Searchers Near Black Boxes

The Brazilian and French navies recovered Monday the tail fin of Flight 447—a hopeful discovery, since black boxes are located in the fuselage beneath the tail fin and therefore may be in the ocean nearby. The U.S. Navy also showed up on the scene with two ultra-sensitive listening devices to pick up the electronic beacon emitted by the black boxes, which sounds in as much as 20,000 feet of water (the ocean is 3,500 feet deep at the recovery site). Searchers stress that, while they are searching for the boxes, recovering bodies is their number one priority.