The Russian Defence Ministry has announced the recovery of the main flight data recorder (black box) from the Tu-154 military plane which crashed into the Black Sea on Sunday.

The Russian news agency –TASS — citing the country’s defence ministry, said on Tuesday that the data recorder was found underwater near the wreckage of the aircraft’s cabin.

The news agency also reported that the data recorder was being taken to the Moscow region for analysis.

Authorities suspect technical problems or pilot error caused the crash on Sunday which is believed to have killed all on board.

Meanwhile emergency teams have found two further bodies in addition with 11 earlier found while teams also recovered damaged sections of the aircraft, according to Russian authorities.

In addition to segments of the plane’s fuselage and tail, 13 bodies have now been recovered in total, the Russian Defence Ministry confirmed.

The plane, a Tupolev Tu-154, is believed to have crashed shortly after take-off on Sunday morning over the Black Sea, after leaving the Russian coastal city.

The majority of the passengers were from a renowned Russian military band, the Alexandrov Ensemble, on their way to entertain troops in Syria.

Some 200 divers and 45 boats are involved in the search operation, a military spokesman told the Russian agency Interfax.

Russia’s Federal Security Service, the FSB, said that the plane was not the target of an attack but suspected technical problems or pilot error.

In 2015, a Russian commercial airliner travelling from the Egyptian resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh to the Russian city of St. Petersburg, crashed shortly after take-off, killing more than 200 people.

An affiliate of the terrorist group Islamic State claimed it placed a bomb aboard that plane in retaliation for Russia’s military campaign in Syria.

(dpa/NAN)