2:19am UK, Monday June 08, 2009

A total of 17 bodies have now been recovered from the Atlantic Ocean near the spot where an Air France jet crashed.

Debris from the Air France plane is recovered by the Brazilian Navy

The Brazilian and French navies say they have spotted an undetermined number of other bodies in the water and are sending ships to recover them.

They also found a blue seat with a serial number matching Air France Flight 447.

A rucksack containing a vaccination card and a briefcase with an Air France ticket inside were also recovered from the ocean.

Brazilian air force planes and navy ships have been scouring a swathe of the Atlantic about 700 miles north-east of Brazil’s coast since the Airbus A330-200 plane disappeared last Monday, killing all 228 people on board.

Rescuers, who said only family members will be informed of the identity of the corpses, believe many bodies could have sunk or been devoured by sharks.

Searchers had found debris in the ocean previously but it turned out to be unrelated to the crash.

French investigators trying to establish the cause of the crash said Airbus had detected faulty speed readings on its A330 jets before last week and had recommended clients replace a sensor.

Air France later issued a statement saying it had begun changing airspeed sensors on Airbus long-haul aircraft due to icing fears five weeks before the crash.

However, this was only after failing to agree on a fix with Airbus.

Investigators are considering the possibility that the speed sensors on Flight 447 may have iced up.

This would have resulted in faulty readings that caused the pilots to set the plane at a dangerous speed as it passed through thunderstorms.

But the head of France’s air accident agency (BEA) said it was too soon to say if problems with the pressure-based speed sensors were in any way responsible.

“Some of the sensors (on the A330) were earmarked to be changed… but that does not mean that without these replacement parts, the plane would have been defective,” BEA chief Paul-Louis Arslanian said.

Airbus confirmed it issued a bulletin asking the plane’s 50 or so airline operators to consider changing the speed sensors, known as Pitot tubes.

However, it said it was an optional measure to improve performance and not related to safety.