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MANILA, Philippines--Metal fragments from an oxygen cylinder have been recovered from a Qantas jumbo jet after a mid-air explosion forced it to make an emergency landing in Manila, an Australian investigator said Monday.
The Qantas Boeing 747-400, which made the emergency landing after its fuselage was ripped open by the explosion, remains grounded in a hangar at Manila's international airport.
Investigators combing the plane for clues were focusing on the possible explosion of an emergency oxygen cylinder, said Neville Blyth, lead investigator from the Australian Transport Safety Bureau.
Blyth said the fourth cylinder -- in a row of six oxygen tanks from the forward cargo hold -- was missing.
"There has been a number of small parts recovered from inside the aircraft cabin, including part of the oxygen cylinder valve," Blyth told reporters in Manila.
He declined to comment on whether those parts indicated that the cylinder had disintegrated or exploded, but he acknowledged the fragments went through the cabin floor and created a 20-centimeter hole above the cylinder's location.
Asked whether it was possible the cylinder itself had been blown out of the aircraft, creating the hole in the fuselage, he said: "That is possible, yes."
Blyth said the recovered parts would be subject to a forensic engineering examination at the ATSB's laboratories in Canberra.
He said the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder have been recovered and were being analysed in Australia.
"That download and analysis of the recorded data would be carried out in the next few days," he said.
The Qantas Boeing 747 was flying from Hong Kong to Melbourne when an explosion led to a sudden loss of air pressure in the cabin.
The plane, which had originated in London and was carrying 365 passengers and crew, plunged 6,000 metres (20,000 feet) before stabilising, then made an emergency landing in Manila.
