The French Bureau of Enquiry and Analysis (BEA) for Civil Aviation Safety has abandoned its search for the flight data and cockpit voice recorders from the Air France passenger jet that crashed in the Atlantic Ocean while enroute from Rio de Janeiro to Paris on June 1, 2009, killing all 228 people on board. Experts will meet soon to determine how to proceed in the Air France Flight 447 accident investigation being led by the BEA. "As the searches did not make it possible to locate the airplane wreckage, the BEA will gather an international team of investigators and experts in the coming weeks to exploit the data gathered with a view to launching a third search phase, and to determine the requirements and means to undertake this,” the agency said in a statement.
A team of about 10 specialists from several countries including Brazil, France, the United States and Germany will study the data gathered so far and decide what a third search phase would cost and require.