French newspaper Le Monde is reporting that Air France black box signals have been located. The weak signals are thought to be from the flight data recorders of Air France flight 447 that crashed in the Atlantic Ocean on June 1, 2009 while it was en route from Rio de Janeiro to Paris. Read about it below.
Air France Black Box
Le Monde is reporting that French naval vessels are picking up weak signals from flight date recorders presumably from the Air France Flight 447 that crashed into the Atlantic Ocean on June 1st. They are reporting that a mini submarine has been sent to search for the black boxes on the bottom of the ocean floor. The depth of the ocean is approximately 5,000 yards, has strong currents and the ocean floor is rugged in the area of the crash, which is making recovery of the black boxes very difficult.
Flight data recorders emit electronic pulses every second for a least 30 days and can be detected up to a mile and a half away. The French have a nuclear submarine with high tech sonar equipment and a research ship equipped with mini submarines searching for the recorders. On Monday, the United States sent a Navy team with high-tech underwater listening devices to help with the search.
It is hoped that recovery of the black boxes will provide information as to the causes of the crash. As of now, there is little information about what happened to the Airbus A330 aircraft. It was first reported to have simply disappeared. Later, debris and bodies found from the crash gave the appearance that the plane had broken up in midair.
It was first reported that the flight had gone missing without explanation. The condition of the debris and the 17 bodies that have been found as well as reports that two of the passengers had the same names as people on the ‘terrorist watch list’ has led to speculation that the flight might have been targeted by a terrorist attack. In addition, there was no indication there were problems with the flight before it disappeared.
Of course, any causes of the airplane suddenly breaking apart in midair is just speculation until the black boxes are retrieved. Now that the Air France black box signals are located, hopefully there will be some real answers as to what caused this tragedy.