This Day In History

Jul 25 1985
Rock Hudson acknowledges he has AIDS.

Jul 25 1990
At a baseball game, actress Rosanne Arnold warbles the Star Spangled Banner, grabs her crotch, and endears herself to an entire nation.

Jul 25 1999
Woodstock '99 festival ends in looting and rioting, leaving 12 trailers burned, towers toppled, and several women raped during the course of the show. About 500 state troopers were needed to quell the mass uprising of peace and love, apparently triggered by overpriced vendors and commercialization.

Jul 25 2000
A right tire explosion on the Concorde causes the plane to crash after takeoff from Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, leaving 113 dead. It is the first crash in Concorde's history, and the only supersonic commercial flight to ever crash.

Structural Rupture Now Being Considered on Air France Flight

PARIS, France (CNN) -- At least some of the bodies recovered from the Air France crash this month had broken bones, Brazilian authorities have told French investigators, evidence that suggests the flight broke apart before hitting the ocean.

Paul-Louis Arslanian, director of the Bureau d'Enquetes et d'Analyses, the French accident investigation board, said Thursday that Brazilian medical examiners had given that information to his agency.

Asked whether the information included reports that the recovered bodies from Flight 447 had fractures to arms, legs and hips, and few had any clothing, Arslanian said yes.

All of that, aviation experts have said, points to a mid-air rupture of the plane at about 35,000 feet.

There is still no explanation of what brought down the Airbus A330, which was en route from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to Paris, France when it crashed in the Atlantic on June 1.

Arslanian pleaded Thursday for the media and the public to stop speculation about the cause of the Air France crash.

A major Brazilian newspaper reported this week that 95 percent of the bodies so far had shown fractures in the legs, arms and hips similar to injuries found in people who fall from great heights. The newspaper O Estado de Sao Paulo cited unnamed officials who are part of the investigation.

Another clue is the low incidence of cranial trauma, the newspaper reported. If the aircraft had nose-dived into the ocean, victims would have more head injuries, the paper said.

A large number of bodies also had red lesions in their mucous membranes, which the paper said is usually associated with asphyxia, or lack of oxygen.

Another major Brazilian newspaper, the Jornal do Brasil, cited information from an unnamed person from the Brazilian military who has access to the teams working in the recovery of the plane. This person told the paper that bodies were found "mutilated" with no clothing, a strong indication of violent depressurization caused by a structural rupture.

Total of 41 Bodies Recovered From Air France 447 Crash

Brazil (CNN) -- Forty-one bodies have been recovered from the crash of Air France Flight 447, the Brazilian Navy Command and Aeronautical Command said Tuesday.

Sixteen bodies pulled from the Atlantic Ocean Tuesday were taken to Fernando de Noronha for transportation Wednesday afternoon by helicopter to the air base in Recife, Brazil.

The 25 bodies previously found were put aboard a Brazilian frigate.

Searches for the remaining bodies will continue overnight, the navy and aeronautical command said in a written statement.

The Airbus A330 crashed in the Atlantic Ocean June 1 en route from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to Paris, France, carrying 228 passengers and crew.

The first bodies were recovered about 320 kilometers (200 miles) northwest of the Brazilian archipelago of Saint Peter and Saint Paul; Tuesday's recoveries were 80 kilometers (50 miles) away. It was not clear whether the bodies had drifted in the 1-2 knot currents or whether their separation suggested that the jet may have broken apart in the air.

Meanwhile, the French, who are leading the investigation, were increasing their naval efforts. The nuclear submarine Emeraude was expected to reach the search area Wednesday to search for wreckage, including the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder. And the French sent two tugs towing 40 tons of recovery equipment, a surveillance ship and a ship equipped for amphibious operations.

The United States is also sending equipment to help with the search.

Brazilian authorities said the plane debris will be taken to France for investigation but the bodies would undergo forensic tests in Recife.

The cause of the crash is not known, but investigators are looking at the possible role of airspeed sensors known as Pitot tubes, among other factors.

Air France has agreed to replace the sensors on its Airbus A330 and A340 jets, a pilots' union said Tuesday.

The airline said Saturday that it began replacing its fleet's sensors last month.

Another Air France pilots' union, ALTER, has advised its pilots not to fly planes until their Pitot tubes are replaced. ALTER, the smallest of three Air France pilots' unions, would not say what percentage of the carrier's pilots it represents.

The biggest union, SNPL, said Tuesday it has accepted Air France's assurances that no Airbus A330 or A340 will take off unless at least two of its three Pitot tubes have been replaced.

Union spokesman Eric Derivry added that there is no indication that the Pitot tubes caused the accident.

Air France said over the weekend that it began to notice in May of last year that Pitot tubes sometimes briefly iced up at high altitude on A330s and A340s. That caused "a loss of airspeed data," according to the airline -- that is, the pilots didn't know the plane's speed.

Air France decided to replace all its probes starting April 27, following laboratory tests earlier in the year, the airline said. That is the program the pilots say the airline has promised to complete within days.

The location of the crash has not been determined, because ocean currents have moved the bodies and debris.

The ocean depth where the debris and bodies have been found varies, but averages about 3,000 meters (nearly 9,900 feet) deep, according to the University of New Hampshire/National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association Joint Hydrographic Center. The search area covers 200,000 square km (77,220 square miles), nearly the size of Romania, Brazilian officials said.

Brazilian officials emphasized Monday that finding bodies was their main priority. The French are in charge of finding the voice and data recorders.

Fourteen aircraft -- 12 Brazilian and two French -- were participating, along with five Brazilian ships and one French frigate. The U.S. Navy will contribute two high-tech acoustic devices to listen underwater for the emergency beacons that are attached to the voice and data recorders.

The "towed pinger locators," which help search for emergency beacons on downed aircraft to a maximum depth of 20,000 feet -- will be placed aboard two French tugs that are part of the search efforts, the official said.

Investigation: Air France 296

On Sunday June 26, 1988, the airclub at the airfield of Mulhouse-Habsheim in Alsace/France had organized with Air France a low approach of a brand new Airbus A320 in landing configuration. Michel Asseline was the pilot in command of F-GFKC, Pierre Mazière was his first officer, when the aircraft overflew the airfield at 2 pm in wonderful sunny weather. Some seconds later the aircraft touched the tops of the trees behind the runway and crashed into a forest. 3 passengers died in the accident and about 50 were injured. The accident was filmed by a video amateur and has been shown dozens of times on TV. F-GFKC was the first of a couple of aircraft of this type to be lost in the next few years.

The Black Boxes were taken undamaged from the aircraft 2 hours after the crash, but unfortunately they have been out of control of justice for 10 days, and since May 1998 it is proven that the Flight Data Recorder was substituted during this period. The Lausanne Institute of Police Forensic Evidence and Criminology (IPSC) comes to the conclusion that the Black Boxes used in the trial to declare the pilot guilty are NOT the ones taken from the aircraft.

The aircraft was new, Airbus was waiting for commands, a lack of confidence in the highly computerized aircraft would have meant a commercial disaster - not only for the manufacturer, but also for the French administration, which has a share in the European Airbus consortium.

(rest of article here)

More Bodies Found From Air France Crash

RECIFE, Brazil (CNN) -- Sixteen bodies have been recovered from last week's crash of an Air France jetliner in the Atlantic Ocean, Brazil's military announced Monday.

The Brazilian navy and air force said they have found nine bodies in the wide search area around where the Airbus A330-200 went down. The crew of a French vessel taking part in the search has found seven bodies, military officials told reporters Sunday evening.

Air France Flight 447 disappeared over the Atlantic early June 1. The jet was en route to Paris, France, from the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro with 228 passengers and crew aboard.

The bodies were found floating about 1,100 kilometers (700 miles) from the Brazilian coast. Items found in the same area Saturday were confirmed to have come from the jet, including pieces of the aircraft's wing section, luggage and a leather briefcase containing an airplane ticket with a reservation code for the doomed flight, Brazilian air force spokesman Jorge Amaral told CNN.

The exact location of the crash has not been determined, since ocean currents probably caused the bodies and debris to drift in the days since the crash. And two key pieces of evidence -- the flight data and cockpit voice recorders -- remain missing, and could lie on the ocean floor.

The part of the ocean where the debris and bodies have been found ranges between 6,000 and 8,000 meters (about 19,700 to 26,250 feet) deep. The search area covers 200,000 square kilometers (77,220 square miles), an area nearly as big as the country of Romania. CNN's Karl Penhaul reports on more bodies found »

Twelve Brazilian and two French aircraft were participating, along with five Brazilian ships and one French frigate. And in Washington, a U.S. defense official told CNN that the U.S. Navy will contribute two high-tech acoustic devices to listen for emergency beacons still operating in deep water.

The "towed pinger locators," which help search for emergency beacons on downed aircraft to a maximum depth of 20,000 feet, will be placed aboard two French tugs that are part of the search efforts, the official said.

Recovery of bodies and debris is significant not only for families, but also 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," she told CNN on Saturday. Watch an explanation of what could have caused the crash »

She said investigators would be able to tell 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 about four minutes before it crashed. The messages suggest the plane may have been flying too fast or too slow through severe thunderstorms it encountered before the crash, officials said.

Schiavo said four minutes "was a very long time" for automated signals to be sent from the plane.

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. The change was not mandatory, and the spokesman would not comment on Air France's failure to follow the advice.

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.

Body From Air France Crash Found, Brazil Says

PARIS, France (CNN) -- The bodies of two men, one of whom was confirmed to be a passenger from the Air France plane that crashed Monday, were found early Saturday, a Brazilian air force spokesman said.

Also found 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, Jorge Amaral said.

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

Air force officials announced the news in Recife, Brazil. The items were discovered 420 miles north of the Fernando de Noronha islands, 220 miles (355 kilometers) off the northeast coast of Brazil.

All 228 passengers and crew aboard the Airbus 330 are presumed to have died when the plane disappeared northeast of the islands.

The flight originated in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and was en route to Paris, France.

Search teams were still trying to find debris from the jet Saturday, two days after an air force official said debris plucked from the ocean was not from the Air France jet.

Earlier Saturday, aviation investigators said Flight 447 sent out 24 automated error messages, including one saying the aircraft's autopilot had disengaged, before it vanished with 228 people on board.

They 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.

Planes have crashed because of faulty or blocked Pitot tubes in the past, Quest said, and there was clearly something wrong with the doomed plane's speed-monitoring equipment.

But it may be a mistake to place too much emphasis on the Pitot tubes, he added, as the jet apparently was experiencing massive system failures.

Even as they analyzed the error messages and satellite images of the doomed flight's path, investigators said they still have a lot of work to determine what caused the plane to go down.

"I would just like to ask you to bear in mind that all of this is dynamic and there are a lot of question marks," said Paul-Louis Arslanian, head of France's accident investigation bureau.

"We don't know how the aircraft entered the water. We don't know how these pieces of debris entered into the water and that you have to take into account the current ... and the shape of the ocean floor."

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

In addition, investigators have said the plane's autopilot disengaged, cabin pressure was lost, and there was an electrical failure before the disaster.

The jet's manufacturer, Airbus, sent a Telex to operators of Airbus models reminding them of what to do when speed indicators give conflicting readings.

The spokesman said the notice does not mean there is any major flaw in the aircraft but is simply a reminder to pilots of what to do in the cockpit if they get conflicting information about air speed.

Flight 447 Crash Could Join List of Mysteries

(CNN) -- As the possibility decreases that investigators will learn what happened to Air France Flight 447 on Monday over the Atlantic Ocean, the chances of it entering the folklore of mystery crashes grows.

Brazilian air force officials still have not identified debris from the Airbus A330, and a former U.S. National Transportation Safety Board official said currents would be scattering any debris from the flight over an increasing area, reducing the probability of finding the jetliner's voice and flight data recorders.

Experts said lack of answers about what happened to Flight 447 could give it a lasting place in the public consciousness, like TWA Flight 800.

Flight 800, headed to Paris, France, from New York, crashed into the Atlantic off Long Island in 1996, killing all 230 people aboard. Initially speculating that the plane was the target of a terrorist attack, the NTSB in 2000 released a report citing a short circuit around the center wing fuel tank as the probable cause.

The exact cause still has not been determined, and several other explanations have been offered over the years.

Clint V. Oster Jr., a professor of public and environmental affairs at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana, said that while the public may more readily process a single explanation, the reality is that many crashes are the result of compound difficulties.

"Many crashes don't have a single cause, but rather are the result of a complex sequence of events involving multiple failures. Understanding how these multiple factors interacted to cause the crash can be difficult," said Oster, co-author of "Why Airplanes Crash: Aviation Safety in a Changing World."

Pilot and author Phaedra Hise of Richmond, Virginia, said a love of mysteries multiplied by the fact that air travel still captivates the public keeps fascination high.

"If [John F. Kennedy Jr.] had died in a car crash, there would not be the same level of fascination. Aviation for a lot of people is still pretty magical," said Hise, author of "Anatomy of a Plane Crash."

"If you don't know how [a plane] works, it's pretty magical; this huge thing takes flight. It's just a big mystery. There's a lot of romance with that, a lot of drama," Hise said. "The people who fly them are considered brave and have a lot of heart. And people just don't understand, so many people just don't understand, how airplanes work."

A number of unsolved plane crashes have remained in the public psyche for years:

One of the most famous was that of aviator Amelia Earhart, whose twin-engine Lockheed Electra vanished over the Pacific Ocean in 1937 while on a round-the-world flight. Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, were never heard from again.

Because of the social intrigue, theories -- and conspiracies -- related to Earhart's disappearance have become legend.

None of course ranks as high in mystery as the Bermuda Triangle, a cone-shaped vicinity extending northward from Puerto Rico to about halfway up the U.S. Eastern Seaboard. Its origins come from the loss of Flight 19, a team of five Navy bombers that vanished in 1945 after getting disoriented and confused about its coordinates.

More recently, South African Airways Flight 295, a Boeing 747 en route to Johannesburg from Taiwan in 1987, crashed into the Indian Ocean shortly after the pilot reported smoke in the cabin. While debris that washed up on the shores of Madagascar was tested, the cause of the crash has never been positively established.

In 1994, U.S. Air Flight 427 crashed in Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, after taking off in Chicago, Illinois, en route to West Palm Beach, Florida. While federal officials identified a problem with the rudder but could not explain why the plane suddenly flipped and crashed, not a single clue has revealed why the mechanism failed. All 132 people aboard died.

Golfer Payne Stewart's Learjet crashed in 1999. Although federal investigators revealed that the cabin air system lost pressure, it still has not been determined why. The pilots reportedly lost contact with air traffic controllers about 15 minutes into the flight. The investigation uncovered that the jet flew a straight course until it ran out of fuel and crashed in South Dakota.

In January 2008, a British Airways Boeing 777 crashed short of the runway at Heathrow Airport in London, England. Nineteen of the 152 people aboard were injured. There still is no explanation for why the plane's engines lost power.

"The one that fascinates me is Steve Fossett," said Hise."I have absolutely no idea what happened to that man."

Fossett, an adventurer famous for being the first person to complete a solo balloon flight around the world, was reported missing over Nevada in September 2007. Months after investigators searched for his body, his widow, in February 2008, requested that he be declared legally dead. His bones, found more than a half-mile from where his plane wreckage was discovered, were positively identified later that year.

"He was flying in clear skies, in an area he was familiar with. That's the one that kind of eats away at me," Hise said.

With all the mystery, David M. Primo, associate professor of political science at the University of Rochester, said there's a broader effect when investigations fail to find clues about how an aircraft go down.

"An unsolved crash has the effect of creating an erroneous perception that flying is unsafe, even though it is a remarkably safe form of travel," said Primo, co-author of "The Plane Truth: Airline Crashes, The Media and Transportation Policy."

The odds of dying in a domestic plane crash are one in 70 million, according to MIT statistician Arnold Barnett, who has performed analyses for the Federal Aviation Administration.

Crucial Air France Crash Data May Be Lost At Sea

PARIS, France (CNN) -- French officials -- who said there is now no hope that anyone survived the crash of an Air France jet that plunged into the Atlantic -- said Wednesday they may never find the doomed jets flight data recorders.

The Airbus 330, with 216 passengers and 12 crew members on board, disappeared from radar screens, some three hours after it took off from Rio de Janeiro in Brazil en route to Paris.

A memorial for the victims of Flight AF 447, which included 61 people from France, 58 Brazilians, 26 Germans and people from 29 other countries, will take place at the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris at 10 a.m. ET (4 p.m. GMT). Brazil has declared three days of mourning.

Air France CEO Pierre-Henri Gourgeon said aircraft encountered heavy turbulence about 02:15 a.m. local time Monday (10:15 p.m. ET Sunday). At that point, the plane's automatic system initiated a four-minute exchange of messages to the company's maintenance computers, indicating "several pieces of aircraft equipment were at fault or had broken down."

The jet, which was flying at 35,000 feet and at 521 mph, also sent a warning that it had lost pressure, the Brazilian air force said. Its last known contact occurred at 02:33 a.m., the Brazilian air force spokesman added.

"We need time to reach the recorders," said Paul-Louis Arslanian, head of France's Accident Investigation Bureau.

The recorders give off a locator signal that lasts for up to 30 days, and the French government has sent a research vessel with a deep-diving submersible on board to the area where the plane's debris was found.

French officials said weather conditions at the site -- believed to be a major factor in the crash -- remain "extremely difficult" and the depth of the Atlantic near the sites where wreckage was found is around 7,000 meters (21,000 feet).

"Even in history ... recorders from time to time were found after the 30 days. But I'm not so optimistic," said Arslanian at a press conference Wednesday. "It's not only deep it's also very mountainous at that place of the ocean."

Arslanian said answers on what caused the crash could take a long time.

"It could be long, we can not do with 80 percent understanding," said Arslanian. "This catastrophe is the worst that our country has known in our country's air history."

He said there appeared to be no problems with Flight AF 447 before take-off, but that everything had to be "checked and verified."

On Tuesday authorities found debris from the jet in two separate debris fields 60 km apart located about 650 km (400 miles) northeast of the Fernando de Noronha Islands, an archipelago 355 kilometers (220 miles) off the northeast coast of Brazil.

Among the wreckage was an airplane seat, metal debris, an orange float, a drum and an oil spill, French officials said.

French investigators were first mobilized on Monday, with four teams set up to conduct the probe. One has been tasked with recovering the wreck and flight recorders, the second group are looking at the aircraft's maintenance history, the third checking the operations of the plane, and the last group studying the plane's systems and equipment.

The investigation's team leader, Alain Bouillard, said their first preliminary report would be submitted by the end of June.

Riverdancer, Former Royal Among Plane's Missing

PARIS, France (CNN) -- Friends and relatives of the 216 passengers and 12 crew members on Air France Flight 447 are coming to terms with the news that wreckage from the flight was found in the Atlantic Ocean.

Among those on board were a member of Brazil's former royal family, a one-time performer with the Riverdance troupe, a Rio city official, executives from major international companies and an 11-year-old British schoolboy.

Pedro Luis de Orleans e Braganca, 26, was a descendant of the family that ruled Brazil until 1889, a branch of the former Portuguese royal family. The Orleans and Braganca family considered him to be fourth in line to the throne. Pedro Luis was the oldest son of Prince Antonio and Princess Christine, the family said. He was the only member of the family on the flight, his relatives said.

Eithne Walls, who danced with Riverdance on Broadway, was also on the plane, said Julian Erskine, senior executive producer of the troupe.

"I never saw her without a smile on her face," Erskine said in a statement. "It is hard to believe that such a bright light could be quenched so early and while burning so brilliantly."

She joined the Irish dance troupe in 1998 and performed with them for most of a decade, studying medicine at the same time, Erskine said.

Watch CNN's Paula Newton report on families awaiting news of Air France Flight 447 »

Wreckage Seen in Search Area for Missing Jet

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (CNN) -- Searchers looking for a missing Air France jetliner spotted wreckage Tuesday in the Atlantic Ocean that may have come from the plane, Brazilian aviation officials said Tuesday.

An airplane seat, orange life vest, small white fragments and signs of oil and kerosene were found 700 kilometers (434 miles) northeast of the Fernando de Noronha archipelago, said Brazilian Air Force spokesman Jorge Amaral. The search will continue, Amaral said.

He said there is not enough material to officially say this is the wreckage from Flight 447, which disappeared early Monday with 228 people onboard.

The debris was found 80 kilometers (50 miles) from the plane's flight path, another Brazilian Air Force official said.

The Airbus A330 encountered heavy turbulence early Monday, about three hours after it left Rio de Janeiro for Paris on an 11-hour flight, according to Air France CEO Pierre-Henri Gourgeon.

Fernando de Noronha is an archipelago of 21 islands around 354 kilometers (220 miles) off the northeast coast of Brazil. It lies in what could be the flight path between Rio de Janeiro and Paris. See map of suspected crash zone »

A search was also conducted in waters off the African nation of Senegal, where a crew from the Brazilian airline TAM said they saw "shiny spots" in the sea along the route of Flight 447. Watch how wreckage has been spotted in Atlantic »

Senegal is northeast of Fernando de Noronha and near what would have been the plane's presumed flight path.

The plane carried 216 passengers -- 126 men, 82 women, seven children and a baby -- and 12 crew members, Air France said. Of the crew, 11 were French and one was Brazilian. Watch latest report on missing aircraft »

(Rest of article)

Sarkozy: Little Hope for Finding Survivors

PARIS, France (CNN) -- The jet carrying 228 people from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, that disappeared overnight as it entered an area of strong turbulence probably crashed into the Atlantic Ocean, the CEO of Air France said Monday.

The first three hours of what was to have been an 11-hour flight appear to have been uneventful, CEO Pierre-Henri Gourgeon said.

But about 4:15 a.m. Paris time, Flight 447's automatic system began a four-minute exchange of messages to the company's maintenance computers, indicating that "several pieces of aircraft equipment were at fault or had broken down," he said.

"This succession of messages signals a totally unforeseeable, great difficulty," he said. "Something quite new within the plane."

During that time, there was no contact with the crew, Gourgeon said.

"It was probable that it was a little bit after those messages that the impact of the plane took place in the Atlantic," he added.

He said the Airbus A330 was probably closer to Brazil than to Africa when it crashed.

He noted that turbulence made flying "difficult" in the area but that it is "too early to say" exactly what happened.

The chances of finding any survivors from were "very low," French President Nicolas Sarkozy admitted Monday.

"This is a catastrophe the likes of which Air France has never seen before," he said at Charles de Gaulle International Airport, where he met with relatives of the missing.

"I said the truth to them: The prospects of finding survivors are very low," he said.

Asked the nationalities of those aboard, he said most of them were Brazilians but added, "that changes nothing, of course. They're victims. It doesn't matter about their nationality."

The airline company identified the nationalities of the victims as two Americans, an Argentinean, an Austrian, a Belgian, 58 Brazilians, five British, a Canadian, nine Chinese, a Croatian, a Dane, a Dutch, an Estonian, a Filipino, 61 French, a Gambian, 26 Germans, four Hungarians, three Irish, one Icelandic, nine Italians, five Lebanese, two Moroccans, three Norwegians, two Polish, one Romanian, one Russian, three Slovakian, two Spanish, one Swedish, six Swiss and one Turk.

Sarkozy said French authorities had sent ships and planes to the area about 400 kilometers from Brazil. "Our Spanish friends are helping us; Brazilians are helping us a lot as well."

He added that authorities were seeking the help of satellites that might be able to pick up signs of what happened to the 4-year-old Airbus 330.

No possibility was being excluded: Turbulence in the area was strong, but other planes were able to pass through it without incident, he said.

The plane had reported a problem with the electrical system, "but the specialists refuse for the moment to express themselves about any possibility," Sarkozy said.

The jet had also sent out a warning that it had lost pressure, the Brazilian air force said.

[rest of article]

Missing Air France Jet Has Electrical Problems

PARIS, France (CNN) --
Air France plane feared to have crashed in the Atlantic with 228 people aboard reported electrical problems in stormy weather before it lost contact, the airline said Monday, describing the loss as a "catastrophe."

The Airbus A330-200 sent an automatic message signaling equipment failure as it hit turbulence early in its 11-hour flight from Rio de Janeiro to Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris, Air France CEO Pierre-Henri Gourgeon told a news conference.

The last known contact with the plane was at 1:33 a.m. GMT (8:33 p.m. Sunday night ET), according to the Brazilian Air Force.

Brazil says it has launched two air force squadrons to hunt near the archipelago of Fernando de Noronha in the Atlantic Ocean, 365 kilometers (226 miles) from its coast, although the plane vanished outside the country's radar coverage.

Flight AF 447, took off shortly after 7 p.m. Sunday local time (6 p.m. Sunday ET). It was carrying 126 men, 82 women, seven children and a baby, in addition to the crew, Air France said.

"I can say without doubt that this is a catastrophe," Gourgeon said, adding "the entire Air France company and its staff are very moved and affected by this."

A crisis center was being set up at Charles de Gaulle to deal with anxious relatives and friends waiting for news of passengers. Air France has also set up a hotline: 0800 800 812 in France, or +33 157021055 for international callers..

Airbus has opened a crisis room and their flight safety team is in place, a company spokesperson told CNN. Airbus is working closely with authorities and Air France, he said, declining to comment further.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy expressed his "very deep concern" and asked the government "to implement every effort to find the plane," according to a statement from his office.

Agence France-Presse quoted France's Environment Minister Jean Louis Borloo saying that it was extremely unlikely the plane had been hijacked.

Gourgeon said the aircraft involved was a new Airbus piloted by a "particularly experienced crew."

Analyst Kieran Daly of online aviation news service Air Transport Intelligence told CNN that the lack of communication with the aircraft "does suggest it was something serious and catastrophic."

He said the aircraft involved is believed to be one delivered to Air France in April 2005.

"It is an extremely young fleet by aviation standards," he said. "The A330 is state-of-the-art with extremely reliable engines made by General Electric."

CNN air travel expert Richard Quest says the twin-engined plane, a stalwart of trans-Atlantic routes, has an impeccable safety record.

"It has very good range, and is extremely popular with airlines because of its versatility," he said.