(Newser)
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Searchers spotted more wreckage today from Air France Flight 447, which crashed into the Atlantic Ocean earlier this week with 228 people aboard. A team of international aircraft discovered four fields of metallic debris and a 12-mile fuel slick some 220 miles off the Brazilian coast, the Washington Post reports. Lighter plane parts may flow in currents to Africa by next week.
France is sending an oceanographic ship that can deploy submarines to the ocean’s bottom—about 9,800 feet in the area—to search for the Airbus A330’s black box; such a mission has never before been accomplished. Aviation specialists haven’t ruled out any causes, but downplayed the role of a strong thunderstorm, noting that modern aircraft routinely overcome such hindrances.
