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AirAsia CEO Expresses Confidence QZ8501 Black Boxes Will Be Found

Rescuers have most probably located the area where AirAsia Indonesia Flight QZ8501 went down in the Java Sea, the head of the airline said.
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The head of AirAsia said Tuesday he is confident rescuers will find the cockpit recorders and full wreckage of flight QZ8501 to determine what brought down the passenger plane in the Java Sea. AirAsia's Chief Executive Tony Fernandes told reporters that Indonesia's search and rescue agency "is very confident that it knows more or less the position of the aircraft so we should be able to locate [the black boxes]." Next the investigators and airline would "move to finding out what went on that tragic day," he said, adding that he felt it is "very clear that it was a crash."

Fernandes spoke from Surabaya, Indonesia — Indonesia's second-largest city and from where the doomed flight originated. He'd traveled there to be with passengers' relatives after rescuers recovered bodies and debris from the Java Sea. AirAsia Indonesia said it had been informed by Indonesia's Search and Rescue Agency that the debris found in the Karimata Strait was "indeed from" flight QZ8501, which disappeared Sunday with 162 people aboard.

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