An AirAsia passenger jet carrying 162 people lost contact with Indonesian air traffic control early Sunday, gripping Southeast Asia with a second missing plane crisis in less than a year.
The search operation for the missing AirAsia Flight QZ8501 has been halted for the night, but big ships won't return to shore and will leave their searchlights on, according to the Indonesian Transportation Ministry.
Before communication was lost, one of the pilots asked to fly at a higher altitude because of bad weather, officials said.
The aircraft, flying from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore, went missing as it flew at 38,000 feet over the Java Sea between the islands of Belitung and Borneo -- a heavily traveled shipping channel with shallow waters, according to Indonesian authorities, who are leading the search and rescue operations.
AirAsia says it lost contact with the aircraft at 7:24 local time.
Of the people on board the Airbus A320-200, 155 are Indonesian, three are South Korean, one is British, one is French, one is Malaysian and one is Singaporean, the airline said.
Eighteen children, including one infant, are among the passengers, the carrier said. Seven of the people on board are crew members.
At the airport in Surabaya, loved ones gathered and wept as they waited for any word on the passengers.
Some took cell phone pictures of a flight manifest posted on a wall. The black-and-white papers showed every passenger's name and seat number, but not their fate.
Others simply sat and dabbed tears from their eyes
Under the US proposal, Russian forces in Crimea would return to their bases
US Secretary of State John Kerry has diverted his homebound flight at the last minute, for hastily arranged talks on the Ukraine crisis with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
The decision came after President Vladimir Putin spoke to President Barack Obama by phone late on Friday.
Mr Obama has called on Russia to pull its troops back from Ukraine's border.
Mr Lavrov told Russian TV on Saturday that Moscow had no intention of sending troops into Ukraine.
Several thousand Russian soldiers are reported to have been stationed near Ukraine's eastern borders.
The two foreign ministers are due to meet in Paris on Sunday evening.
Reports say Mr Kerry was flying home from the Middle East on Saturday when he abruptly changed travel plans and instructed his plane to fly to France.
Meanwhile, Ukraine's interim authorities have been pressing ahead with plans for elections due on 25 May.
Boxer and leading political figure Vitaly Klitschko pulled out of the race for president on Saturday, declaring his support for billionaire chocolate tycoon Petro Poroshenko.
"The only chance of winning is to nominate one candidate from the democratic forces," he told supporters of his Udar (Punch) party.
Former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who was freed from jail when Viktor Yanukovych was ousted as president last month, has also said she will stand.
After Mr Yanukovych fled Ukraine, pro-Russian forces moved in to take control of the Crimean peninsula. Moscow then annexed the Ukrainian region after a referendum condemned as illegal by Kiev and the UN General Assembly.
Pro-Russian activists held a rally in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk on Saturday
In an interview with state TV channel Rossiya 1 on Saturday, Mr Lavrov said: "We have absolutely no intention of - or interest in - crossing Ukraine's borders."
He added that Russia was ready to protect "the rights of Russians and Russian-speaking people in Ukraine, using all available political, diplomatic and legal means".
After the interview was broadcast, it emerged Mr Lavrov had spoken by phone to Mr Kerry, in a conversation that Russian officials said was initiated by the US.
That call followed an hour-long phone discussion late on Friday between the US and Russian presidents. Mr Putin had contacted President Obama, according to US officials.
The White House said in a statement. that the US was keen to de-escalate the crisis.
"President Obama made clear that this remains possible only if Russia pulls back its troops and does not take any steps to further violate Ukraine's territorial integrity and sovereignty," it added.
Ukrainian servicemen abandoned their bases in Crimea after they were seized by Russian forces
Russian sailors have also seized Ukrainian ships and naval bases in the peninsula
The US proposal, described as a "diplomatic off-ramp", has been developed in consultation with Ukraine and several EU countries,
It is thought to involve halting the military build-up near Ukraine's border, the deployment of international monitors in eastern Ukraine to protect the rights of Russian speakers, and the return of Russian troops in Crimea to their bases there.
The Kremlin said that the Russian president had drawn Mr Obama's attention to "the continued rampage of extremists" in Kiev and various regions of Ukraine.
Russia's reported troop movements near Ukraine's eastern border - described by Nato as a "huge military build-up" - have triggered fears that Mr Putin's interest in Ukraine is not limited to Crimea.
The BBC's North America Editor, Mark Mardell, said Friday night's phone call could indicate tentative progress towards a diplomatic solution - just when fears were growing in the West that Russia could be about to stage an invasion of eastern Ukraine.
