More Bodies Found From Missing Air France Plane

RECIFE, Brazil (CNN) -- Three more bodies were found Sunday from the Air France plane that went missing off the coast of Brazil nearly a week ago, Brazilian officials said.

The discovery brings to five the number of bodies found from the flight AF447, which was carrying 228 passengers and crew when it vanished on Monday.

On Saturday, a Brazilian navy frigate transported the bodies of two men -- south of Brazil's Fernando de Noronha archpelago.

Brazilian air force and navy officials said it was not possible to identify the sex of the latest three bodies. Asked their condition, the officials declined to describe them, citing good taste and the victims' families.

All the bodies and items are confirmed as being from Air France 447, which vanished over the Atlantic early Monday en route to Paris, France, from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

The items recovered include parts of the plane's wing section and at least two seats from the plane and many more items of luggage, officials said.

The area where the bodies and crash debris are being found is about 1,100 kilometers (700 miles) from the Brazilian coast.

Bodies and debris from the aircraft will be taken to the coastal city of Recife for formal identification and forensic examination, officials said.

Brazilian authorities said the investigation into the cause of the crash would be handled by Air France and by French authorities. Once everything is brought to the mainland, the French investigators will examine the items.

The Brazilian officials said their first priority is to recover as many bodies as possible, in order to return them to the victim's families. They also want to recover luggage items and aircraft pieces to aid in the crash probe.

The discovery of the bodies Saturday provided a sliver ofhope to anxious relatives awaiting news.

"When I heard about this accident, they told us there were no bodies, no pieces of the plane," Nelson Faria Marinho, the father of a missing passenger, told Globo News television in Rio de Janeiro.

"Now, it's all surfacing. We have pieces of the airplane. We have bodies. This renews my hope. As a father, I can't think of the worst. I couldn't."

Also found Saturday were a backpack and a leather briefcase containing an airplane ticket with a reservation code, which Air France verified belonged to a passenger on the jet, another air force spokesman, Jorge Amaral, told CNN.

The Brazilian navy and air force officials said the backpack contained a laptop, and an oxygen mask also was discovered.

The search area covers 200,000 square kilometers (77,220 square miles).

It is not clear where the plane crashed, since ocean currents likely caused the bodies and debris to drift in the six days since the crash.

Recovery of bodies and debris is significant not only for families, but for crash investigators, said Mary Schiavo, a former inspector general for the U.S. Department of Transportation.

"Even if they don't find anything else they can get some very important clues from the pieces that they do find and from the human remains," Schiavo told CNN Saturday.

She said investigators would be able to discern if there was an explosion from possible residue on the bodies or other items. Or, if water is found in the lungs of victims, investigators would know the plane went down intact, she said.

Investigators in Paris said Saturday that the Air France flight sent out 24 automated error messages lasting about four minutes before it crashed.

The error messages suggest the plane may have been flying too fast or too slow through severe thunderstorms it encountered before the crash, officials said.

Schiavo, the former inspector general, said the four minutes of automated signals sent from the plane "was a very long time."

Investigators also reported that the airline had failed to replace a part, as recommended by the manufacturer, Airbus.

Airbus had advised airlines to update equipment that monitors speed, known as Pitot tubes. The recommendation was a result of technological developments and improvements, an Airbus spokesman told CNN's Richard Quest. The change was not mandatory, and the spokesman would not comment on Air France's failure to follow the advice.

But investigators said a lot of work remains to be done to determine why the plane crashed.