- Liverpool suffer Alisson injury blow
- Habosi helps Racing beat Vannes before Auradou's playing return
- Thousands march in London in support of Palestinians, 1 year after Oct 7
- Israel readying response to Iran missile attack
- Schutt, Mooney help Australia beat Sri Lanka in Women's T20 World Cup
- Liverpool extend Premier League lead with win at Palace
- Djokovic 'shakes rust off' to make third round of Shanghai Masters
- 'Imperfect' PSG fighting on all fronts - Luis Enrique
- Struggling Pakistan look to thwart adaptable England
- Child 'trampled to death' in asylum seekers' Channel crossing: minister
- Gauff fights back to set up Beijing final against Muchova
- Guardiola claims Premier League won't delay season for Man City
- Israel to mark October 7 attack as Gaza war spreads
- Gauff fights back to reach China Open final
- Recovering Stokes ruled out of first Pakistan Test
- Hezbollah battles troops on border as Israel pounds Lebanon
- Alcaraz, Sinner breeze into third round of Shanghai Masters
- Bagnaia wins Japan MotoGP sprint to cut Martin's lead
- Alcaraz breezes into third round of Shanghai Masters
- Gaza cultural heritage brought to light in Geneva
- 'Bullet for democracy': Trump returns to site of rally shooting
- Italy targets climate activists in 'anti-Gandhi' demo clampdown
- South Korean cult-horror series 'Hellbound' returns at BIFF
- Nepalis fear more floods as climate change melts glaciers
- Honduras arrests environmentalist's alleged murderer
- Padres pitcher Musgrove needs elbow surgery
- Supreme Court lets stand rules to curb mercury, methane emissions
- Boston beat Denver in NBA exhibition season opener, but Jokic says omens are good
- Chagos diaspora angry at lack of input on islands' fate
- Biden says 'not confident' of peaceful US election
- US trade chief defends tariff hikes when paired with investment
- Lukaku stars as Napoli beat Como to hold Serie A top spot
- Ohtani set for MLB playoff debut as Dodgers face Padres
- Pogba's drug ban cut to 18 months from four years
- Devine leads New Zealand to big win over India in Women's T20 World Cup
- Bosnia floods kill 16 people
- EU court blocks French ban on vegetable 'steak' labelling
- Prosecutors seek dismissal of rape charges against French rugby players
- Meta AI turns pictures into videos with sound
- Bolivia's Morales says claims he raped a minor are a 'lie'
- MLB Reds hire two-time champion Francona as manager
- Daniel Maldini receives first Italy call-up for Nations League
- US dockworkers return to ports after three-day strike
- Ancelotti points finger at Madrid's 'lack of intensity'
- Haiti reeling after 70 killed in gang attack
- Five Czech kids in hospital over TikTok 'piercing challenge'
- What happens next in Iran-Israel conflict?
- Country star Garth Brooks denies rape accusations
- Stubbs hits maiden century as South Africa make 343-4 against Ireland
- DR Congo to begin mpox vaccination campaign Saturday in east
Smoke doesn't reveal what caused EgyptAir crash, experts say
Smoke detected in the cabin shortly before EgyptAir flight MS804 crashed into the Mediterranean suggests there was a fire on board, but is not enough to establish the cause of the disaster, experts said Saturday.
So what can be inferred from this latest discovery?
- What were the signals? -
Shortly before the plane disappeared from the radars, it transmitted a series of automatic messages indicating there was smoke in the cabin, France's BEA aviation safety agency said.
According to specialist magazine Aviation Herald, the Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS) messages read: "smoke lavatory smoke" then "avionics smoke" -- referring to the plane's electronic systems. Both messages were confirmed by BEA.
But the agency did not comment on a third message cited by Aviation Herald, which indicated a "fault" with the FCU, the pilots' flight control unit in the cockpit.
- Do they point to a cause? -
A BEA spokesman said it was "far too soon to interpret and understand the cause of Thursday's accident as long as we have not found the wreckage or the flight data recorders."
Jean-Paul Troadec, a former BEA director, agreed: "All you can say... is that there was smoke. The smoke could be due to a fire in the plane following a technical problem, or it could also mean an explosion... but it is far too early to formulate hypotheses."
- Why didn't the pilots raise the alarm? -
"The fact that there was no distress call doesn't necessarily mean anything," Troadec said.
"The pilots maybe had other things to do, reacting to the event. Sending a message is not the first priority."
Francois Grangier, an airline pilot and judicially certified expert on crash investigations, agreed there might not have been time.
"A fire is extremely rapid, extremely violent, and you know when smoke begins to invade a cockpit the first priority is to fight the smoke."
He said the crew would have been wearing oxygen masks and that one of them would have had to read the procedures off a printed checklist if display screens were no longer legible.
"So you can see how calling an (air traffic) controller who can do nothing besides tell you your position" would not be a priority, he said.
- Did the pilots have time to react? -
"Clearly, given the time of the (ACARS) messages and the sequence of the messages, everything happened in a minuscule space of time," Grangier said.
"Basically it means they had a very, very, very rapid invasion of smoke into the cockpit, and visibility can be reduced to a few centimetres when there's smoke. So... it's possible they couldn't see anything at all. And then the temperature could become unbearable."
R.J.Fidalgo--PC