This is the first picture of Emiliano Sala’s doomed plane lying 220ft down on the bed of the English Channel as it was revealed a victim has been found in the wreckage.
The haunting image of the wreckage was released by the Air Accident Investigation Branch today whose team also revealed that the body of either Sala or his pilot David Ibbotson is on board.
The operation to recover the doomed plane was cancelled today and could be hampered by days of poor weather.
It was found by a sea search vessel paid for by Sala’s family yesterday and a small submarine [ROV] with an HD camera confirmed it was the Piper Malibu that disappeared over the Channel Islands two weeks ago.
The body is also lying either in a seat or under the debris but he has not yet been identified.
An AAIB spokesman said: ‘Tragically, in video footage from the ROV, one occupant is visible amidst the wreckage. The AAIB is now considering the next steps, in consultation with the families of the pilot and passenger, and the police’.
The new image shows the rear left side of the fuselage, including part of the aircraft registration, N264DB.
A decision has yet to be taken on whether to raise the wreckage to the surface.
The statement added: ‘The AAIB is now considering the next steps, in consultation with the families of the pilot and passenger, and the police.’
The families of the £15million striker and his pilot David Ibbotson are waiting to hear whose body is in the fuselage of the Piper Malibu that vanished in a storm two weeks ago.
Sala’s bereft father Horacio, who has not joined his ex-wife, son and daughter in Britain, told reporters in the Argentinian town of Progreso: ‘I cannot believe it …. this is a dream … a bad dream … I’m desperate’.
The coastguard abandoned their search last week after ruling out any survivors of the air crash with the footballer’s family brought in a celebrated shipwreck hunter to lead the search.
The sea search vessel FPV Morven picked up the wreckage using sonar yesterday morning and an unmanned Air Accident Investigation Branch submarine sent to the sea bed used an HD camera to identify the blue and white aircraft.
Marine scientist David Mearns – known as ‘the Shipwreck Hunter’ – volunteered to help the Sala family for free after initial search and rescue efforts by a number of agencies failed.ADVERTISEMENT
