A section of AirAsia flight QZ8501's tail is loaded onto a boat for transportation to Jakarta from Kumai Port on February 7, 2015 in this file photo taken by Antara Foto. (Reuters)
Indonesian investigators said today a chronically faulty component and the crew's attempt to fix the problem were among the factors that contributed to the crash of an AirAsia passenger jet last year, killing all 162 aboard.
The plane's flight control computer had a cracked solder joint that malfunctioned repeatedly, including four times during the flight, and 23 times the previous year.
"Subsequent flight crew action resulted in inability to control the aircraft ... causing the aircraft to depart from the normal flight envelope and enter a prolonged stall condition that was beyond the capability of the flight crew to recover," the national transport safety committee said in a statement.
The Airbus A320 aircraft crashed less than halfway into a two-hour flight from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore on December 28 last year.
© Thomson Reuters 2015