Paris: A second body was brought to the surface on Friday from the submerged wreckage of the Air France Rio-Paris flight that plunged into the sea off Brazil two years ago, the French Interior Ministry said.
The body was hauled up from a depth of 3,900m still strapped into an airline seat, like the first body recovered on Thursday.
“These operations were carried out with the most dignified care, in difficult conditions,” the ministry said in a statement.
Beginning around May 20, a reinforcement team from France will join the search party, based on a ship off northeast Brazil, to work on bringing up the remaining bodies and personal effects.
The French investigators recently recovered the two `black box` voice and data recorders from the Airbus 330-203 wreckage, providing hope of an explanation for the crash. The wreckage was located in April after nearly two years of searching the seabed.
The plane crashed into the sea after flying into storms following its take-off from Rio de Janeiro in June 2009. All 228 passengers and crew were lost, and the Brazilian Navy found dozens of bodies in the sea in the days after the crash.
Bureau Report
