Weather map of Atlantic at the time of crash, last known contact at 2:15 UTC
Daunting search begins of the vast mid-Atlantic Ocean
Stephen Pate, NJN Network, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada, June 4, 2009 with story from BBC News
The Brazilian Navy reached the debris field of Air France flight 447 early this morning.
They are looking for bodies and pieces of the aircraft that are still on the surface.
The Air France jet is believed to lie at 12,000 feet (3,700m) below the surface.
Eleven aircraft and five naval vessels will aid in the search effort.
A 7m metallic object, spotted from the air, is expected to be a piece of the tail or fuselage. The Navy will attempt to recover this first.
The Air France plane had 228 passengers and no bodies have been spotted from the air. There is a 20 km long oil slick and debris scattered over 5 square kilometers.
According to Brazil’s Estado de Sao Paulo newspaper, there are unconfirmed reports of messages in the last minutes including
“Airliner’s pilot first sent a message that he was entering thick black clouds of a type normally associated with violent winds and lightning.
Ten minutes later a series of electronic messages were sent from the plane indicating that the autopilot had disengaged and that a computer on board had switched to an alternative power system.
The controls needed to keep the aircraft stable had also been damaged, the newspaper report says, and an alarm sounded, suggesting the situation was becoming increasingly grave.
This cascade of messages ended with one pointing to a loss of air pressure and electrical failure.” BBC
The real answers to all questions will come with recovery of the two black boxes. French officials are not optimistic.
“France’s minister responsible for transportation, Jean-Louis Borloo, warned that “black boxes” had never been recovered at such depths.
“The sea currents are powerful that far down,” he said.
Paul Louis Arslanian, head of France’s air accident investigation agency, said: “We cannot rule out that we will not find the flight recorders.” (BBC)
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