More than 100 pieces of debris from EgyptAir Flight 804, which crashed into the Mediterranean Sea, has been found and reported to Egyptian officials, the U.S. Navy said today.
“The U.S. Navy P-3s continued to support the search effort with two missions from NAS Sigonella,” the U.S. Navy said in a statement updating its operation to help locate the plane. “While on station the first aircraft coordinated its search efforts with an Egyptian navy. While on station the second aircrew located a large debris with over 100 pieces of debris they were able to positively identify as aircraft debris. The location and description of all debris was passed to the Egyptian Navy.”
P-3s refer to a type of four-engine maritime surveillance aircraft.
The Egyptian navy is leading the search, but the U.S. Navy is providing assistance.
Egypt’s civil aviation minister, Sherif Fathi, told reporters today that the black boxes had yet to be recovered.
“We haven’t recovered them yet,” Fathi said. “Nothing new since yesterday. We have been recovering wreckage, we have been recovering human remains and other parts of the plane.”
Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi said earlier today that a submarine belonging to his country’s Oil Ministry was headed to the crash site to search for flight and voice recorders, also known as black boxes.
He said Egypt was jointly investigating the Thursday crash with the French government.
“It is very, very important to us to establish the circumstances that led to the crash of that aircraft,” he said in comments broadcast live on Egyptian TV channels.
He said the submarine, which has the capacity to operate at a depth of 9,842 feet, left for the site Sunday. He gave no further details.
Making his first public comments since the crash of the Airbus A320 while en route from Paris to Cairo, el-Sisi said it “will take time” to determine the exact cause of the crash, which killed all 66 people on board.
He thanked the nations that have joined Egyptian navy ships and aircraft in the search for the wreckage and began his comments to the press by leading a moment of silence in memory of the victims.
Later, El-Sisi cautioned the media against premature speculation on the cause of the crash, saying that “all scenarios are possible”.(MICHAEL EDISON HAYDEN)
Link: http://abcnews.go.com/International/us-navy-finds-100-pieces-egyptair-debris/story?id=39291126
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