CAIRO, June 29 (UPI) — One of the “black boxes” recovered from EgyptAir Flight MS804 has confirmed the possibility of an on-board fire in one of the jetliner’s lavatories and avionics bay, Egyptian authorities said Wednesday.
The flight data recorder has been undergoing a thorough analysis in recent days to help investigators clue in on what doomed the Airbus A320 on May 19 during a flight from Paris to Cairo, killing all 66 on board.
The data recorder, one of two mandated pieces of equipment all commercial airliners must carry, was recovered by investigators earlier this month. The box, outfitted in an armored casing, had been damaged in the crash but technicians in France were able to salvage its information.
Wednesday’s news confirmed what investigators already suspected — that smoke was detected on Flight MS804. They first received an indication that was the case weeks ago after reviewing automated messages the plane had sent to EgyptAir’s ACARS communications system while in flight.
Wreckage from the plane’s front end also suggests fire damage, the Egyptian Aircraft Accident Investigation Committee has said.
Data from the flight recorder indicates that fire may have broken out on board Flight 804 while the jetliner was still at cruising altitude. Officials suspect this scenario because power to the box was abruptly cut while the plane was still at 37,000 feet.
The data indicates smoke set off a detector in the plane’s front lavatory, near the flight deck, and in the avionics compartment, beneath the cockpit. A fire so close to the pilots and their critical flight controls has the potential to bring a plane down quickly, officials said.
Investigators now hope to glean additional information from the other box, the cockpit voice recorder, which was also found damaged. It is not yet known whether that recording can be repaired.
Officials hope what was said on the flight deck will help investigators piece together the sequence of events that led to the crash.
The cause of the smoke is not yet known, but experts have speculated that one of the systems in the avionics bay may have malfunctioned, possibly triggering a total power failure aboard Flight MS804.
