A young mother aboard the doomed Indonesian airliner that plunged into the sea off Jakarta with 62 people aboard posted a heartbreaking message before the tragedy, according to reports.
Ratih Windania posted an Instagram selfie snapped aboard a plane Dec. 22 with her beaming daughter, Yumna, 2, and nephew, Athar Rizki Riawan, 8, The Australian reported.
“Bye bye family. We’re heading home for now,” the four-months-pregnant woman wrote Saturday from Jakarta’s airport along with two emojis blowing kisses after their three-week vacation, the Sun reported.
Their Sriwijaya Air flight back to Pontianak, on the Indonesian side of Borneo, crashed shortly after takeoff.
Windania’s brother Irfansyah Riyanto — who had rushed to Soekarno Hatta Airport after the plane, which also was carrying their parents, went down — posted a picture of his sister and the children along with the words: “Pray for us.”
Pieces of the wreckage and body parts were recovered Sunday from the Java Sea, Indonesian officials said.
Investigators have so far been unable to determine why the 26-year-old plane crashed just four minutes after takeoff, but they do know the location of the black boxes about 75 feet below the surface.
“We feel powerless, we can only wait and hope to have any information soon,” Irfansyah told reporters, according to the Sun.
“I was the one who drove them to the airport, helped with the check-ins and the luggage … I feel like I still can’t believe this and it happened too fast,” he added.
Irfansyah said his relatives had originally intended to take an earlier flight operated by Sriwijaya’s unit NAM Air, but changed their plans for some reason.
With Post wires