France’s air safety agency has began studying data from the black boxes of a Boeing 737 MAX plane that crashed in Ethiopia, as regulators worldwide grounded the plane and the US plane maker halted deliveries of its latest model.
The flight data and cockpit voice recorders were handed over to France’s Bureau of Enquiry and Analysis for Civil Aviation Safety (BEA) on Thursday. The first conclusions could take several days.
An Ethiopian team investigating the crash has arrived in Paris and the investigation process has started, Ethiopian Airlines said on Friday.
US lawmakers said on Thursday the 737 Max fleet would be grounded for weeks if not longer until a software upgrade could be tested and installed.
The captain of Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 requested permission to return to Addis Ababa airport three minutes after take-off as it accelerated to abnormal speed.
All contact between air controllers and Flight 302 to Nairobi was lost five minutes after it took off, a person who reviewed air traffic communications told the newspaper.
The FAA cited satellite data and evidence from the scene that indicated some similarities and “the possibility of a shared cause” with October’s crash in Indonesia.