EgyptAir Crash: First Images of Debris Out, Hunt For Black Box On
Egypt’s aviation minister said a terrorist attack was more likely than a technical failure.
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EgyptAir Debris Found
The EgyptAir military has found pieces of debris of the missing EgyptAir plane 290 km north of Alexandria.
The Navy has also found some passengers’ belongings and is sweeping the area looking for the plane’s black box, the military said in a statement.
Egypt’s President Fattah el-Sisi has offered his condolences to the families of victims on board the plane.
Three french investigators and a technical expert from Airbus arrived at Cairo airport early Friday morning to help in the ongoing investigations.
The French investigators were part of the French civil aviation ministry’s office of investigations and analysis.
Greek Ships Withdrawn
Greek ships were withdrawn from participating in the search operations ,the deputy spokesperson of the Hellenic National Defense General Staff, Commander Marius Tzannis, told CNN. This was supposedly done because the Greek coastguard vessels could not perform so far away from the coast.
Commander Tzannis added that Greece was still operating a C-130 aircraft in the area while several others were on standby including “an appropriate number” of F-16s.
What We Know So Far
An EgyptAir jet carrying 66 passengers and crew from Paris to Cairo had disappeared from the radar over the Mediterranean on Thursday.
Flight MS804 bound for Cairo from Paris’ Charles de Gaulle airport at around 11 pm Wednesday, lost contact with the airline 10 miles into Egyptian airspace. The plane was flying at 37,000 feet when it disappeared from the radar, EgyptAir said.
The plane made abrupt turns before crashing, going from 37,000 feet to 15,000 feet and then 9,000 feet, according to the New York Times, which cited the Greek defence minister. There was no distress signal from the plane before it crashed.
Officials from multiple US agencies told Reuters that a US review of satellite imagery so far had not produced any signs of an explosion aboard the EgyptAir flight.
Greece had deployed aircraft and a frigate to search for the missing plane. Egypt was leading the investigation and France was participating.
No group has so far claimed responsibility for disappearance of the flight.
Where Confusion Remains
The Egyptian civil aviation ministry initially said Greek authorities had found “floating material” and life jackets likely to be from the plane, an Airbus A320. However, late on Thursday EgyptAir Vice President Ahmed Adel told CNN that the wreckage had not been found.
Egyptian Prime Minister Sherif Ismail said it was too early to rule out any explanation for the crash, including an attack like the one blamed for bringing down a Russian airliner over Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula last year. The country’s aviation minister said a terrorist attack was more likely than a technical failure.
(With inputs from Reuters)
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