Searchers put to test in search for crashed plane in Indonesian waters(2)

Adil said that weather has been unfriendly since the initial debris and bodies were found and that this has made it hard for the vessel to carry out its job.

"High waves have hindered our tasks many times. Besides endangering our ship, the foam from the waves may be leading the searchers to falsely assume they're seeing floating bodies," Adil said after receiving several phone calls from the captain's seat to coordinate with other search vessels.

The experienced sailor who is largely sleep-deprived during his extensive search for the doomed QZ8501, said weather at the crash site often turned bad, making the search ineffective and sometimes forcing ships to turn back to their bases in Kumai seaport, the closest harbor from the site, which actually takes 4 hours to reach.

Adil said that to avoid encountering bad weather, he left the base early in the morning so it would have ample time to search before the torrential rain that often comes down at noon.

After the ship approached the search area on Friday, some of his crews started to get to the deck and put on binoculars while the ship kept running on slowly.

Suddenly, one the crew members shouted after he spotted a suspicious object floating not far from the ship.

After closer inspection, another crew member found out that it was a bag of garbage dumped by fishermen.

A ship crewman Irwan said that they have to carefully check every object they saw in the sea before they decided on its credibility. If not, they will let the object continue to drift in the waves. Some helicopters and planes were seen from afar, combing the sea surface at relatively low altitude.

At noon the weather started to get nasty with strong wind blowing notoriously that made the crews sought shelter inside the cabin.

The ship ran slow as the waves raised up to 4 meters that made the ship bounced up and down, right to left wildly.

Amid that rough situation, the engine suddenly stopped, which incited an eerie situation inside the cabin. After a while, the restart of the engine broke the silence. In the captain's cockpit, Adil continued to make contact with other searching teams in the vicinity.

He was ordered by an Indonesian navy ship to turn back as the waves ahead had raised up to 5 meters, a situation that the Purworejo search ship could not cope with. Adil ordered his officers to turnaround the ship for the safety of his crews.

"Our mission is to look for victims of the crash. But you cannot argue with safety. Don't make more victims from this mission," Adil said.