SYDNEY, Australia — It may be a week or more before investigators determine whether a piece of debris found on the island of Réunion came from Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, a French official with knowledge of the investigation said on Thursday.

The object, which appeared to be a wing flap torn from a jetliner, has been crated and sealed for shipment to France, the official said, but it is not expected to reach Paris for two or three days.

Once the object is in France, it will be taken to an aviation testing facility in southern France for analysis, the French Defense ministry said in a statement on Thursday evening. The facility often works with the French aviation safety bureau, known as BEA, in investigating accidents and incidents, the statement said, without saying when the object would arrive.

American investigators have concluded, based on photographs and videos, that the object that washed up on Réunion, a remote French island off the coast of Madagascar, came from a Boeing 777, and Flight 370 is the only Boeing 777 known to be missing.