Safety

French investigators have confirmed that a fractured elevator cable was the direct cause of last year's fatal Air Moorea de Havilland Canada Twin Otter accident in French Polynesia. On 9 August 2007 the Air Moorea aircraft suffered a sudden and rapid loss of control, causing it to crash into the sea 11s later, killing all 20 people on board.

Last December France's BEA investigation bureau said it was focusing attention on a fractured elevator cable discovered in the wreckage. In its preliminary findings BEA said that recovery personnel had retrieved the entire pitch-down cable from the sunken wreckage. But an 8.8m (29ft) section of the pitch-up cable, between its forward and rear fracture points, was missing.

The BEA now says that "ongoing studies have confirmed that the failure of the elevator pitch-up cable, at the moment when the flaps were retracted, was the direct cause of the accident. Tests and research have made it possible to reconstruct the complex process which led to the failure of the cable." The full report will be published before year-end.