Ethiopia's Transport Minister Dagmawit Moges on Sunday stated that the black boxes recovered from the crashed plane had revealed similarities to the Indonesian (Lion Air) disaster that occurred in October 2018.
Associated Press (AP) quoted the Minister stating that the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder were “in a good condition that enabled us to extract almost all the data inside.”
"Information collected so far from the flight data recorder has indicated clear similarities between both crashes," she told the publication.
Both the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder were sent to Paris for analysis by the French air accident investigation agency BEA.
Moges, however, did not elucidate on what the similarities were.
Echoing her sentiments, Ethiopian transport ministry spokesman Muse Yiheyis who spoke to Reuters assured that data was successfully recovered to aid in investigations and more information would be availed in the following days.
“It was the same case with the Indonesian (Lion Air) one. There were clear similarities between the two crashes so far.
“The data was successfully recovered. Both the American team and our (Ethiopian) team validated it. The minister thanked the French government. We will let you know more after three or four days,” he explained.
On her part, Moges stated that the Ethiopian Government would release the detailed finding within a month.
Already, Aviation authorities in the US had stated that the movements of the Ethiopian plane (FLight 302) were similar to those of Lion Air Flight 620 based on satellite-based tracking data.
Both the planes were Boeing 737 MAX 8s, and both crashed minutes after take off. In both instances, the crews tried to return to the airport but crashed.
Earlier on, Boeing grounded its entire global fleet of 737 Mar aircraft after new evidence was discovered at the crash site.
