Electronic pulse signals reportedly detected by a Chinese ship in the southern Indian Ocean are consistent with those of an aircraft black box, the Australian-led joint agency co-ordinating the search for the missing Malaysian jetliner said.

Six more bodies were recovered from the Atlantic Ocean where an Air France jet crashed, as the race to find the black boxes and gather key evidence from human remains and debris gained urgency.

TWO Brazilian helicopters took off from the islands of Fernando de Noronha to pick up 16 bodies of Air France crash victims, as airline chiefs at a conference insisted the Airbus A330 was one of the safest planes in the world to fly.

Crews searching for the wreckage of the Air France jet which crashed in the Atlantic have found a key part that could tell experts why the plane went down, Brazil’s air force said today.