Paris/Sao Paulo  – A union representing some Air France personnel has urged the carrier’s pilots not to fly Airbus planes with airspeed measuring instruments used on the A330-200 that crashed into the Atlantic, the daily Le Figaro reported Tuesday.

The Alter trade union has told pilots not to take command of any Airbus A330 or A340 plane in which at least two of the instruments, known as Pitot tubes, have not been replaced.

Otherwise, there exists “a real risk of loss of control of the Airbus,” the union wrote.

Air France has told its pilots that it would give pilots a replacement schedule for the gauges in several days.

Investigators looking into the cause of the accident, which killed 228 people, are concentrating on the functioning of the plane’s Pitot tubes, which provide information over ambient air pressure and therefore aid in measuring the airspeed of an aircraft.

In the final minutes of its flight, the Airbus A330-200 sent out a series of inconsistent airspeed readings.

Since 1995, there have been a number of cases in which the Pitot tubes indicated an incorrect airspeed, which prompted the French Civil Aviation Authority (DGAC) in 2001 to order repairs to the devices, Le Figaro reported.

The measure was justified by the possibility of “the loss of or fluctuations in airspeed indications in extreme weather conditions,” the DGAC said at the time.

It is believed the doomed Air France flight encountered a violent storm just before it fell into the Atlantic on June 1 while on a flight from Rio de Janeiro to Paris.

The number of crash victims recovered from the waters has risen to 24, Brazilian authorities said Monday.

Search teams have also discovered hundreds of large and small pieces of the aircraft, including the vertical tail fin, as well as personal belongings.

The remains were found about 440 kilometres north-east of Brazil’s tiny, unpopulated Atlantic island group, the St Peter and St Paul Rocks. The sea is about 3,500 metres deep at that location.  (dpa)