Paris – French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve says a black box has been located at the site in the French Alps where a plane crashed while traveling from Barcelona to Duesseldorf.
Cazeneuve, speaking from the Alps region, said the black box had been located and would ultimately help in the investigation into the cause of the crash Tuesday.
It wasn’t immediately clear if the box had been recovered.
Officials believe all 150 people onboard the plane were likely killed when it crashed.
The pilots sent out no distress call and had lost radio contact with its control center, France’s aviation authority said, deepening the mystery over the A320’s mid-flight crash after an 8-minute surprise steep descent as it flew from Barcelona to Duesseldorf.
The crash left officials and families across Europe in shock. Sobbing, grieving relatives at both airports were led away by airport workers and crisis counselors.
Photos of crash site from the La Provence newspaper showed scattered black flecks across a mountain and several larger airplane body sections with windows, five in one chunk and four in another.
French officials said a helicopter crew that landed briefly in the area saw no signs of life.
“Everything is pulverized. The largest pieces of debris are the size of a small car.
No one can access the site from the ground,” Gilbert Sauvan, president of the general council, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, told The AP.
