EgyptAir Airliner Goes Down

EgyptAir Flight MS804 on a flight from Paris to Cairo disappeared today over the Mediterranean Sea. What is known is that the airliner, an Airbus A320, was cruising at 37,000 feet and had just entered Egyptian airspace when it vanished from radar approximately 150 nautical miles from the Egyptian coast at about 2:30 a.m. local time, 45 minutes before it was scheduled to arrive in Cairo. The Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has confirmed that debris from the missing airplane has been found near Karpathos Island.

The aircraft was carrying 66 people, 56 passengers and 10 crew members, of various nationalities, according to the airline. There were no American citizens on board. Most of the people were either Egyptian or French.

EgyptAir also reported that the captain had 6,275 hours of total flight time including 2,101 hours flying the A320. The first officer had 2,766 hours. The airplane was manufactured in 2003.

The Egyptian Armed Forces have been deployed for a search and rescue mission and Egypt’s Civil Aviation Authority is investigating. Egypt’s prime minister, Sherif Ismael, has also arrived at the EgyptAir Crisis Center to aid in the investigation. On its website, EgyptAir said there is a lot of “misleading information” being reported in the media. No cause for the disappearance is known at this time.