AirAsia fuselage found

In a Facebook post on Wednesday, Ng Eng Hen said a Singapore Navy ship, MV Swift Rescue, had found the fuselage close to where the flight crashed en-route from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore on December 28.

According to Ng, images taken by a remote-controlled vehicle "show part of the wing and words on the fuselage." The words "now" and "everyone" are visible on the photos, which appear to be from AirAsia's slogan "Now Everyone Can Fly," painted on the plane's exterior.

"We have informed BASARNAS, the Indonesian search authority, who can now begin recovery operations," Ng said.

So far only 48 bodies of the 162 people on board flight 8501 have been recovered from the Java Sea. Most of those who remain missing are believed to be trapped inside the fuselage.

"I hope that with the fuselage located, some form of closure can come to the families of the victims to ease their grief," Ng added.

On Monday the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder were recovered from the Java Sea, raising hopes of determining why the flight went down.

The Airbus 320-300 lost contact with air traffic control shortly after pilots had requested to ascend to avoid bad weather. Permission was denied and the plane disappeared from radar a few minutes later, without issuing a distress call.

ksb/kms (Reuters, AFP, AP)