Russian Tu-154 Plane Crash Cause: Pilot's Last Words Hint At Wing Flap Fault; Plane Fragments To Be Taken To Taganrog Plant For Examination

UPDATE: 5:42 a.m. EST — The Russian defense ministry reportedly said Wednesday that a second flight recorder from Tu-154 military plane has been recovered. Search teams are currently looking for bodies of the victims and plane debris in the Black Sea.

UPDATE: 5:27 a.m. EST — Russia's defense ministry said Wednesday that large pieces of debris belonging to the crashed Tu-154 and personal belongings of passengers on board the jet have been recovered from the Black Sea. Authorities said the items will be handed over to investigators probing the crash, according to Interfax.

Original story:

The last words of Russian Tu-154 plane's pilot hint at a wing flap fault as the possible cause of the crash, local media reported late Tuesday. The military plane, which was en route to Syria with 92 people on board, crashed into the Black Sea on Sunday.

The Life.ru news portal said it had obtained a readout of one of the pilot's last words, indicating a problem with the wing flaps, "Commander, we are going down," the pilot was reported to have said. The pilot was also heard yelling: "the flaps, damn it!" However, there was no official confirmation of the readout so far.

The Interfax news agency reported, citing an unnamed investigative source, that preliminary data showed the wing flaps had not worked in tandem. Due to this, the aging Soviet-era plane had not been able to gather enough speed and plunged into the sea, breaking up on impact.

After a massive search operation on Monday and Tuesday, divers found three black box flight recorders from the aircraft. Fifteen bodies of victims and several body fragments have also been recovered from the sea floor. Fragments of the plane were also retrieved from the Black Sea.

Interfax reported Wednesday that the fragments of the plane will be sent to Taganrog plant in the Rostov region for examination to establish the cause of the crash.

"Tu-154 wreckage will be taken to the Taganrog aircraft plant for examination; it is being gathered," a plant representative told Interfax Wednesday, adding that currently plane fragments are being amassed in hangars of the old Sochi airport.

The plane, which disappeared from radar screens two minutes after taking off Sunday from Sochi in southern Russia, had last been serviced in September and underwent major repairs in December 2014.

Local media reports said Tuesday that Russian authorities have grounded all Tu-154 planes until the cause of Sunday's crash became clear.

After retrieving fragments of the military plane’s wreckage, authorities determined an explosion or on-board fire was not responsible for the crash. Authorities also ruled out terrorism in the downing of the Russian military jet, but said that they are probing other theories.

"The four main versions are an engine being hit by a foreign object, substandard fuel that caused the loss of thrust on and eventually stopped the engines, the pilot’s mistake and the plane’s technical failure," Russia’s Federal Security Service said in a statement.