Search analysis for the underwater wreckage of Air France Flight 447

On 1 June 2009 Air France Flight 447, with 228 passengers and crew aboard, disappeared over the South Atlantic during a night flight from Rio de Janeiro to Paris. An international air and surface search effort located the first floating debris during the sixth day of search. Three phases of unsuccessful search for the underwater wreckage ensued. Phase I was a passive acoustic search for the aircraft´s underwater locator beacons. Phases II and III were side-looking sonar searches scanning the ocean bottom for the wreckage field. In July of 2010 the French Bureau d´Enquêtes et d´Analyses tasked Metron to review the searches and produce posterior probability maps for the location of the wreckage. These maps were used to plan the next phase of search beginning in March 2011. On April 3, after one week of search, the wreckage was located in a high probability area of the map.