Human remains from EgyptAir crash recovered from sea

Bodies to be examined by forensic experts and prosecutors in Alexandria, then sent to Cairo for DNA checks

By AFP 4 July 2016, 10:32 am

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This still image taken from video posted Saturday, May 21, 2016, on the official Facebook page of the Egyptian Armed Forces spokesman shows an Egyptian ship collecting wreckage of EgyptAir flight 804. (Egyptian Armed Forces via AP)

CAIRO — Search teams have recovered more human remains from the EgyptAir plane that crashed into the Mediterranean in May, the Egyptian-led investigative committee said Sunday.

The search vessel John Lethbridge “retrieved all the human remains that were mapped at the crash location,” the Egyptian Aircraft Accident Investigation Committee said in a statement.

After delivering the remains in Alexandria, the vessel will return to the crash location “to conduct a new thorough scan of the seabed and to search for any human remains,” the committee said.

The Airbus A320 plunged into the sea on May 19 while heading to Cairo from Paris, killing all 66 people on board.

Egyptian and French forensic doctors onboard the search vessel supervised the retrieval process, the committee said.

The recovered remains will be examined by prosecutors and forensic specialists in Alexandria before being sent on to Cairo for DNA analysis.

A committee probing the plane disaster said Saturday that the memory chips of EgyptAir 804’s black box voice recorder are intact and investigators should be able to access them.

The other black box, a data recorder that had also been retrieved from the bottom of the Mediterranean, has already been accessed.

Investigators said last week that the plane’s wreckage showed signs of fire while the data recorder confirmed smoke alarms had been activated.

The plane was carrying 40 Egyptians, 15 French, two Iraqis, two Canadians and one passenger each from Algeria, Belgium, Britain, Chad, Portugal, Saudi Arabia and Sudan.