The Boeing 737 MAC aircraft disappeared around 13 minutes after taking off from Indonesian capital Jakarta on October 29, killing all 189 people onboard.

Preliminary investigations established the pilots asked to return to Jakarta after take-off following trouble with the aircraft’s anti-stall system.

This reportedly prevented them from pulling up the nose, pitching the aircraft into the sea.

The AFP news agency on Monday (January 14) reported the aircraft’s second black box, the more telling cockpit voice recorder, had since been recovered, citing deputy head of Indonesia’s National Transportation Safety Committee (NTSC) Haryo Satmiko.

It is hoped the find will shed new light on the issues faced by the pilots, and what exactly sent the aircraft spiralling into the sea.

Late last year, it emerged the aircraft in question should have been grounded on account of a recurrent technical fault dating back several days.

"In our opinion, the plane was no longer airworthy and it should not have continued," said Nurcahyo Utomo, aviation head of the NTSC, last November.

Boeing’s initial investigation uncovered an “erroneous input” from an angle-of-attack sensor, which helps the aircraft judge whether its nose is correctly positioned.

The findings sparked an airworthiness directive from the US Federal Aviation Administration containing guidance to 737 MAX pilots.