Paris: An EgyptAir flight from Paris to Cairo carrying 59 passengers and 10 crew members disappeared from the radar over eastern Mediterranean sea on Wednesday.
Flight MS804, operated by a Airbus A320, had departed Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport at 23:09 (CEST) and was scheduled to land at Cairo International went it off the radar – 16 kms into Egyptian airspace; 30-40 miles from the Egyptian coast.
As per reports, MS804 was cruising at an altitude of 37000ft (11,300m) when it lost contact with radar at 02:45 Cairo time (00:45 GMT).
Here are LIVE updates:
2.15 pm: Egypt says exchanged 'condolences' with France
The French and Egyptian foreign ministers exchanged "condolences" over an EgyptAir flight from Paris to Cairo that is feared to have gone down in the Mediterranean on Thursday, Egypt said.
1.45 pm: Egypt prime minister says cannot rule out terrorism behind vanished plane
Egypt's Prime Minister Sherif Ismail said that the search was underway to find the missing EgyptAir plane and it was too early to rule out any explanation for the incident, including terrorism.
"Search operations are ongoing at this time for the airplane in the area where it is believed to have lost contact," he told reporters at Cairo airport.
1.04 pm: Egypt Army denies detecting distress signal from missing plane
The Egyptian army denied it detected any "distress messages" from an EgyptAir flight, in a statement posted on its spokesman`s Facebook page.
12.40 pm: EgyptAir plane sent distress message before vanishing: airline
A missing EgyptAir flight sent a distress message before vanishing from radar screens on Thursday that was detected by the military, the airline said in a statement.
12.15 pm: Pilot of missing aircraft did not report problem, says Greece
Greek air traffic controllers spoke to the pilot over the island of Kea, in what was thought to be the last broadcast from the aircraft. "The pilot did not mention any problems," Kostas Litzerakis, head of Greece`s civil aviation department told Reuters.
11.48 am: Greece says deploys ship, aircraft to search for EgyptAir plane
Greece said it had deployed air assets and a frigate to an area in the southern Mediterranean where an EgyptAir aircraft vanished from radar screens early on Thursday. A defence ministry source said authorities were also investigating an account from the captain of a merchant ship who reported a "flame in the sky" some 130 nautical miles south of the island of Karpathos.
11.45 am: French PM Manuel Valls says "no theory can be ruled out"
"No theory can be ruled out on the cause of this disappearance," said Valls.
11.30 am: 30 Egyptians, 15 French among passengers on vanished flight: EgyptAir
The EgyptAir flight plane that vanished over the Mediterranean was carrying 30 Egyptian and 15 French passengers, as well as a Briton and a Canadian, the airline said.
11.15 am: Egyptian officials believe missing EgyptAir plane crashed into sea
An EgyptAir plane missing with 66 people on board probably crashed into the sea, officials from the airline and the Egyptian civil aviation said on Thursday.
Egypt`s state newspaper Ahram reported that there had been no distress call from the plane and that the last contact with the pilot was about 10 minutes before the aircraft disappeared.
11.00 am: EgyptAir plane that left Paris for Cairo ''did not land'' - French official
The Egyptair plane reported missing after leaving Paris for Cairo never landed, a French airport official said.
Referring to flight MS804 reported missing by the Egyptian airline, the French official, asking not to be identified by name, said: "It did not land. That is all we can say for the moment."
Officials at France`s foreign ministry were looking into the matter but had no immediate information to report when contacted.
