1 aircraft accident in Atlantic ocean since 2000

The Air France Airbus A330-200 went missing on transatlantic flight from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to Paris, France. The airplane carried 12 crew members and 216 passengers. The plane crashed in the Atlantic Ocean, killing all onboard. Flight AF447 departed Rio de Janeiro heading toward Paris. Three hours later, while the plane was flying over the Atlantic Ocean, the aircraft reportedly went through a thunderstorm with strong turbulence. A few minutes later, Air France received an automatic message from the A330 indicating electrical circuits malfunction. It was the last information received from AF447. Six minutes later, Brazilian Air Force said plane failed to make previously scheduled radio contact with Brazil. Last radio contact with the flight was at 01:33 UTC. The crew was in contact with the Atlantic Area Control Centre (CINDACTA III) when the flight reported over the INTOL waypoint, estimating TASIL at 02:20 UTC. INTOL is an RNAV waypoint located in the Atlantic Ocean, 565 km from Natal, Brazil. The TASIL waypoint is located 1228 kilometers from Natal. Over a time span of four minutes, starting at 02:10 UTC, a series of ACARS messages were sent -automatically- from the plane. Indication was that the autopilot had disengaged and the fly by wire system had changed to alternate law (mode allowing the flight control to work properly while some inputs parameters are not available or detected as erroneous). Between 02:11Z and 02:13Z a flurry of messages indicating failure of navigation and air data systems arrived. At 02:13Z flight control system faults were indicated, at 02:14Z the last message received was an advisory regarding cabin vertical speed. An analysis of meteorological information shows that AF447 crossed through three key thunderstorm clusters: a small one around 01:51 UTC, a new rapidly growing one at about 01:59 UTC, and finally a large multicell convective system (MCS) around 02:05-02:16 UTC.