With Egyptian and French officials downplaying possibilities that last week's Sharm El-Sheikh plane crash might have been caused by anything but a technical failure, the black boxes currently being retrieved from the sea may end the speculation once and for all. Amira Ibrahim reports Investigators are still searching for a reason why a Boeing 737 crashed into the Red Sea on 3 January, killing all 148 people on board. Both black boxes containing Flash Airlines Flight FSH604's flight data were located last week, submerged so deep into the sea that more advanced equipment had to be brought in from France so they could be retrieved. The signals picked up from the black boxes indicated they were some 800 metres below the sea's surface, and about 500 metres from where the plane was thought to have plunged. The plane, which went down just a few minutes after taking off from Sharm El- Sheikh on its way to Cairo and then Paris, splintered after it nose-dived at 45 degrees and slammed into the water at 500 kilometres/hour. Only debris from its wings has been recovered, and divers say it is increasingly unlikely that they will ever find remains of the plane's fuselage. The French government had already provided the search efforts with a robot submarine -- along with a radar-equipped frigate, three helicopters and 500 personnel, including 16 divers and 49 experts -- but its maximum depth was around 400 metres. Military sources said that a submarine robot named Scorpio arrived on a cargo plane on Saturday from an air base in southern France, and was transported to the site in a four-truck convoy escorted by the Egyptian army. The convoy was carrying an additional 40 tonnes of equipment. Scorpio can dive to approximately 1100 metres and retrieve objects weighing from 100 to 400 kilogrammes. The Super Achille, another French ship with a submarine robot on board, arrived in Sharm El-Sheikh on Monday. A third is scheduled to arrive today. Although France -- which lost 133 of its citizens in the crash -- was invited to participate in both the rescue operations and the technical investigations, Egypt is leading the quest. The high-level Egyptian Aviation Ministry team includes two top investigators -- Captains Shaker Kilada and Hassan Musharrafa -- both of whom headed the Egyptian investigation team that attempted to decipher the mystery behind the 1999 EgyptAir Boeing 767 crash off the East Coast of the United States. Egyptian aviation authorities also announced this week that an American team from the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) would take part in the investigations. The Americans, including investigators from the manufacturer Boeing, have already started their work, questioning the control tower officers at Sharm El-Sheikh Airport. After French radio station RTL reported that the French investigators were discretely trying to establish whether one of the two pilots had links to fundamental groups, Aviation Minister Ahmed Shafiq admitted that the overall crash probe has included checks of the crew's background. Mohamed Nour, who heads Flash Airlines, ruled out the suggestion, insisting that the pilots had no contact with extreme groups. Immediately following the crash, Egyptian and French officials quickly dismissed the possibility of terrorism being behind the cause. French Deputy Foreign Minister Renauld Muselier concluded that an explosion had not occurred, because no burn marks were found on the human remains. Eyewitness testimony lent weight to this as well, with two soldiers from the Multinational Forces Operation (MFO) based in Sharm El-Sheikh near where the Boeing crashed telling investigators that they noticed the plane did not turn left towards Cairo as usual. "It turned right against the usual navigation route of planes flying to Cairo. When it came near, it was obvious the engines' sound was low, indicating something was wrong with them, then it plunged into the sea with the body intact," the MFO soldiers said. According to the aviation minister, the pilot appeared to have been trying to return to Sharm El-Sheikh Airport. Shafiq also appeared to disagree with the divers when he suggested that the plane's fuselage was relatively intact, basing that conclusion on the plane's sudden disappearance from radar screens and the small sizes of the debris floating in the sea. "There is a major part of the plane still deep in the water, perhaps holding some of the victims' bodies," Shafiq said. "But the fuselage is far deeper than we are currently capable of going." Flash Airlines' safety record, meanwhile, came under fire following a report released by the Swiss Aviation Federal Authority, disclosing that the Egyptian charter airlines had been banned from Swiss airspace and airports since October 2002. The report said the Cairo-based company was banned after a 2002 spot check revealed serious shortcomings in one of its planes. At a news conference, Shafiq attacked the Swiss federation, disclosing that the Egyptian airliner had been subject to blackmail by a Swiss ground services company. "I have two letters that prove there is foul play. The first letter is from the Swiss company to Flash Airlines threatening to do everything they can to ensure the company would no longer operate in Switzerland unless they pay the 32,000 francs they owed the Swiss company. The second letter is from the Swiss company to the Swiss aviation authorities and airports, activating the complaint against Flash Airlines and asking officials to ban the Egyptian company." The Swiss accusations also prompted a widespread outcry amongst European consumer groups and travel agents regarding the secrecy surrounding aviation safety. While the results of safety inspections are stored in a central database that can be accessed by all 41 European Civil Aviation Conference member states, international protocols dictate that the identity of airlines should be kept secret. Only the state that issues the ban can name them. The British government, meanwhile, revealed that safety concerns had led to 11 airlines being banned -- mostly for safety reasons -- from UK airspace in the past three years. The list included an Egyptian cargo airline, Memphis Air. Shafiq told the Weekly he knew nothing about the British ban. "Neither the British government nor the airline informed us," he said. "We'd welcome investigating it." On Monday, the European Parliament held an emergency meeting on air safety during which some members demanded that an airline that has been banned from one country should be banned from all. Much of the post-crash debate has also centred on compensation for the victims' families. The Egyptian Al-Sharq Insurance Company initially announced that because Flash Airlines had not paid their last installment, the company would not be obligated to fulfil its insurance payouts in full. Later, however, Flash and Al-Sharq resolved the issue, and $350,000 in compensation was earmarked for each victim. Air transport between Cairo and Paris did not seem to have been affected by the tragic accident. According to Rifa'i Rashad, who heads EgyptAir's flight stations at international airports, said all flights between Paris and Cairo were running as scheduled. Rashad also said "charter flights organised by private companies broke records over the New Year break. Five charter flights were in operation on the same day of the accident transporting some 500 French and 300 Italian tourists." Solemn rites Families of the 148 people killed in last week's charter jet crash gathered in Sharm El-Sheikh on 9 January to pay their final respects to the victims, reports Reem Nafie At memorial services held both on land and at sea, the weeping and gushing sobs of grieving families filled the air. Some 100 relatives and friends of the French victims left Paris on 8 December aboard a flight organised by the French government. A team of doctors and psychologists, foreign ministry officials, five chaplains of various faiths, and French police personnel who will be joining the ongoing recovery efforts at the scene, accompanied the relatives. French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin was on a separate flight for Egypt about an hour later. Egyptian families also arrived on 8 December on a private plane from Cairo. Under an open-air tent facing the sea, De Villepin addressed the victims' families, as well as Mrs Suzanne Mubarak, Red Sea Governor Mustafa Afifi, and top French and Egyptian officials. "We recall the memory of the families who shared the same joys and were struck by the same fate," he said, reading a message from President Jacques Chirac. A marble monument had been placed at the site, which is located near the area where the plane went down. A plaque lists the names of the "Victims of the 3 January 2004 plane crash". The Egyptian victims' names are written in Arabic. "For all our disappeared, for all those you love, I want to convey to each of you the solidarity, the support and the deep fraternal bonds of our nation," de Villepin said. He and Mrs Mubarak then placed flowers on the marble monument. Relatives who placed white roses and white carnations at the site followed them. There was much grieving as family members approached the monument, with some holding on to it tightly as if grasping for a final memory of their beloved. A woman wailed, and a man staggered away from the service before collapsing in grief. Muslim and Christian prayers were also held on the shore before the grieving families set out in a French Navy vessel to place flowers on the waters of the Red Sea. Nearby, search teams were still looking for the wreckage of the Boeing 737, as well as victims' remains. Some tossed messages written on pieces of paper into the water, and there was a minute of silence before all the victims' names were read aloud.
