull them from the disaster scene, and police said today that the total death toll now stood at 142.

“There must be an evaluation of the age of planes and defence systems,” Widodo tweeted late on Tuesday, as earth movers recovered the dead from rubble of twisted metal and smashed buildings.

The plane had been on its way from an air force base in Medan, one of Indonesia’s largest cities, to Tanjung Pinang in the Riau Islands off Sumatra. Media said the pilot had asked to return to the base because of technical problems. Victims’ families said on Wednesday that some passengers had paid to get on the aircraft.

“My older brother bought a ticket to take the Hercules plane,” a victim’s relative, who asked to be identified only by her initials B.A., told Reuters. “He paid around 800,000 rupiah ($60),” she said, adding that her brother was a civilian. Others told local media their relatives had paid up to 1 million rupiah to board the flight. — Agencies