France to analyze Ethiopian Airlines flight recorders: Spokesman

(Reuters) — France's air accident investigation agency BEA will analyze black-box flight recorders from the Boeing 737 MAX 8 that crashed near Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on Sunday, a spokesman said.

Ethiopian Airlines said earlier it would send the two cockpit voice and data recorders abroad for analysis.

The French announcement resolved uncertainty over the fate of the two recorders after Germany’s BFU said it had declined a request to handle them because it could not process the new type of recorder used on the 737 MAX jets, in service since 2017.

The BEA is one of the world’s most active air crash agencies alongside the National Transportation Safety Board of the United States and has laboratories at its Le Bourget headquarters.