Second 'black box' from Egyptian crash site found

A French-led search team has recovered the second "black box" voice recorder from an Egyptian Boeing 737 that crashed into the…

A French-led search team has recovered the second "black box" voice recorder from an Egyptian Boeing 737 that crashed into the Red Sea killing 148 people, sources close to the operation said.

The team earlier gave Egyptian officials the first black box data recorder recovered on Friday evening to be taken to Cairo for analysis.

Search and rescue experts had detected a weak signal from the second flight recorder four days after the plane, carrying 133 French tourists and 15 other people, plunged into the sea minutes after take-off from Sharm el-Sheikh on January 3.
   
Egypt's Civil Aviation Minister Mr Ahmed Mohamed Shafiq Zaki said Egypt had the technical means to download and analyse the data from the flight recorder, while personnel from US plane manufacturer Boeing would act as observers in the investigation.

Egypt has asserted its sovereign right to take the lead in the investigation and has defended its air safety record after Switzerland said it had earlier banned the operating company, Flash Airlines, from its air space because of safety violations.