I am fluent in Indonesian; I’ve seen and heard the original quote by the Barsanas chief.
Regrettably, there was no error in translation. He really is saying that, in his “analysis,” the plane “exploded” on impact with the water, and that the air pressure differential consequent to the impact caused the passengers’ bodies to be expelled from the plane.
Keep in mind that Soelistyo is not an accident investigator; he’s an ex-military general who now leads the mostly civilian search and rescue agency.
While Indonesia does have some good technical experts, Soelistyo is not one of them and there is unfortunately not a culture of message discipline here.
Expect more premature and cringe-worthy conclusions to be aired: The first was the meteorological agency; the second (and very much under-reported) was last Thursday’s announcement by Santoso Sayogo, the NTSC (Indonesia’s NTSB) lead investigator, that the ping locators will no longer needed, since the tail had been found — even though, at that point, no pings had been detected from the tail; and now Soelistyo’s gaffe.
The best reading of Soelistyo’s remarks is as a “just-so” story to explain the absence of victims’ bodies from the fuselage, which the Indonesian public widely expected to be still strapped into their seats. In remarks as recently as Sunday, Soelistyo repeatedly stressed that the recovery mission will prioritize recovery of victims’ bodies over that of the black boxes. Now he has to explain why the divers under his command surfaced with boxes and not bodies.
The NTSC’s Sayogo should be lauded for quickly rejecting Soelistyo’s speculation: “There is no data to support that kind of theory,” he said a few hours ago. You need some courage to do that to a general here — and one on whom your investigation depends for operational and logistical support.