Plane recovery
April 4, 2011
As the two-year anniversary of the crash of Air France flight 447 approaches, more pieces of the plane have been recovered by salvage teams in the Atlantic.
"These elements were identified by BEA [France's Bureau of Investigation and Analysis] investigators as belonging to the wreckage of the A330-203 plane," the BEA said in a statement.
Last month, France launched a new search of the suspected crash area, in an effort to locate more wreckage and the black box cockpit recorders that could shed more light onto what happened in the crash, in which 228 people lost their lives.
The flight recorders have still not been found and investigators are unsure if they are still attached to the fuselage. According to French officials, bodies and additional wreckage from the plane could be pulled up from the ocean within a month.
The searches were funded by Air France and Airbus, the manufacturer of the A330 aircraft.
On June 1, 2009, the Air France flight crashed on its way from Rio de Janeiro to Paris. So far, only scattered pieces of the plane and about 50 bodies have been recovered.
Author: Matt Zuvela, Christian Nathler (AFP, Reuters, dpa)
Editor: Martin Kuebler