Hopes dim for 228 aboard missing French jet
updated 2 hours, 6 minutes ago
RIO DE JANEIRO - An Air France jet with 228 people on a flight to Paris vanished over the Atlantic Ocean after flying into towering thunderstorms and sending an automated message that the electrical system had failed. A vast search began Monday, but all aboard were feared killed.
Military aircraft scrambled out to the center of the Atlantic, far from the coasts of Brazil and West Africa, and France sought U.S. satellite help to find the wreckage. The first military ship wasn't expected to reach the area where the plane disappeared until Wednesday.
If there are no survivors, it would be the world's worst aviation disaster since 2001.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy said the cause remains unclear and that "no hypothesis" is being excluded. Some experts dismissed speculation that lightning might have brought the plane down. But violent thunderheads reaching more than 50,000 feet high can pound planes with hail and high winds, causing structural damage if pilots can't maneuver around them.
Sarkozy said he told family members of passengers on Air France Flight 447 that prospects of finding survivors are "very small."
Brazil's president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, expressed hope that "the worst hasn't happened," and said "we have to ask God" to help find survivors.
The four-year-old Airbus A330 left Rio Sunday night with 216 passengers and 12 crew members on board, said company spokeswoman Brigitte Barrand. Most of the passengers were Brazilian and French, but 32 nations in all were represented, including two Americans.
'Thunderous zone'
The plane was cruising normally at 35,000 feet and 522 mph just before it disappeared nearly four hours into the flight. No trouble was reported as the plane left radar contact, beyond Brazil's Fernando de Noronha archipelago, at 10:48 local time.
But just north of the equator, a line of towering thunderstorms loomed. Bands of extremely turbulent weather stretched across the Atlantic toward Africa, as they often do in the area this time of year.
The plane "crossed through a thunderous zone with strong turbulence," Air France said. About 14 minutes later, at 11:14 p.m. local time, an automatic message was sent reporting electrical system failure and a loss of cabin pressure. Air France said the message was the last it heard from Flight 447.
While what happened to the plane has not been determined, a Pentagon official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said he'd seen no indication of terrorism or foul play.
Chief Air France spokesman Francois Brousse said a lightning strike could have damaged the plane. Henry Margusity, a senior meteorologist for AccuWeather.com, noted that the thunderstorms towered up to 50,000 feet in the area, so it was possible that the plane flew directly into the most charged part of the storm.
Other experts doubted a bolt of lightning would be enough to bring the jet down. Some pointed to turbulence as a more dangerous factor.
"Lightning issues have been considered since the beginning of aviation. They were far more prevalent when aircraft operated at low altitudes. They are less common now since it's easier to avoid thunderstorms," said Bill Voss, president and CEO of Flight Safety Foundation, Alexandria, Va.
Voss said planes are built to dissipate electricity along the aircraft's skin, and are tested for resistance to big electromagnetic shocks.
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