An emergency was never declared onboard the Lion Air flight that went down off the coast of Indonesia with nearly 200 people on board.

Searchers have picked up the black box from the wreckage of the craft, and located the fuselage, where passengers bodies are still strapped to their seats

Aviation expert Mary Schiavo told Kate Hawkesby it's likely everything happened too quickly for an emergency call.

"The altitude wavered and the plane struggled up and down with airspeed, to me that says the pilots were fighting a heck of a fight to keep that plane in the air."

She said investigators will have answers as soon as they can get the data from the black box but because the plane is so new, it'll be recording more than a thousand instruments and computers on the plane.

LISTEN ABOVE AS MARY SCHIAVO SPEAKS WITH KATE HAWKESBY