EGYPTAIR FLIGHT DISAPPEARS Search of the Mediterranean underway

Posted on 05/19/2016 | About Cairo, Egypt

An EgyptAir flight from Paris to Cairo with 66 passengers and crew on board, including one Canadian, crashed in the Mediterranean Sea early Thursday morning, Egyptian aviation officials said.

EgyptAir Flight 804 was lost from radar at 2:45 a.m. local time when it was flying at 37,000 feet, the airline said. It said the Airbus A320 had vanished 16 kilometres after it entered Egyptian airspace, around 280 km off the country's coastline north of the Mediterranean port city of Alexandria. 

The aviation officials later said the plane crashed and that a search for debris was now underway. The “possibility that the plane crashed has been confirmed,” as the plane hasn't landed in any of the nearby airports, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. 

The official said a signal had been picked up from the plane two hours after it disappeared from radar, thought to have been an emergency beacon

Egyptian military aircraft and navy ships were taking part in a search operation off Egypt's Mediterranean coast to locate the plane. Greece is assisting in the search. 

The 56 passengers include one Canadian, 30 Egyptians, 15 French citizens, one Briton, two Iraqis, one Kuwaiti, one Saudi, one Sudanese, one Chadian, one Portuguese and one Algerian. The airline said a child and two babies were among the passengers. 

Global Affairs Canada said it was “aware of the possibility that a Canadian may have been on board the flight” and that the department was “monitoring the situation closely.” The statement added that Canadian officials in Cairo and Paris are working with local authorities to confirm this information. 

Egypt's state-run newspaper Al-Ahram quoted an airport official as saying the pilot did not send a distress call, and that last contact with the plane was made 10 minutes before it disappeared from radar. It did not identify the official. 

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said no scenario could be ruled out at the moment as for what caused the plane to disappear. France, he told RTL radio, was “ready” to join the search operation if Egyptian authorities requested his country's assistance. 

Around 15 relatives of passengers on board the missing flight have arrived at Cairo airport. Airport authorities brought doctors to the scene after several distressed family members collapsed. 

Neither France's foreign ministry nor its interior ministry would comment on the disappearance or on whether it could have been an attack. 

France remains under a state of emergency after Islamic extremist attacks killed 130 people in a spree of attacks in November claimed by the extremist Islamic State group.