Today is the third day of the identification process that had started on August 19."
Jayapura (ANTARA News) - The police have been able to identify 12 of the victims out of the remains of the 54 deceased passengers recovered from the Trigana aircraft crash site in Papua recently.

The head of the Health and Medical Center of the National Police Headquarters, Brigadier General Arthur Tampi, said on Saturday that 26 bags of remains had been examined.

"Today is the third day of the identification process that had started on August 19. We worked until 12 pm last night and until that time we had examined 26 bags of the remains," he said.

Arthur said that out of the 26 bags, the Disaster Victims Identification (DVI) team had successfully identified 12 victims and their remains had been handed over to their families.

"On August 19, we were able to identify four bodies from four bags of remains and on August 20 we identified three from 9 bags we examined and on August 21 five from 13 bags," he said.

The 12 victims identified are Teguh Warisman Saleh, Emilia Gobai, Milka Kakiarmabin, Oscar Mangontoh, Hasanuddin, Martinus Aragai, Terianus Salawala, Boni Wori-Wori, Wendepan Bamulki, Asirun, Dita Amelia Kurniawan and Agustinus Luwanmase.

The chief of the Papua Regional Police Command, Brigadier General Paulus Waterpauw, had asked the families of the victims to be patient and wait for the results of the identification process.

"The DVI team will continue making efforts to identify the bodies of the victims, but it is a difficult process," he added.

ATR IL 257 belonging to Trigana Air had crashed in the Okbape sub-district in the Pegunungan Bintang district on August 16 during its flight from Jayapura to Oksibil, killing all 54 passengers on board, including five crew members.

(Reporting by Dhias Suwandi/Uu.H-YH/INE/KR-BSR/A014)

Editor: Priyambodo RH
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