Aircraft Went Down In The Atlantic 9 Months Ago

The French investigative agency BEA says that it will begin a third search next week  for the flight data recorder from Air France Flight 447, which went down on a flight from Rio de Janeiro to Paris June 1st of last year. All 228 people on board the airplane were lost.

The A330 went down in about 13,000 feet of water off the coast of Brazil. Thunderstorms were reported in the area where the plane went down, but attention has also focused on some of the flight instruments on board the aircraft. Automated messages from the aircraft just before it went down indicated that there may have been a problem with the airspeed sensors, and EASA has since ordered the Thales sensors on Airbus aircraft to be replaced.

"Without finding the recorders this investigation could never be conclusive and this accident could remain largely unexplained," Jean-Paul Troadec, head of the BEA French investigation agency, told a news conference in Brazil on Thursday.

The Associated Press reports that Troadec said the latest effort will include the two ships. Remotely piloted deep-water subs will search for the wreckage of the plane in an area about one-tenth the size of previous searches. The area has been narrowed by an international scientific effort that includes the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. The operation, expcted to cost about $13.3 million, is being paid for by Airbus and Air France.

FMI: www.bea.aero/en/index.php