EgyptAir Flight from Paris to Cairo Disappears

An EgyptAir flight that was coming from Paris and was 10 miles into Egypt airspace went missing in the early morning hours.

EgyptAir tweeted that flight MS 804, which was an Airbus A320-232, was at 37,000 feet when it dropped off the radar over the Mediterranean at 2:45 a.m. Cairo local time.

FlightRadar24 reported that the aircraft, which left Paris just after 8 p.m. local time, was delivered in 2003. There was no bad weather reported in the area where the plane disappeared.

“EGYPTAIR has contacted the concerned authorities and bodies and inspection is underway through the rescue teams,” the airline tweeted.

Ahmed Abdel, vice chairman of EgyptAir Holding Company, told CNN that 66 were on board. This included 56 passengers (including two infants and one child) and 10 crew — five cabin crew members, three security officers, and two in the cockpit.

Abdel said there was no report of trouble from the crew. The captain had 6,000-plus flying hours and the first officer had 4,000-plus hours, he said. He was not releasing any more information about the pilots upon notification of next of kin.

Abdel said there was no “special cargo” on flight that could have posed a danger.

Speaking at midnight Eastern time, but after dawn had broken in Egypt, he added that search and rescue had already arrived at the point where the airplane lost contact but had not yet reported sightings in a potential crash.

There was no distress call, Abdel said, before it was lost on the radar.

An emergency center for relatives was being set up at Cairo Airport. The toll-free number set up by the airline for anyone outside Egypt or using a cell phone is +202 25989320.

ISIS has increased its presence in the Sinai and in neighboring Libya. On Tuesday, ISIS in Libya released a 21-minute video viewed by PJM that slammed Libyan leaders and President Obama, but largely focused on ISIS battles and Sharia law enforcement.

One scene in the video showed ISIS fighters shooting at an unidentified aerial object with an anti-aircraft gun.

In March, an EgyptAir Airbus A320 flying from Alexandria to Cairo was hijacked and taken to Cyprus, where all on board were released safely and the hijacker surrendered. The hijacker’s suicide belt was determined to be fake; his ex-wife lived in Cyprus.

In October, a Russian Metrojet A321 exploded over the Sinai after leaving Sharm el-Sheikh en route to St. Petersburg. ISIS later posted in their Dabiq magazine a photo of the soda-can bomb they said took down the plane.

Last received ADS-B position from #MS804 with Egyptian FIR (Egyptian airspace) boundary overlay. pic.twitter.com/TCGyEM6zT7

— Flightradar24 (@flightradar24) May 19, 2016