More Flight 447 debris found, black box hardly retrievable

A seven-meter-long object and 10 other objects, some of them metallic, were spotted by the search planes at 3:40 a.m., said the Brazilian Air Force. A 20-kilometer-long oil track was spotted as well. The items were found in four different points, spread over a five kilometers radius, 90 kilometers south of the place where the first debris were spotted. According to the Air Force, the debris' position alone is no indication that the Air France plane suffered some sort of explosion in the air. The plane which identified the debris, an Embraer R-99 model, has not spotted any bodies, but according to the Air Force's spokesman, Colonel Jorge Amaral, the authorities are still working with the possibility of finding survivors of the accident. A total of 11 aircraft are involved in the search efforts, including a P-3 Orion model from the U.S. Air Force and a Falcon 50 model from the French Air Force. The remaining planes, including three Lockheed C-130 Hercules models, all belong to the Brazilian Air Force. The French government also sent submarines, in an attempt to find the plane's Flight Data Recorder, which may help uncover the causes of the crash. This may prove to be a difficult task, as the depth in the area surpasses 4,000 meters. The French accident investigation agency said on Wednesday it was not hopeful that the black box of the Air France airliner would be found. Speaking at the first news conference since the disappearance of the Air France flight 447 from Rio to Paris on Monday, Paul-Louis Arslanian, the director of France's air safety investigation agency, said he was "not optimistic" that the box would be found in the "deep sea and mountainous area"; Kazinform cites Xinhua. See www.chinaview.cn for full version