Atlantic crash jet fell like a stone

CRASH investigators say the Air France jet that plunged into the Atlantic off Brazil killing all 228 on board “fell like a stone” and the people on board did not even have time to fix their seat belts.

Flight AF 447 dropped 35,000ft in seconds and hit the water at its normal flying position.

Alain Bouillard, the chief accident investigator, denied previous reports that the plane had broken up in flight and said: “It appears to have hit the surface of the water in its flying position with a strong vertical acceleration.”

He also said that defective airspeed sensors on the Airbus A330-200 were a "factor but not the cause" of the crash.

It has been suggested these Pitot tubes had iced over and Air France has now replaced the instruments on all its Airbus A330 and A340 aircraft.

Meanwhile, the search is still going on for the black box flight recorders and Mr Bouillard said they have until July 10 to find them before their alert signals start to fade.