Sriwijaya Air Flight 182
PK-CLC, the aircraft involved in the accident | |
| Accident | |
|---|---|
| Date | January 9, 2021 |
| Summary | Crashed into the sea; pilot error; mishandling of faulty autothrottle leading to loss of control |
| Site | Near Laki Island, Thousand Islands, Java Sea 5°57′50″S 106°34′28″E / 5.96389°S 106.57444°E |
| Aircraft | |
| Aircraft type | Boeing 737-524 |
| Aircraft name | Citra |
| Operator | Sriwijaya Air |
| IATA flight No. | SJ182 |
| ICAO flight No. | SJY182 |
| Call sign | SRIWIJAYA 182 |
| Registration | PK-CLC |
| Flight origin | Soekarno–Hatta International Airport, Tangerang, Indonesia |
| Destination | Supadio International Airport, Pontianak, West Kalimantan, Indonesia |
| Occupants | 62 |
| Passengers | 50 |
| Crew | 12 (including 6 deadheading) |
| Fatalities | 62 |
| Survivors | 0 |
Sriwijaya Air Flight 182 was a scheduled domestic passenger flight from Jakarta to Pontianak, Indonesia. Five minutes after departing from Soekarno–Hatta International Airport on 9 January 2021, the Boeing 737-500 experienced an upset and crashed into the Java Sea off the Thousand Islands just 4 minutes after takeoff, killing all 62 people on board. A search of the area recovered wreckage, human remains, and items of clothing. The flight data recorder was recovered on 12 January, and the data storage module of the cockpit voice recorder was recovered on 30 March. Flight 182 is the third deadliest accident involving a Boeing 737-500 after Aeroflot Flight 821 and Asiana Airlines Flight 733, and was the deadliest plane crash in 2021.
During the search, Indonesia's National Transportation Safety Committee (NTSC) used the available data from Flightradar24, and hypothesised that the plane's engines were still operating upon impact. It was known that the autothrottle on this aircraft had malfunctioned a few days earlier, and one line of investigation was whether this might have contributed to the accident.
A preliminary report released on 10 February 2021 suggested problems with the plane's autothrottle; the thrust lever for the left engine reduced thrust as the aircraft climbed, while the thrust lever for the right engine remained fixed. On 10 November 2022, the NTSC published the final report of the investigation, concluding that the crash had been caused by a combination of a faulty autothrottle and pilot error.