PARIS (AP) — Searchers found two bodies and a briefcase containing a ticket for Air France Flight 447 in the Atlantic Ocean close to where the jetliner is believed to have crashed, a Brazil military official said Saturday.
The two male bodies were recovered Saturday morning about 45 miles south of where Air France Flight 447 emitted its last signals — roughly 400 miles northeast of the Fernando de Noronha islands off Brazil's northern coast.
Brazilian air force spokesman Col. Jorge Amaral said an Air France ticket was found inside a leather briefcase.
"It was confirmed with Air France that the ticket number corresponds to a passenger on the flight," he said.
Admiral Edison Lawrence said the bodies were being transported to the Fernando de Noronha islands for identification. A backpack with a vaccination card also was recovered.
FIND MORE STORIES IN: Air France
The French agency investigating the disaster, meanwhile, said airspeed instruments on the plane were not replaced as the maker recommended before it disappeared in turbulent weather nearly a week ago.
The French accident investigation agency, BEA, found the plane received inconsistent airspeed readings from different instruments as it struggled in a massive thunderstorm on its flight from Rio de Janeiro to Paris with 228 people aboard.
Airbus had recommended that all its airline customers replace speed-measuring instruments known as Pitot tubes on the A330, the model used for Flight 447, said Paul-Louis Arslanian, the head of the agency.
Air France issued details about the monitors Saturday, hours after the French agency investigating the disaster of Flight 447 said the instruments were not replaced before the plane crashed last week en route from Rio de Janeiro to Paris.
The airline acknowledged that speed monitors on its Airbus planes have proven faulty, icing up at high altitude, and that recommendations to change them were first made in September 2007.
Air France said it began replacing the monitors on the Airbus A330 model on April 27.
Pitot monitors are used to measure aerodynamic speed.
An Air France statement said icing of the monitors at high altitude has led to loss of needed flying information.
Arslanian cautioned that it is too early to draw conclusions about the role of Pitot tubes in the crash, saying that "it does not mean that without replacing the Pitots that the A330 was dangerous."
He told a news conference at the agency's headquarters near Paris that the crash of Flight 447 does not mean similar planes are unsafe, adding that he told family members not to worry about flying.
Airbus had made the recommendation for "a number of reasons," he said.
The finds could potentially establish a more precise search area for the crucial black box flight recorders that could tell investigators why the jet crashed, although Brazilian authorities refused to comment on implications for the search.
Investigators have been searching a zone of several hundred square miles for debris. A blue plane seat with a serial number on it has been recovered — but officials were still trying to confirm with Air France that it was a seat belonging to Flight 477.
The investigation is increasingly focused on whether external instruments may have iced over, confusing speed sensors and leading computers to set the plane's speed too fast or slow — a potentially deadly mistake in severe turbulence.
Pitot tubes, protruding from the wing or fuselage of a plane, feed airspeed sensors and are heated to prevent icing. A blocked or malfunctioning Pitot tube could cause an airspeed sensor to malfunction and cause the computer controlling the plane to accelerate or decelerate in a potentially dangerous way.
Air France has already replaced the Pitots on another Airbus model, the 320, after its pilots reported similar problems with the instrument, according to an Air France air safety report filed by pilots in January and obtained by The Associated Press.
The report followed an incident in which an Air France flight from Tokyo to Paris reported problems with its airspeed indicators similar to those believed to have been encountered by Flight 447. In that case, the Pitot tubes were found to have been blocked by ice.
"Following similar problems frequently encountered on the A320 fleet, preventative actions have already been decided and applied," the safety report says. The Pitots on all Air France's A320s were retrofitted with new Pitots "less susceptible to these weather conditions."
The same report says Air France decided to increase the inspection frequency for its A330 and A340 jets' Pitot tubes, but that it had been waiting for a recommendation from Airbus before installing new Pitots.
As they try to locate the wreckage, investigators are relying on 24 messages the plane sent automatically during the last minutes of the flight.
The signals show the plane's autopilot was not on, officials said, but it was not clear if the autopilot had been switched off by the pilots or had stopped working because it received conflicting airspeed readings.
The flight disappeared nearly four hours after takeoff, killing all on board. It was Air France's deadliest plane crash and the world's worst commercial air accident since 2001.
The head of France's weather forecasting agency, Alain Ratier, said weather conditions at the time of the flight were not exceptional for the time of the year and region, which is known for violent stormy weather.
On Thursday, European plane maker Airbus sent an advisory to all operators of the A330 reminding them of how to handle the plane in conditions similar to those experienced by Flight 447.
Peter Goelz, a former managing director of the National Transportation Safety Board, said that advisory and the Air France memo about replacing flight-speed instruments "certainly raises questions about whether the Pitot tubes, which are critical to the pilot's understanding of what's going on, were operating effectively."
Arslanian said it is vital to locate a small beacon called a "pinger" that should be attached to the cockpit voice and data recorders, now presumed to be deep in the Atlantic.
"We have no guarantee that the pinger is attached to the recorders," he said.
Holding up a pinger in the palm of his hand, he said: "This is what we are looking for in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean."
Currents could have scattered debris far along the ocean floor, he said.
President Obama said at a news conference with French President Nicolas Sarkozy Saturday that the United States had authorized all of the U.S. government's resources to help investigate the crash.
BEA head Arslanian said U.S. forces have lent the agency acoustic systems that will be fitted to two naval vessels. France's Emeraude submarine and other high-tech equipment from French marine research institute Ifremer are also being sent to the region.
The submarine, to arrive next week, will try to detect signals from the black boxes, said military spokesman Christophe Prazuck.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Showing posts with label World. Show all posts
Showing posts with label World. Show all posts
Obama calls for new start between U.S., Muslim world
CAIRO — In a speech he called a first step toward changing U.S.-Muslim relations, President Obama on Thursday called on Muslims, Jews and Christians around the world to cast aside fear and mistrust in the name of a safer, more prosperous future.
In a speech delivered at Cairo University, Obama sought to challenge stereotypes after a decade of violence and misunderstanding in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
"I have come here to Cairo to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world — one based upon mutual interest and mutual respect, and one based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive," he told an audience of dignitaries, students and journalists.
THE OVAL: Obama speaks in Cairo
MORE ON SPEECH: President's team cast wide net
TEXT: Read Obama's speech
He offered no new policy prescription on the key areas of discord: Arab-Israeli peace, the war in Afghanistan and Iran's nuclear ambitions. And he acknowledged as much.
"No single speech can eradicate years of mistrust, nor can I answer in the time that I have all the complex questions that brought us to this point," he said. "But I am convinced that in order to move forward, we must say openly the things we hold in our hearts, and that too often are said only behind closed doors. There must be a sustained effort to listen to each other, to learn from each other, to respect one another; and to seek common ground."
The only disruption during the speech came when someone from the audience shouted, "We love you." Obama did not respond as he often does at home with, "I love you back." He smiled and said, "Thank you."
U.S.-MUSLIM RELATIONS: Obama plans to reach out
Security was tight on campus and along the streets in and out of the usually chaotic city. Armed police stood on the sidewalks along miles and miles of road, spaced only about 20 feet apart.
On his way to the speech, Obama met with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and visited the Sultan Hassan Mosque, one of the largest in the Islamic world, with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Afterward, he conducted a roundtable interview with journalists from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Palestinian territories, Malaysia and Indonesia.
His speech was broadcast around the world and sent out via Twitter and several social-networking sites in what the White House described as its most ambitious effort to date to distribute its message.
At the university, Obama went over several key areas that, he said, have contributed to the misunderstanding and distrust that has marked U.S.-Muslim relations for years:
• On violent extremists, he offered a vigorous defense of his decision to send more troops to Afghanistan while promising that the U.S. does not intend to stay.
"America is not — and never will be — at war with Islam," Obama said. "We will, however, relentlessly confront violent extremists who pose a grave threat to our security … it is my first duty as president to protect the American people."
With respect to the troop buildup, he said: "Make no mistake: We do not want to keep our troops in Afghanistan. We seek no military bases there. It is agonizing for America to lose our young men and women. It is costly and politically difficult to continue this conflict. We would gladly bring every single one of our troops home if we could be confident that there were not violent extremists in Afghanistan and Pakistan determined to kill as many Americans as they possibly can. But that is not yet the case."
• On the Arab-Israeli conflict, he urged both sides to follow through on their commitments and reiterated his support for a two-state solution.
He passionately reinforced the United States' bond with Israel and cautioned against the kind of heated rhetoric that has inflamed passions in the past.
"Around the world, the Jewish people were persecuted for centuries, and anti-Semitism in Europe culminated in an unprecedented Holocaust," he said. "Tomorrow, I will visit Buchenwald, which was part of a network of camps where Jews were enslaved, tortured, shot and gassed to death by the Third Reich. Six million Jews were killed — more than the entire Jewish population of Israel today. Denying that fact is baseless, ignorant, and hateful. Threatening Israel with destruction — or repeating vile stereotypes about Jews — is deeply wrong, and only serves to evoke in the minds of Israelis this most painful of memories while preventing the peace that the people of this region deserve."
He also highlighted the suffering of the Palestinians.
"It is also undeniable that the Palestinian people — Muslims and Christians — have suffered in pursuit of a homeland," he said. "For more than 60 years they have endured the pain of dislocation. Many wait in refugee camps in the West Bank, Gaza, and neighboring lands for a life of peace and security that they have never been able to lead. They endure the daily humiliations — large and small — that come with occupation. So let there be no doubt: the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable. America will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own."
• On Iran's nuclear ambitions, Obama said the world has reached "a decisive point."
Preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, he said, "is not simply about America's interests. It is about preventing a nuclear arms race in the Middle East that could lead this region and the world down a hugely dangerous path. "
• On the promotion of democracy, Obama acknowledged the controversy of the U.S. role in Iraq. "Let me be clear," he said. "No system of government can or should be imposed upon one nation by any other."
In a stark contrast in tone from Bush administration officials, Obama said: "America does not presume to know what is best for everyone, just as we would not presume to pick the outcome of a peaceful election. But I do have an unyielding belief that all people yearn for certain things: the ability to speak your mind and have a say in how you are governed; confidence in the rule of law and the equal administration of justice; government that is transparent and doesn't steal from the people; the freedom to live as you choose.
" Those are not just American ideas, they are human rights, and that is why we will support them everywhere."
