A Germanwings plane carrying 150 people has crashed in the French Alps on its way from Barcelona to Duesseldorf.

The Airbus A320 - flight 4U 9525 - went down between Digne and Barcelonnette. There are no survivors, officials say.

The "black box" flight recorder has been found, France's interior minister says. The cause of the crash is not known and the plane sent no distress signal during an eight-minute descent.

Among the passengers were 16 German pupils returning from an exchange trip.

Germanwings, a low-cost airline owned by Germany's main carrier Lufthansa, has an excellent safety record. French, Spanish and German leaders have expressed shock.

A recovery team reached the site, in a remote mountain ravine, earlier on Tuesday. Their work was called off in the evening and will resume at first light on Wednesday, the French interior ministry said.

The Germanwings airliner, similar to this one, had been flying to Duesseldorf in Germany

Bruce Robin, a prosecutor from Marseille, told the Reuters news agency that he had seen the wreckage of the aircraft from a helicopter.

"The body of the plane is in a state of destruction, there is not one intact piece of wing or fuselage," he said.

Source: BBC