Hollande confirms missing Egypt Air flight crashed

An EgyptAir flight that disappeared en route to Cairo from Paris has crashed into the Mediterranean sea, but authorities have not determined if a mechanical failure or terrorist attack is to blame.

“We must ensure that we know everything on the causes of what happened. No hypothesis is ruled out or favored,” French President Francois Hollande told reporters in Paris, where he confirmed the plane, with 66 people on board, had crashed. He said the French government is in contact with Egyptian and Greek authorities to help in the search mission.

EgyptAir said it lost contact with the Airbus A320 plane at about 2:30 a.m., Cairo time, when the airliner was at an altitude of about 11,278 meters and just 16 kilometers inside Egyptian airspace.

Greek defense minister Panos Kamennos said the plane made sudden turns and a sharp descent before disappearing from the radar.

‘It turned 90 degrees left and then a 360-degree turn toward the right, dropping from 38,000 (11,582 meters) to 15,000 feet (4,572 meters) and then it was lost at about 10,000 feet (3,048 meters),” he said.

In Cairo, the aviation minister said neither a terror attack nor technical problem could be ruled out.  As he spoke, relatives of those on board had gathered at the airport, anxiously awaiting news on their loved ones.

Aviation experts are warning against speculation, reiterating that at this point too little is known to draw any conclusions.

“I will say that when an airplane disappears at 37,000 feet it’s a highly unusual event,” Scott Hamilton of Leeham Aviation Consultancy told VOA.  “It either typically indicates a catastrophic failure, catastrophic emergency of some kind, or as we know from not too long ago a bomb could go off … But you just have to be cautious and not jump to any conclusions at this point.”
Hamilton explained that a search team would most likely go to the last point where the plane could be traced and search for debris. Either a search and rescue or search and recovery team would then be dispatched to locate survivors and bodies.
“They would be ultimately looking for the airplane’s main records and black boxes,” he added.

The airline said earlier Egyptian armed forces received a distress message before communication with the plane was lost; however, a military spokesman later posted on his Facebook page a statement denying a distress call had been received.

Fifty-six passengers were on board, including one child and two infants. Saudi officials say the flight included passengers from France, Britain, Egypt, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Chad, Portugal, Algeria and Canada. No U.S. citizens were reported among the missing.

EgyptAir has released phone numbers specifically for the families of passengers, and provided translators and doctors in the Cairo airport.

The disappearance has renewed security concerns months after a Russian passenger plane was shot down over the Sinai Peninsula. The Russian plane crashed in Sinai on October 31, killing all 224 people on board. Moscow said it was brought down by an explosive device, and a local branch of the extremist Islamic State group claimed responsibility for planting it.

In 1999, EgyptAir Flight 1990 crashed into the Atlantic Ocean near the island of Nantucket, off the coast of the U.S. state of  Massachusetts, killing all 217 people aboard. U.S. investigators filed a final report that concluded its co-pilot switched off the autopilot and pointed the Boeing 767 downward. But Egyptian officials rejected the notion of suicide altogether, insisting some mechanical reason caused the crash.

Hamilton explained that a search team would most likely go to the last point where the plane could be traced and search for debris. Upon finding debris, either a search and rescue or search and recovery team would be dispatched to locate survivors and bodies.

“They would be ultimately looking for the airplane’s main records and black boxes,” he added.

The disappearance has renewed security concerns months after a Russian passenger plane blew up over the Sinai Peninsula. The Russian plane crashed in Sinai on October 31, killing all 224 people on board. Moscow said it was brought down by an explosive device, and a local branch of the extremist Islamic State group claimed responsibility for planting it.