French investigators hope data will solve debate over whether faulty sensors caused 2009 accident
A black box flight recorder from an Air France plane that crashed off the coast of Brazil in 2009, killing 228 people, has been recovered by a deep-sea search team, reviving hopes of understanding what caused the crash.
French investigators said one of the plane's two data recorders had been located by a robot submarine about 3,900 metres (12,800ft) below the Atlantic ocean's surface.
Pictures published on the website of France's Bureau of Investigation and Analysis (BEA), before the box was pulled on to the deck of the ship Île de Sein, show an orange cylindrical object half-buried in sand.
In a statement, BEA confirmed that the device was "in good physical condition".
The discovery comes after months of start-and-stop search efforts on a 15,540 sq km (6,000 sq mile) area of sea-bed off the north-east coast of Brazil.
Investigators hope information inside the recorder – expected to include records of cockpit conversations – will settle a dispute over the cause of the crash.
The Airbus A330 plane plunged into the Atlantic while on the way to Paris from Rio de Janeiro in June 2009, after the flight hit stormy weather. There were no survivors.
Speculation about what caused the accident has focused on the possible icing up of the aircraft's speed sensors, which seemed to give inconsistent readings before communication was lost.
Automatic messages sent by the Airbus A330's computers showed it was receiving false air speed readings from sensors known as pitot tubes. However, investigators have said the crash was likely to have been caused by a series of problems, and not just sensor error.
The recent discovery of chunks of the plane's wreckage, as well as the chassis of the flight recorder, had rekindled hopes of locating the black boxes and explaining the crash, the worst in Air France's 75-year history.