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Indonesian rescuers launched new sea, land and air searches yesterday for a missing plane with 102 people aboard as anger grew over false official statements that its wreckage had been found.

 

Senior government officials apologized late on Tuesday for erroneously saying the 17-year-old Boeing 737-400, operated by budget carrier Adam Air, had been spotted in the mountains of Sulawesi island after disappearing in heavy rain on Monday.

 

Early reports that 12 people had survived were also officially denied, the general air of confusion prompting reactions of shock, dismay and even scorn from families of the missing passengers and crew.

 

"I feel fooled. This is what I call playing games with the feelings of the victims' relatives," said Peter Tolitton, whose brother was aboard the ill-fated plane.

 

"If up to the ministerial level the information is inaccurate, we doubt the credibility of the officials," said Tolitton, a Jakarta resident who was flown by Adam Air to Makassar.

 

The missing plane was carrying 96 passengers and six crew. A copy of its manifest showed three passengers as non-Indonesians. The US Embassy in Jakarta said they were Americans.

 

The renewed search effort, in the face of heavy rain and strong winds, was being co-ordinated from Makassar, Sulawesi's largest city, 1,400 kilometers east of Jakarta.

 

Transport Minister Hatta Radjasa said military planes had been deployed since daybreak and naval ships sent to the Makassar Strait between Sulawesi and Borneo in case the doomed plane had fallen into the sea.

 

An Indonesian air force official said the aircraft were searching areas between the Sulawesi coastal town of Majene and Toraja, a mountainous region popular with tourists.

 

However, much of it is covered with jungle and forest, and transportation and communication facilities can be poor at best.

 

South Sulawesi governor Amin Syam said that, besides facing continuing bad weather, many rescuers were worn out after efforts made based on the wrong data.

 

"It is very regretful that in the middle of this tragedy, some people aggravated the situation. We lost energy and time because we focused our efforts using that information," he said.

 

Officials said the mistaken information about location of wreckage and survivors had come from accounts from a local village that police then relayed to government agencies.

 

Rescuers spent long hours struggling to reach the rumoured site tucked in a remote spot high in the jungle-clad Sulawesi mountains, only to find out no wreckage was there.

 

(China Daily January 4, 2007)