Searchers find second 'black box' from downed Lion Air flight

Jan. 14 (UPI) -- Indonesia officials said Monday they've located the second "black box" from the Lion Air flight that crashed in the Java Sea more than two months ago.

Arba Agung, head of the First Fleet Navy Information Agency, said a team was dispatched to retrieve the device so it can be analyzed. It was found Monday.

Searchers have been looking for the cockpit voice recorder, which records audio from the flight deck for the last 30 minutes of a flight, for weeks. They found the other box, the flight data recorder, almost immediately.

"It's very good progress," Luhut Pandjaitan, head of the Coordinating Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry, said. "I think the information in the box might make things clear."

Lion Air Flight JT610 crashed Oct. 29 en route from Jakarta to Pangkalpinang, killing 189 people on board. Pilots attempted to return to the airport but didn't make it, crashing into the Java Sea at 450 miles per hour.

An analysis of the flight data recorder showed the plane's anti-stall system pushed the plane's nose down while pilots wrestled with the flight stick more than a dozen times. Pushing the plane's nose down is a standard maneuver to recover from a stall, but it only works if there's enough altitude. JT610 crashed shortly after takeoff.

The airliner, a new Boeing 737 MAX 8, had displayed similar problems before the doomed flight. It had also reported problems measuring airspeed and altitude on multiple flights in the three days before it crashed, a preliminary report from Indonesia's National Transportation Safety Committee said in November.

Some of the victims' families have filed lawsuits against Boeing, arguing the automated safety system caused the crash and Boeing failed to sufficiently outline the system in its operations manual or train pilots how to use it.

Boeing issued safety bulletins for the 737 MAX 8 after the crash.