Rio de Janeiro - Brazilian civil aviation authorities on Thursday rejected accusations from France that it took far too long to determine that the Air France plane flying across the Atlantic had disappeared. Flight AF 447 plunged into the Atlantic in the early hours of June 1, killing all 228 people aboard. It was on its way from Rio de Janeiro to Paris.
Alain Bouillard, an official with the French Office of Accident Investigation (BEA) and who is in charge of the investigation, said Thursday at Le Bourget airport near Paris that it took hours to determine that the plane had disappeared.
He said investigators determined this was because no flight plan had been sent to the flight control station in Dakar, Senegal, and therefore control of the plane's flight path could not be transferred from Brazil.
Civil aviation authority spokesman Henry Munhoz said Brazil's officials had sent the Airbus's flight plan to the control station in Dakar and also informed Dakar over the telephone of the time scheduled for the plane's arrival in Dakar's airspace.
"All regular flights have a repetitive plan, which is transmitted to all control stations that the plane will fly over," Munhoz said.
"Besides, there was a call to the Dakar aviation authority at 10:35 pm on May 31 (0135 GMT on June 1) to inform that the Air France airbus would enter the airspace they were responsible for at 11:20 pm (0220 GMT). And the Dakar authority confirmed reception of the information," Munhoz said.
This means that responsibility for the flight is transferred automatically, as long as the plane enters the other country's airspace according to schedule or up to three minutes later, he explained.
So far, searchers have recovered 640 fragments of the aircraft and 51 bodies. Bouillard said he regretted the fact that French authorities have received no information from Brazil about the results of the autopsies.
The flight recorders have not been found. Bouillard said French authorities would continue to look for them, since they are key to finding out what happened to the plane.
