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HINA SEA: The RSS Persistence, a Republic of Singapore Navy (RSN)vessel, will reach its designated search zone – about 555km away from Singapore – at 3pm on Tuesday (Dec 30).It is set to conduct drills today, before beginning actual search operations for the missing AirAsia QZ8501 plane on Wednesday.The RSS Persistence – an endurance class landing ship tank – is the third and largest Singapore Navy ship to be deployed to the area, after the RSS Supreme, a frigate, and missile corvette RSS Valour. The 123 navy personnel on board brings the total number of RSN personnel in the area to 265.On board the RSS Persistence are two Super Puma helicopters, which landed on the ship at about 8pm on Monday night. They are expected to conduct two sorties a day, and can each hold up to 16 passengers.Singapore has also committed two C-130 aircraft to the search mission.Apart from Singapore, other countries joining Indonesia in the multinational search effort include Malaysia, South Korea, Australia, China and the United States.- CNA/es

STORY HIGHLIGHTSExperts: First priority is to recover bodies and return them to familiesLocation of debris and bodies are carefully logg...