EgyptAir crash investigators: Pilots tried to put out fire

The second “black box” from EgyptAir Flight MS804 appears to offer a vital clue to investigators – that a fire was burning in the final minutes before the jetliner crashed into the Mediterranean Sea six weeks ago, authorities said Tuesday.

The data recorders had been taken to Paris after being found, and the cockpit voice recorder was in need of considerable fix.

Though the memory chips are intact, some of the components used to communicate with the chips were damaged and had to be replaced, according to a statement released by Egypt’s Ministry of Civil Aviation.

The recordings are in line with data extracted on the plane’s other devices, which indicate the presence of smoke in the plane’s lavatory and avionics system, the sources said.

Debris from the jet was brought to Cairo airport last week, where investigators will try to reassemble part of the frame to help establish what might have caused the disaster.

Pilots of the EgyptAir jet that crashed in the Mediterranean Sea in May battled to extinguish a fire, the cockpit voice recorder reportedly shows.

No distress call was made from the plane prior to the crash.

The bulk of the wreckage is believed to be at a depth of about 3,000 meters (9,800 feet).

Before it disappeared from radar screens around 2.45am Cairo time, the plane spun all the way around and suddenly lost altitude.

Radar data showed the aircraft had been cruising normally in clear skies before it turned 90 degrees left, then a full 360 degrees to the right as it plummeted from 38,000 feet (11,582 meters) to 15,000 feet (4,572 meters).

The Paris prosecutor’s office has opened a manslaughter investigation, saying last week that it was not looking into terrorism as a possible cause.