Private firm hired to hunt for EgyptAir black boxes

CAIRO: Egypt hired a private firm Friday to help in the hunt for the black boxes from the EgyptAir plane that crashed last week en route from Paris to Cairo, authorities said.

Egyptian civil aviation officials said in a statement they had signed an agreement with Deep Ocean Search (DOS) to carry out the search and retrieval process of the two data recorders.

EgyptAir Flight MS804 crashed in the Mediterranean last Thursday between the Greek island of Crete and Egypt's north coast with 66 people aboard, including 30 Egyptians and 15 French nationals.

French and Egyptian aviation officials have said it is too soon to determine what caused the disaster, although a terror attack on the Airbus A320 has not been ruled out.

DOS says it can operate in depths of up to 6,000 metres (20,000 feet) and has a robot that is capable of mapping the seabed.

France's aviation safety agency has said the aircraft transmitted automated messages indicating smoke in the cabin and a fault in the flight control unit before contact was lost.