EgyptAir Flight 804 Disappears En Route from Paris to Cairo with over 60 on Board (Updated)
An EgyptAir flight carrying at least 59 passengers and 10 crew members went off the radar after departing from Paris and heading to Cairo, the airline said in a brief statement.
“An informed source at EGYPTAIR stated that Flight No. MS804, which departed Paris at 23:09 (CEST), heading to Cairo has disappeared from radar,” the airline said on its Twitter.
Flight MS804 left Charles de Gaulle Airport at 11:09 pm on Wednesday Paris time and was expected to arrive in Cairo by 3 am on Thursday. A direct flight usually takes just over four hours.
The Egyptian government has released no comment on the incident so far.
EgyptAir tweeted out that the flight disappeared from radar at 2:45 am Cairo time, when the plane was at an altitude of 37,000 feet (11,300 meters) and around 10 miles (16 kilometers) inside Egyptian airspace.
.@EGYPTAIR stating #MS804 has "disappeared from radar". FR24 flight track: https://t.co/6tH4GQzOWU pic.twitter.com/NteMuuFj1O
— Flightradar24 (@flightradar24) May 19, 2016
EgyptAir confirmed that all authorities have been informed of the missing plane, which disappeared near Greece. Rescue efforts are underway.
Egyptian rescue teams are reportedly working with their Greek counterparts to locate the plane. – RT
UPDATE:
CAIRO, Egypt — An EgyptAir jetliner bound from Paris to Cairo with 66 people aboard crashed in the Mediterranean Sea early Thursday after a mysterious series of extremely abrupt turns, authorities said, and Egypt’s aviation minister said it may have been a terrorist attack.
There were no immediate signs of any survivors.
EgyptAir Flight 804, an Airbus A320 with 56 passengers and 10 crew members, went down about halfway between the Greek island of Crete and Egypt’s northern coastline after takeoff from Charles de Gaulle Airport, authorities said.
Greek Defense Minister Panos Kammenos said the plane spun all the way around and suddenly lost altitude just before vanishing from radar screens around 2:45 a.m. Egyptian time.
He said the aircraft made a 90-degree left turn, then a full 360-degree turn toward the right, dropping from an altitude of 38,000 to 15,000 feet. It dropped from sight at about 10,000 feet, he said.
An Egyptian search plane later located two orange items believed to be from the aircraft, 230 miles southeast of Crete, a Greek military official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
In Cairo, Civil Aviation Minister Sherif Fathi cautioned that the disaster is still under investigation. But he said the possibility it was a terror attack “is higher than the possibility of having a technical failure.” -abcny
