France has dispatched three aircraft and two navy ships to scour the area of the Atlantic where the Airbus 330-200 is believed to have crashed, French Chief of Staff Christophe Prazuk has told FRANCE 24.

“One of the planes took off this afternoon with 12-hours-worth of fuel,” he said. “It will spend four hours flying in the search area. At first light on Tuesday the other two will be in place in Dakar and will continue searching all day if nothing is found.”

The two Atlantic 2 and one Falcon 50 planes are equipped with specialist radar and sonar equipment. The first took off from Dakar to patrol the area where the passenger jet was last recorded.

“We are examining the original route and working from there to see where the plane may have flown,” explained Prazuk.

The aircraft will be on the lookout for floating objects. Meanwhile, the navy vessels will take several days to reach the search area from their stations in the Antilles and Guinea.

The Brazilian air force on Monday launched its own search operation from the Fernando de Noronha archipelago 350km off the Brazilian coast. Five planes, two helicopters and three naval vessels took the search a further 1,100km into the Atlantic.

A Spanish air force plane also joined the search immediately after Flight AF 447 was reported missing.

France is also analysing data from American military satellites.