I’ve been meaning to pass along for awhile  this superb Gearld Traufette/Spiegel Online article on the continuing investigation into last summer’s horrific crash of Air France 447 into the Atlantic Ocean (earlier post here).

Although the black box still has not been recovered (and quite likely won’t be), investigators are becoming more confident that they understand what happened, including the following interesting theory:

According to this scenario, the pilots would have been forced to watch helplessly as their plane lost its lift. That theory is supported by the fact that the airplane remained intact to the very end. Given all the turbulence, it is therefore possible that the passengers remained oblivious to what was happening. After all, the oxygen masks that have been recovered had not dropped down from the ceiling because of a loss of pressure. What’s more, the stewardesses weren’t sitting on their emergency seats, and the lifejackets remained untouched. "There is no evidence whatsoever that the passengers in the cabin had been prepared for an emergency landing," says BEA boss Jean-Paul Troadec.

Read the entire article, including this informative graphic.