Indonesian officials have dredged up the cockpit voice recorder from the Sriwijaya Air jet that disappeared into the sea off Jakarta with 62 people aboard on Jan. 9, authorities said Wednesday.

Investigators said it will take three days to one week to listen to the tape, which was dug up from the Java Sea beneath a meter of mud. The device must first be dried out then cleaned of mud and salt, officials said.

“It was found at 8 p.m. last night at a spot not far from where we retrieved the [flight data recorder],” Indonesian Transport Minister Budi Karya Sumadi said at a press conference on Wednesday, the Straits Times reported.

A preliminary report released in February relied on information from the airliner’s flight data recorder, which was found within days of the crash along with the casing and beacon of the cockpit recorder.

The February report blamed the crash on an engine thrust imbalance, which caused the Boeing 737-500 to roll onto its side then plummet into the sea.

The crash occurred shortly after the plane took off for Pontianak, another city in Indonesia, according to the Straits Times.

The jet vanished from radar within four minutes of taking off.

With Post Wires