Shortly before it crashed into the Atlantic Ocean on Monday, the Air France Airbus A330 sent 24 warnings of a technical malfunction. The warnings were issued within the space of five minutes.

French investigators say it is not clear whether the automatic pilot was switched off by the pilots or if there was a malfunction. The investigation is not ruling anything out, not even an attack. The Airbus A330 was flying from Brazil to France. All 228 people on board perished.

At first it was thought that the plane went down in a storm or was hit by lightning; however, French meteorologists dismiss this theory. As a precaution, Air France has decided to replace the air speed sensors on its Airbuses, as it is thought the sensor on the plane which crashed fed incorrect information to a computer.