The search and recovery operation continues in Egypt’s Sinai after a Russian passenger plane crashed there, killing all 224 people on board Saturday. Russian and Egyptian investigators are looking into the causes of the tragedy.
09 November 2015
At least 100 bodies from the crashed plane have been identified, Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodyets said.
08 November 2015
The Sunday Times paper reports that the UK’s intelligence leadership believes that the Russian jet which crashed in Egypt last week was brought down by a bomb planted by an Islamic State offshoot in the Sinai Peninsula.
The so-called Sinai Province group is headed by Abu Osama al-Masri, an Egyptian cleric, who agreed on a deal with IS last year in Syria.
According to the paper, UK officials have confirmed that Masri is a “person of interest” and that Britain is ready to help Egypt or Russia in a “kill or capture” mission against him.
Masri and his group claimed responsibility for Russian plane’s crash in Sinai shortly after it occurred.
President Vladimir Putin has signed an order officially suspending all passenger flights to Egypt. The order also recommends that companies halt sales of tours to Egypt, especially those involving air travel. The government has been instructed to facilitate the return of Russians who are still in the country, as well as their baggage.
Investigators of the jet crash are "90 percent sure" that the noise heard in the final moments of the cockpit recording was a bomb exploding, a member of the investigation team told Reuters.
Emirates Airlines expects the plane tragedy will result in demands for stringent aviation security across the globe, the airline’s president, Tim Clark said, as cited by Reuters.
The luggage of Russian tourists who arrive from Egypt is undergoing stricter than usual checks, said Igor Pedan, an official from UTG aviation services, which maintains Moscow’s Vnukovo Airport.
“The procedure was non-standard, I can say,” he said. “All luggage was sent to a special zone, [it] was checked by cynologists [dog-handlers] with [sniffer] dogs, the luggage was checked by special equipment and only then was transferred to a clear zone, for passengers to pick it up, ” he added.
At least 11,000 Russians have returned from Egypt to Russia in the latest 24 hours, Russian deputy PM Arkady Dvorkovich said.
"Today [on Sunday], the number will be even higher," he said. "Today will be the hottest day in this sense."
Earlier, the authorities said that there are an estimated 80,000 Russians staying in Hurgada and Sharm el-Sheikh.
The first group of Russian specialists has set off to Egypt to check the security of the local airports, Russia’s deputy PM Arkady Dvorkovich said. He added that Russia plans to send two more groups to check security at Egyptian airports.
The fourth plane carrying remains of the plane crash victims has set off to St Petersburg, the press service of the Russian Emergencies Ministry told RIA Novosti.
07 November 2015
All of the systems of the crashed Russian A321 plane had been working normally before its black box records abruptly ended, the Interstate Aviation Committee (IAC) announced after conducting an official preliminary analysis of the tapes.
The IAC analyzed the copied and deciphered information from both the flight data recorder (FDR) and the cockpit voice recorder (CVR) of the plane.
The FDR stopped recording at an altitude of about 9,400 meters (30,800 ft), and “until that moment the flight was going as planned, there was no information registered on any system or mechanical failures of the plane,” the body said.
The head of Egypt’s Investigations Committee, Captain Ayman Mokadem, confirmed that some “noise” can be heard on the recording right before the Russian plane’s crash. He stressed its nature is unclear and a spectral analysis will be carried out to identify it.
Egyptian authorities are checking cameras at Sharm al-Sheikh airport for any suspicious activity related to the crash of a Russian passenger airliner one week ago, security officials told Reuters.
"We want to determine if, for instance, anyone sneaked past security officials or the metal detectors. We are also trying to determine if there was any unusual activity among policemen or airport staff," one of the officials said. (Reuters)
Egyptian adviser to the Minister of Tourism, Mohamed Yousef, said that losing Russian and British tourists tourists in the aftermath of the Russian plane crash would be “a severe blow” to the country’s industry.
“Russian tourists are ranked first with 3 million tourists per year. British – 1 million,” Yousef said according to Al Ahram newspaper. “Their leaving is a severe blow for the industry. The loss will be 70 percent of the tourist influx.”
Such a scenario could see Egypt’s GDP plummet, as tourism makes up 11.3 percent of GDP, while also providing for about 14 percent in the country’s revenue in foreign currencies.
06 November 2015
Russia’s Ministry of Transport issued a statement saying that all flights between Russia and Egypt have been suspended as of 8 pm Moscow time. It added that all airlines have been informed about the decision.
READ MORE: Russia suspends flights to Egypt due to security concerns after Sinai crash
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Egyptian counterpart, Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, have agreed to make every effort to ensure the security of tourists, the Kremlin press service said on Friday after a telephone conversation between the two leaders.
The bodies of 33 crash victims were given back to their families for burial, deputy governor of St. Petersburg Igor Albin told reporters, saying 6 had been buried on Friday and five more will be on Saturday.
Meanwhile, the visual identification procedure has been completed and genetic tests are underway to complete the task, according to the Ministry of Health official Oleg Salagay.
A source familiar with the contents of the black boxes from the crashed plane in Sinai told AFP the recording showed that “everything was normal during the flight, absolutely normal, and suddenly there was nothing.” He described the accident as a “violent, sudden” demise.
An unnamed Egyptian official told ABC News that an onboard bomb explosion is the “most plausible reason” for the crash of the Russian passenger jet in Sinai. He added that possible technical problems are now at the bottom of the list of possible scenarios.
Analysis of the cockpit voice recorder shows that the plane crash could not have been caused by either a technical fault or an error by the crew, French LePoint claimed citing unnamed sources.
Meanwhile, a source with access to the black boxes told France 2 TV channel that a sound similar to that of an explosion could be heard on the recording.
President Vladimir Putin has agreed with the recommendations of the Federal Security Service (FSB) to halt all Russian flights to Egypt, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday.
"While we still haven’t established the causes of the incident, I consider it appropriate to suspend the flights of Russian aircraft to Egypt. This primarily applies to the tourist flow,” FSB Director Aleksandr Bortnikov told a meeting of the Russian Anti-Terror Committee.
READ MORE: Russia to suspend flights to Egypt until causes of Sinai crash are clear
The Obama administration is considering “a number of different steps” to tighten security “for commercial flights bound for the United States from certain foreign airports,” White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said. “When we develop those additional measures we work closely with [the airline] industry and our international partners to make sure they are properly and effectively implemented.”
A third plane carrying the bodies of victims who died in the Sinai plane crash back to St. Petersburg left Cairo early on Friday morning, TASS quoted the Russian Emergencies Ministry press service as saying. “The aircraft is carrying the remains of victims, personal belongings and documents discovered in the vicinity of the plane crash,” the ministry said.
The UK grounded passenger jets flying to and from Egypt’s Sharm el-Sheikh after British intelligence intercepted “communications and ‘chatter,’” indicating that a major terror attack had been plotted in the region by Islamic State extremists, the Telegraph reported, citing information it had obtained.
According to the outlet, it is this intelligence that led Prime Minister David Cameron to believe that a bomb had “more likely than not” been planted aboard flight 7K9268.
The report claims that UK intelligence uncovered the information only after the A321 jet had crashed.
Up to 20,000 British tourists have been stranded at the Egyptian resort as a result of the security shutdown.
US President Barack Obama said the US is taking the possibility that a terrorist act caused the crash of the Russian A321 passenger plane “very seriously.”
“We are taking very seriously the possibility that there was a bomb on board,” Obama told a Seattle-based KIRO radio station, adding that the US is going to “spend a lot of time just making sure our own investigators and own intelligence community find out what’s going on before we make any definitive pronouncements.”
“I don’t think we know yet,” he added.
05 November 2015
Three UK airlines – Easyjet, Monarch and Thomson – are going to run flights to bring thousands of British tourists home from the Sharm el-Sheikh resort in Egypt. The passengers will only be allowed to take hand baggage onboard – their hold luggage will be transported separately.
Such security measures were put in place after a Russian Airbus crashed flying from Sharm el-Sheikh to St. Petersburg. While Russian officials refuse to comment on the various theories as to the cause until the investigation is completed, some western countries believe that the jet could have been destroyed by an IS terror attack.
All the available evidence so far indicates that the Russian airliner crash was caused by an Islamic State bomb attack, US Representative Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said Thursday, Reuters reports.
However, another theory – that the tail of the plane, repaired several years ago, may have broken off – is still not off the table, he added.
“But I think the more likely scenario, where all indicators seem to be pointing, is that this was an ISIS attack with an explosive device on the airplane,” he said in an interview to Fox News.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and British Prime Minister David Cameron have held a telephone conversation about the Sinai plane crash. The Russian president said it is necessary to use data gathered during the official investigation to find out the reasons for the incident. The leaders also discussed the joint fight against terrorism.
Lufthansa’s low-cost carriers Edelweiss and Eurowings are halting their flights to Sharm el-Sheikh in the wake of the announcement by British authorities that a terrorist group affiliated to ISIS in Egypt may be responsible for downing the Russian airliner, Reuters reported.
Both carriers were flying to the Egyptian holiday destination twice a week. Lufthansa now plans to cooperate with Germany’s foreign office and travel companies to bring tourists back from Sharm el-Sheikh.
France has halted all flights to Sharm el-Sheikh for security reasons, following the earlier announcement that the UK is stopping all flights to the Egyptian resort.
The body of 10-month-old girl Darina Gromova, who became the symbol of the fatal A321 plane crash in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, has been discovered by rescue teams, TASS news agency has reported.
"Now she is being taken to Cairo, from there she will be sent to St. Petersburg to be identified by the relatives," the head of Russian Emergencies Ministry's operation headquarters in Egypt, Vladimir Svetelsky, said.
UK Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin says the authorities hope that flights bound for the UK could leave Sharm el-Sheikh Airport on Friday.
The US media’s reports on the possible causes of the A321 plane crash don’t reflect the US government’s stance on the situation, Secretary of State John Kerry told Egyptian authorities.
“We cannot be certain that the Russian airliner was brought down by a terrorist bomb, but because it is a strong possibility, it is right to act quickly, it’s right to act on the advice that we received, it’s right to act on the intelligence that we have,” British Prime Minister David Cameron said on the fifth day after the crash of Metrojet Flight 9268. The British PM added that London has discussed this with “others in Europe, the Americans, and we are calling President Putin in a moment or two to discuss this with him as well.”
Paris is not planning to evacuate French citizens from the Sinai Peninsula, a French Foreign Ministry representative told the media.
Egyptian authorities claim the UK has taken the decision to suspend flights from Sharm al-Sheikh airport without consulting Cairo.
“The British decision was taken unilaterally and there were no consultations with Egypt over it, despite the high-level contacts that took place between the two countries hours before,” the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said in a statement published by MENA state news agency. The statement said that so far no official conclusions have been made about the cause of the disaster.
The media leaks about a bomb planted onboard causing the Metrojet Flight 9268 crash are not the official US position, Egyptian authorities say, claiming that they have the US assurances on this issue.
The German government has urged its citizens traveling to Egypt to avoid the Sinai Peninsula. Those who have already bought tickets to Sharm el-Sheikh are being advised to contact their travel agency or airline to change their travel arrangements.
Getting preliminary results from the Flight 9268 crash investigation will take several months, Aleksandr Neradko said. The investigation of the catastrophe of the Russian Airbus A321 should not repeat the mistakes made by the investigation of the Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17 crash in Eastern Ukraine, when a version was put forward and all evidence was adjusted to fit it, he said. An investigation into the MH17 crash that occurred on July 17, 2014, took more than a year.
The cockpit voice recorder of Flight 9268 suffered minor damage and will be decoded very soon, Aleksandr Neradko, head of the Russian aviation authority, said.
Dust storms have interfered with the investigation of the Metrojet Flight 9268 crash in Sinai, with experts being unable to visit the scene of the catastrophe for some days running, Russian aviation authority chief Aleksandr Neradko said. On Wednesday, the head of the Russian Investigative Committee, Yury Bastrykin, who arrived to Egypt to oversee the investigation, failed to get to the crash site because of a sandstorm and his helicopter was forced to return to Cairo.
Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has entrusted Transport Minister Maksim Sokolov with the task of establishing dialogue with air safety agencies from countries that Russian air carriers fly to, in order to discuss additional security measures. Moscow has contacted Egyptian authorities regarding additional audit of air security measures, Sokolov reported.
The Egyptian investigation has passed the first results from the decoding of Flight 9268’s black boxes to Russian experts, Transport Minister Maksim Sokolov said.
All British citizens are to be evacuated from Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, on Friday, Sky News reported. British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond promised that all security measures will be taken at the Egyptian airport before the British jets take off. It will take weeks or even months before the UK restores air communication with the Egyptian resort city.
Investigators have found no evidence so far to suggest an explosion caused the October 31 Russian plane crash above Sinai, Egypt’s civil aviation minister Hossam Kamal said in a statement.
"The investigation team does not have yet any evidence or data confirming this hypothesis," Kamal said.
He added that flight continue to arrive to Sharm el-Sheikh, where the A321 took off on October 31, including 23 Russian flights scheduled for Thursday.
Russian airline Metrojet’s Flight 9268 crashed due to a bomb planted in the aircraft by members of Islamic State or their associates, CNN said, citing unidentified US intelligence officials.
Russia's federal air safety watchdog, Rostransnadzor, announced Thursday that all of Metrojet's Airbus A321 aircraft have been grounded for “additional safety checks.”
The Russian Health Ministry confirms that 58 bodies of the A321 plane crash victims have been identified, RIA Novosti cited the first deputy health minister as saying.
The British government has grounded all UK passenger flights to and from Sharm el-Sheikh after it has concluded that the Russian A321 jet that crashed over Egypt’s Sinai on Saturday was likely brought down by an “explosive device.”
“We have concluded that there is a significant possibility that the crash was caused by an explosive device on board the aircraft… We are now advising against all but essential travel by air through Sharm el-Sheikh airport. That means that there will be no UK passenger flights out to Sharm el-Sheikh from now,” Philip Hammond, the UK Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, told reporters after a meeting of a crisis response committee chaired by Prime Minister David Cameron.
An updated statement from Cameron’s office said that all flights to and from Sharm el-Sheikh have been suspended “with immediate effect” and the government will “work urgently with the airlines and the Egyptian authorities with the aim of getting some flights up and running as soon as possible so that we can get people already in Sharm el-Sheikh… back safely to the UK as soon as possible.”
04 November 2015
US intelligence has suggested a bomb planted on the Russian passenger plane by Islamic State or an affiliate group is “most likely” behind the Metrojet flight crash, CNN reported, citing a US official familiar with the matter. The US intelligence community has not reached a formal conclusion, the source added, but said “there is a definite feeling it was an explosive device planted in luggage or somewhere on the plane.”
The Irish Aviation Authority has directed the country’s airlines to suspend operations to and from Sharm el-Sheikh Airport as well, AirLive.net reported. The world’s largest charter airline, Thomson Airways, which flies from the UK and Ireland, has also temporarily suspended its flights to and from the Egyptian resort destination with immediate effect.
Data from the crashed A321 Flight Data Recorder (FDR) has been successfully copied, and handed over to investigators responsible for decoding, processing and analyzing it, TASS cited the Interstate Aviation Committee as saying.
Reuters cited a Russian aviation source as saying two scenarios that could have brought down the plane are currently being considered – a technical fault and an object stowed inside the aircraft.
All flights from Egypt’s Sharm el-Sheikh resort to the UK have been delayed as a “precautionary measure,” the joint statement from the Prime Minister’s Office, the Department for Transport, and Foreign & Commonwealth Office said on Wednesday. While the investigation of the Russian passenger jet crash over Egypt’s Sinai is ongoing, the British government has become “concerned that the plane may well have been brought down by an explosive device.”
READ MORE: UK govt: ‘Explosive device’ may have downed Russian passenger jet over Sinai
Investigators from the Russian Emergencies Ministry (EMERCOM) continued to comb through Sinai where the Russian passenger jet crashed. The investigators have collected plane debris and personal objects thought to belong to the victims of the crash, including clothes, luggage, jewelry and documents. The items are due to be taken to St Petersburg, where they are expected to be returned to the victims' relatives.
British PM David Cameron and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi have had a phone conversation about the Russian plane crash in Sinai, Downing Street said Wednesday. The two officials "agreed it was important not to prejudge the investigation," but with the cause of the crash still uncertain, they decided "it would be prudent to ensure the tightest possible security arrangements at Sharm el-Sheikh airport," the statement said.
Earlier, the Egyptian leader had said that speculation that Islamic State might be behind the Russian plane crash were "false propaganda" aimed at damaging Egypt's image, the Daily Telegraph reported.
An explosion within the engine allegedly caused the Airbus A321 crash in Sinai, media reports suggest. Citing sources in Egypt's investigative committee, Egypt’s Al-Masry Al-Youm reported that the decoded black boxes showed that an engine blast caused the crash of the plane, killing all 224 people on board.
With no distress signal sent from the plane to the flights control center, the anonymous source told the media that the explosion was huge and might have affected all the engines at once.
"The investigation did not point yet to have any links to terrorists," Al-Masry Al-Youm cited its source as saying, adding that samples from the wreckage had been taken to determine whether any explosive materials were present on the plane, or if the blast was the result of a mechanics failure.
"Documents and items" which might have importance in the investigation of the criminal case of the plane crash in Sinai have been found at the site of the Airbus A321 crash. According to Vladimir Markin, the spokesman for Russia's Investigative Committee, the area of the search operation has been widened by the Egyptian authorities, and this led to the discovery of the new items.
Preliminary information retrieved from the black boxes of the crashed Russian jet indicates that no discussion took place in the cockpit concerning any mechanical or system problem, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing an anonymous source familiar with the investigation, indicating that the pilots may have had no advance warning of the crash. The initial analysis of the cockpit recording contradicts previous reports that the crew realized they had an emergency and started dealing with it. The source told the WSJ that the crew may have had little or no time to react to the emergency.
Red Wings Airlines, a privately-owned Russian company, has stopped flying over the North Sinai conflict zone to avoid the area of Egyptian airspace where the Russian plane crashed shortly after takeoff Saturday. Previously Emirates, Lufthansa and Air France also said they have stopped flying over North Sinai, an area that is a base for Islamist insurgency.
Red Wings says it also plans to introduce some additional measures to enhance security during flights to Hurghada and Sharm el-Sheikh, TASS reported.
“[Our] cabin crew will be reinforced by highly qualified instructor pilots. Such a specialist is required in the cockpit to ensure the prompt reaction of the crew in case of emergency. Besides, from now on, our planes will be accompanied by a representative of the company, who will control the plane to prevent any unauthorized persons from boarding the aircraft,” Red Wings CEO Sergey Savostin told Izvestia daily.
03 November 2015
Russian rescue teams will continue their search efforts for another two days, a representative of the Emergency Ministry told RIA Novosti. He added that the rescue mission could be extended.
Media reports citing sources close to the investigation of the flight 7K9268 crash are “negatively impacting” the progress of the probe, as preliminary conclusions are misinforming the public and complicating things for the investigating officials, an unnamed Russian investigator told RIA Novosti.
“We are talking about the dissemination of statements from informed sources in Cairo as well as experts, allegedly close to the investigation,” a source, said to be from the technical side of the investigation, told the agency.
Russian and Egyptian experts failed to find any blast-related trauma during their preliminary examination of the bodies of the victims of the Russian passenger jet that crashed in the Sinai Peninsula, a Russian source within the investigation told TASS news agency.
“There were no signs of an explosion impact found during the preliminary examination,” the source said.
One of the Egyptian experts also told TASS that “there were no signs of external impact” found on the bodies.
In an attempt to collect more information on the crashed plane, specialists from the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations (EMERCOM) have observed the plane’s debris in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula using drones.
The bodies of the last 28 people killed in the plane crash have been sent to Russia alongside with the passengers’ personal belongings, Medhat Qandil, the head of the health unit at Sharm el-Sheikh airport said, Reuters reports.
No facts can prove the assumptions made by Russian officials that the crashed Airbus A321 broke up in the air, Egypt’s Civil Aviation Ministry claimed. "This could be a long process and we can’t talk about the results as we go along,” the ministry’s spokesman Mohamed Rahmi said referring to the process of investigation, as quoted by Reuters.
The US has offered Russia help in investigating the A321 passenger plane crash over Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Tuesday.
The passengers who were sitting near the back of the plane died of so-called “explosive trauma,” sustaining 90 percent skin burns and having metal pieces in their bodies, Russian tabloid LifeNews reports, citing the results of a forensic examination. Those closer to the front of the plane died of different types of injuries, including blood loss, open cranio-cerebral traumas and multiple fractures. So far, there has been no official response to these reports.
Experts from various countries working in Cairo have started decoding the flight recorders of the crashed Russian plane and analyzing its data, TASS reports.
Kremlin has called not to link the plane crash in Sinai with Russia's military operation in Syria, Dmitry Peskov said.
"Hypothetic speculations about this [plane crash] are inappropriate,” he added. "It's absolutely different things, they should not be linked."
The investigators can’t define any “concrete dates” for the probe into the plane crash, said the Kremlin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov.
"No deadlines can be set," he said. "This is out of the question. It's never done this way."
The experts haven’t yet detected any traces of external force on the fragments of plane covering, a source in Cairo told Interfax.
A source in Cairo told Interfax that just before the moment when the plane disappeared from radar screens, the recordings show sounds "uncharacteristic of a standard flight." According to the recording, "there was a sudden emergency situation on board which was a surprise to the plane’s crew, and the pilots did not have time to send a distress signal," the source added.
At least 140 bodies have been transported to St Petersburg, Aleksey Smirnov, an official from the Russian Emergencies Ministry said Tuesday.
Experts have found components at the site of the crashed plane that are not related to pieces of the A321 jet, sources in Cairo told TASS, adding that they have been sent to be scrutinized by experts.
The bodies of nine victims of the plane crash have been identified, St Petersburg Deputy Governor Igor Albin told the media.
The Pentagon could not comment on a media report claiming that a US satellite registered an explosion over the Sinai peninsula at the moment flight 7K9268 crashed there, RIA Novosti reports, citing a spokesperson’s response.
Earlier, NBC News quoted an unnamed senior defense official as saying that an infrared satellite had detected a “heat flash” in the area, which he interpreted as either the plane’s fuel tank exploding or a bomb going off. The official ruled out a surface-to-air missile being involved in the accident, as the satellite can also reportedly track the heat trail of a missile.
02 November 2015
It could take between one and four weeks for a report on the data from the flight recorders of the crashed Russian Airbus A321 to be completed, Hossam al-Kawish, a spokesman for the Egyptian cabinet, told CBC news.
“The decoding of the black boxes depends on the technical condition in which they were found,” al-Kawish said.
He added that the plane’s recorders were in a good condition, meaning that the decoding process should not take long.
Islamic State (formerly ISIS/ISIL) could not have had a hand in the crash of the Russian airplane over Sinai, US State Department spokeswoman Elizabeth Trudeau said, adding that the US “has no indication of terrorists taking down” the plane.
US Director of National Intelligence James Clapper also said earlier that he had “no direct confirmation of a terrorist attack.”
Another aircraft carrying bodies of crash victims, as well as their passports and personal belongings, has left Egypt for St. Petersburg, according to the press-service of the Russian Emergency Ministry. The next such flight is scheduled for Tuesday, Emergency Minister Vladimir Puchkov said.
Russian investigators and experts have begun working with the flight recorders from the crashed plane in Cairo, although they have not yet decoded it, as this procedure will only begin when the representatives from all of the investigative teams have arrived in the Egyptian capital. They include the IAC commission, German and French specialists from Airbus, and representatives from Ireland, Aleksandr Neradko, head of the Russian Air Transport Agency, said. He confirmed that the flight recorders are in good condition and likely ready for decoding.
A minute of silence was held at the 6th Session of the UN Anti-Corruption Conference in St. Petersburg, Monday, in memory of the victims of the Airbus-A321 crash in Egypt.
Of the plane crash victims, 96 bodies have been delivered to the morgue of the St. Petersburg Central Crematorium. So far, six have been identified, RIA Novosti reports, citing a source in the regional emergency service.
Russia’s transport minister, Maksim Sokolov, and the head of the Russian Air Transport Agency have inspected the flight recorders of the crashed plane. Sokolov has also held a meeting with his Egyptian counterpart to discuss further coordination, as well as measures aimed at lending assistance to the IAC commission.
Specialists from Airbus and the Interstate Aviation Committee (IAC) team, as well as Egypt’s aviation authorities have also begun their own investigation at the crash site and started examining the debris.
The Russian Emergency Ministry has confirmed that the first four bodies of the crash victims have been identified in St. Petersburg.
Cairo has not received any official notifications from any country about suspending their flights over the Sinai Peninsula and the air routes stay open, the Egypt Aviation Ministry says, according to RIA Novosti.
The bodies of the victims will not be handed over to their relatives today, TASS reports citing its source. “It is technically and physically impossible,” the source told the news agency, adding that some procedures still needed to be finished.
Some plane crash victims’ bodies have already been identified by relatives, TASS reports, citing its sources.
The US intelligence community says it has determined “with high confidence” that the crashed Russian airplane wasn’t exposed to any external influence (i.e. a missile attack or mid-air collision with another object) that could have caused “the structural failure” of the aircraft. This opinion is based on photos and video footage from the crash site, CBS news reports, citing intel community sources.
There is "no direct evidence" yet that A321 was the target of a terrorist attack, CIA director James Clapper told a military conference in Washington. Earlier, Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) took responsibility for the crash in a Twitter post.
Clapper added he cannot rule out terrorism altogether, however, and it is not impossible that terrorists have the potential to attack high-flying passenger jets.
There are no traces of explosives on the plane parts examined by specialists, a source in Cairo told RIA Novosti.
Specialists from the Russian Emergency Ministry, together with their colleagues from Egypt, are expanding the search zone to 30 sq. km, said Vladimir Puchkov, the head of Russia’s Emergencies Ministry. Earlier, the ministry defined the area of search operations as 16 sq. km.
Search operations will continue until all the bodies of the victims are found, Vladimir Puchkov, the head of Russia’s Emergencies Ministry, told the media.
It is early to speak about the causes of the tragedy, the head of Russian aviation agency Rosaviatsia, Aleksandr Neradko, told Rossya-24 channel.
“We have to do a lot of work on detailed examination of the construction elements of the plane, as well as of decoding and analysis of black boxes.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin once again expressed condolences to the families of the victims, describing the crash as an “immense tragedy.”
“In times of such tragedies and such hours, it is very important to feel the support of your close ones and the empathy of the whole country over this horrible catastrophe.”
RT has obtained new footage from the crash site:
The Russian Investigative Committee is viewing all possibilities surrounding the plane tragedy, but it is too early to speak about a definitive version of the events, committee spokesman Vladimir Markin said on Monday.
“Proposed possibilities from various sources are only assumptions, not on the objective picture.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has urged an end to speculation until the investigation is complete.
“It would be wrong to articulate any preliminary guesses or voice statements that are not based on anything,” Peskov said. “Let the investigators produce at least some results first.”
The jet must have been damaged by a force in flight and couldn’t have just broken apart, the Kogalymavia airline said during a press conference.
“The only possible explanation is a mechanical force acting on the aircraft,” Aleksandr Smirnov, who supervises the company’s fleet, said. “There is no combination of system failures that could have broken the plane apart in the air.”
Viktor Yung, deputy director of the airline, added the crew of Kolavia Flight 7K9268 was apparently disabled before the aircraft started its rapid descent and crashed in the Sinai Peninsula.
“As the catastrophic incident started to develop, the crew members were rendered completely incapable. This explains why they didn’t attempt to contact air traffic and report the incident happening on board,” he said.
Siberian operator Kogalymavia, also known as Metrojet, has not paid any salary to its employees for at least two months, Russia's Labor Inspection Services told RIA Novosti.
At least 12 fragments of the fuselage have been found at the crash site, an official from the Russian Emergency Ministry, Aleksandr Agafonov, said during the briefing.
At least 140 bodies from the plane crash have been transported to St. Petersburg for forensic examination, the city’s Vice Governor Igor Albin said.
A second plane transporting the remains of the victims will depart from Cairo to St. Petersburg at 21:00 local time on Monday (18:00 GMT), the Russian Emergency Ministry said.
The first buses carrying the bodies of 144 of the plane crash victims have departed from Pulkovo airport in St. Petersburg to the morgue, where the identification process of the remains will begin.
The Il-76 aircraft, with a sorrowful cargo of 144 out of the total 224 crash victims’ bodies, has landed at St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo airport.
READ MORE: Russian jet crash in Egypt: First bodies brought to St. Petersburg
The Russian Foreign Ministry warns that it is too early to discuss the possible course of events that led to the tragedy until the investigation into the crash is completed.
“How can we talk about any versions, when only now our experts began to work directly at the crash site?” the ministry's spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told Rossiya 1 TV channel.
READ MORE: Flight 7K9268: What we do and don’t know about Russia’s deadliest-ever air crash
Zakharova urged patience and encouraged the following of facts rather than believing any speculation surrounding the tragedy. She said that Egyptian authorities are showing their full support and cooperation.
“There is every chance, and everything is done to ensure that we know the truth,” Zakharova said.
01 November 2015
The first plane carrying the bodies of flight 7K9268 crash victims has left Egypt for St. Petersburg.
"EMERCOM Il-76 aircraft has taken off from Cairo to St. Petersburg. The bodies of those killed are on board," the Russian Emergencies Ministry said.
Earlier, the deputy head of the Emergencies Ministry, Vladimir Stepanov, said that 144 bodies out of 224 victims were set for departure.
Crowds have flocked to Palace Square in central St. Petersburg to commemorate the victims of the A321 crash in Sinai.
The remains of 144 victims of the Sinai plane crash are ready to be transported from Cairo to St. Petersburg. A special flight is to take off at 8:30pm GMT, Russia’s Emergencies Ministry said.
The head of the Russian Transport Ministry said that the flight recorders from the crashed plane have not yet been opened and decoded, counter to the claims of the Egyptian side.
Kolavia has said that it will gradually suspend the operation of A321 Airbuses.
Watch RT's latest report from Cairo
Personnel from the Russian Emergencies Ministry are setting up a base camp at the Airbus A321 crash site and are defining the work schedule for Monday, according to the ministry’s spokesman, Aleksandr Agafonov.
He added that the Russian team is working in cooperation with the Egyptian side which is providing additional vehicles and equipment. Russian rescuers are planning to use drones to examine the crash site as well, in order to scour the place for the bodies of victims that still have not been found.
The search and recover operation will be resumed on Monday at 7:00am.
The Russian A321 aircraft, which crashed over Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula on Saturday, fell apart in the air, Victor Sorochenko, executive director of Russia’s Interstate Aviation Commission, said.
“It’s too early to make any conclusions. The destruction [of the plane] happened in the air and the fragments scattered over a large area (around 20 square kilometers),” Sorochenko said.
The Russian Emergency Ministry said they had managed to get photos of the crash site from space.
“We have received photos from space in which the wreckage of the plane is clearly seen over an area of 16 sq. km,” said Aleksey Smirnov, an official from the ministry.
Egypt’s president Abdel Fattah el-Sisi said the investigation into the plane crash could take months, Reuters reported.
"This is a complicated matter and requires advanced technologies and broad investigations that could take months," he told army recruits in a televised speech.
Egyptian investigators said it could take days to determine the cause of the jet’s crash, sources told Reuters.
Ukrainians in Kiev, Odessa, Kharkov and Lvov are gathering near Russian consulates and embassies to pay tribute to the victims of the plane crash in Sinai. People are bringing flowers, candles and toys to express their condolences.
The investigators have questioned the crew who flew on Airbus-321 on September 30, the before the tragedy, Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin said.
An international commission, including specialists from Egypt, Russia and France, has begun examining the contents of one of the black boxes, an official from the Egyptian Prosecutor's Office said, as cited by TASS.
Watch RT's latest report on Sinai plane crash
Among the victims of the plane crash were 132 St. Petersburg residents, 46 residents from the Leningrad Region and 34 from other Russian regions, Georgy Poltavchenko, the St. Petersburg governor told media. He added that four Ukrainian and one Belarus citizens were among the victims.
Poltavchenko said he had decided to prolong the mourning for the victims of the plane crash in Sinai for two more days.
Dozens of people have laid flowers and candles on the place where the plane was supposed to land in Pulkovo Airport in St. Petersburg.
“I don’t know any of the victims, but I am from St. Petersburg myself and my family is. I have two small children and I just can’t be indifferent when things like that happen,” one woman told RT.
“Things like this can happen to anyone, they happen all the time, no one is safe… And it is very sad,” a man holding a small child added.
The area of the search operation at the site of the plane crash is about 16 sq. km, the Russian Emergency Ministry said.
At least 83 rescuers from the Russian Emergency Ministry are involved in the operation, the ministry tweeted.
Russia’s transport watchdog Rospotrebnadzor has suspended Kolavia airline flights on Airbus A321 aircraft until all the causes of the crash are investigated, the regulator told TASS.
The remains of at least 120 people from the crashed plane have been examined in Cairo, Egypt, the Russian Emergency Ministry said during a briefing.
The remains of at least 175 people have been extracted from the crash site, officials from the rescue operation said, as cited by TASS.
Watch RT's latest report on Sinai plane crash
At least 147 relatives of the plane crash victims have given DNA samples to identify the bodies, vice governor of St. Petersburg Igor Albin told journalists.
The Russian Emergency Ministry tweeted their rescuers have landed in Cairo and have headed to the site of the crashed plane.
The black boxes from the crashed plane may be decoded in Egypt, Rosaviation head Aleksander Neradko told TASS.
Black boxes from the crashed Airbus A-321 have been slightly damaged, and haven’t been exposed to any thermal damage, Russian Minister of Transport Maksim Sokolov said, as cited by TASS.
Personnel from the Russian Emergency service are going to the crash site, the press service said, adding that they will start work in several hours.
The search operation has been resumed at the site of the plane crash, Egypt’s Al Yaum al Sabia newspaper reported, citing local officials. At least 170 ambulances have arrived at the scene to transport the bodies.
Psychiatrists from the Centre for Social and Forensic Psychiatry in Moscow have begun to prepare relatives of victims of the plane crash for the body identification process, TASS reports.
The heads of the Ministry of Emergencies, Ministry of Transport and Federal Air Transport Agency, in addition to the representatives of the Interstate Aviation Committee (IAC) will personally fly out to the crash site on Sunday, the Ministry of Transport reported.
An interdepartmental working group has drafted a work plan for recovery operations at the crash site, the deputy head Russia’s of Ministry of Emergencies, Vladimir Stepanov announced.
Emirates airlines has temporarily halted all flights flying over Egypt's Sinai peninsula.
"Emirates is currently avoiding flying over the Sinai peninsula until more information is available," a spokesperson for the airline told AFP. "We are currently monitoring the situation.”
The Gulf carrier is the third foreign airline that has announced its intentions to halt flights over Egypt. Air France and Lufthansa announced that they would stop flying over the area as a precaution.
Two more Russian Ministry of Emergencies planes are expected to land in Egypt in the early hours of Sunday morning, the Russian embassy in Cairo reports. Two of the ministry's planes have already arrived in the country.
Russian Emergencies Ministry personnel will be ready to head to the crash site at 8:00am local time, according to the ministry’s head, Vladimir Puchkov.
31 October 2015
Egypt is ready to assist in sending the bodies to Russia as soon as an initial analysis is complete, Egyptian Minister of Tourism Hisham Zazou told Russian representatives who arrived in Cairo.
“If you’re ready to send them home, we are ready to assist,“ he said, as cited by RIA.
A full examination of the victims’ remains will be conducted in St. Petersburg, said a representative of the Russian Federal Center of Forensic Medicine.
In a phone call to the Russian president, Italian PM Matteo Renzi has expressed his sincere condolences with regards to the tragedy.
Some 150 victims’ bodies which have been recovered from the crash site have already been transported to Zeinhom morgue in the Egyptian capital, RT’s Harry Fear reports from downtown Cairo.
A third Russian Emergencies Ministry’s plane is heading to Egypt with a team of personnel, RIA Novosti reported. In total, the Russian ministry has sent 83 emergency personnel and two pieces of machinery to aid with the recovery operation at the crash site.
The aircraft crew of the Airbus A321 made no complaints about the technical state of the plane during pre-flight operations in the Russian city of Samara, TASS reported citing the regional transport prosecutor’s office.
“On October 30, after arriving to Samara airport… the aircraft did not undergo overhaul as there were no maintenance requests from the plane commander. The crew also made no remarks concerning the technical state of the airplane,” a spokesperson for the office told the agency.
Watch RT's latest report on Sinai plane crash
Egyptian Prime Minister Sherif Ismail visited the Russian embassy in Cairo and expressed his deepest condolences to the ambassador. He promised to lend all necessary assistance to Russia in the investigation of the plane crash, Egyptian media reported. The prime minister confirmed that Egypt is in close contact with Russia and the two countries are fully coordinating their actions for the inquiry.
US Secretary of State John Kerry extended his condolences “to the families and friends of the victims” of the Russian plane crush in Sinai during a telephone conversation with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov. Kerry also offered “US assistance, if it is needed,” deputy head of the US State Department press-service, Mark Toner, said.
Ireland offered “assistance in the investigation of the causes of the tragedy” with its aviation investigations authority sending a corresponding official proposal to Egypt, TASS reports. The crashed Airbus A321 was formally registered in Ireland.
Both flight data recorders from the crashed Russian plane have been found, Egypt’s civil aviation minister said.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko offered his condolences to the families of the Russian plane crash victims. Apart from Russian citizens, the plane had also been carrying two Ukrainians and one Belorussian citizen on board.
First official images from Sinai crash scene emerge:
European Council President Donald Tusk issued an official statement, in which he expressed his “heartfelt condolences” to “the Russian authorities and people” after the Russian airplane crash.
Experts have started decoding the flight data recorder that was found at the crash site, Egypt’s prime minister said.
The pilot of the crashed plane did not address flight operations officers at Sharm El-Sheikh International Airport before the catastrophe, said the Egyptian civil aviation minister Hossam Kamal.
“Communication between flight operations officers and [the] Russian aircraft was carried out in normal way up to the moment of the catastrophe,” he said at a press-conference in Cairo, stressing that the pilot had not asked for help and the plane “suddenly” disappeared.
Two experts from French civil aviation safety investigations authority BEA will arrive in Egypt on Sunday, along with six representatives of Airbus in the wake of the Russian plane crash.
Watch RT's latest report on Sinai crash
The Egyptian Prosecutor General’s office has allowed Russian investigators to participate in the inquiry into the causes of the crash, TASS reports. It also called in flight operation officers and pre-flight preparation crews for questioning, which that will be reportedly conducted together with the Russian side.
The Russian Air Transport Agency has advised Kolavia to suspend flights to Egypt “until further notice” in view of the airplane crash, RIA Novosti reports citing its sources.
The heads of the Russian Emergency Ministry, Transport Ministry and Russian Air Transport Agency have left for Cairo in an emergency ministry airplane with representatives of the Russian Investigative Committee and Interstate Aviation Committee also on board, RIA Novosti reports. Russian and international officials are going to take part in the investigation of the crash. Another two emergency ministry aircraft are expected to leave for Egypt shortly.
Egyptian military aircraft are transporting some of the crash victims’ bodies to a base in the east of Cairo. The first 35 bodies have already been taken to the mortuary, RT Arabic reports. So far, the remains of 140 passengers have been retrieved from the crash site.
German carrier Lufthansa and Air France-KLM have decided to avoid flying over the Sinai peninsula while they wait for clarity on what caused a Russian airliner carrying 224 passengers to crash in the area, spokeswomen for the carriers said on Saturday.
The Egyptian General Prosecutor’s office has retrieved the black boxes from the crashed plane. They contain the recordings of the conversations between pilots as well as between pilots and flight operations officers, Egyptian newspaper Al Ahram reports.
An overhaul on the Airbus A321 was carried out in 2014. Comprehensive preflight maintenance operations were also completed, Kolavia said.
There is no point in hypothesizing about the cause of the plane crash until there is reliable data on the circumstances, the Russian Air Transport Agency said in a statement.
The Interstate Aviation Committee said it had set up a special investigative commission after the Russian plane crash. The commission will fly to the scene of the accident together with representatives from Russia’s Emergency Ministry, according to a Committee statement.
The Russian Transport Ministry refuted information the Airbus A321 had been shot down by terrorists as “unreliable.”
“Now, different media report… that a Russian passenger airliner on a flight from Sharm El-Sheikh to St. Petersburg has been allegedly shot down by an anti-aircraft missile fired by terrorists. This information cannot be regarded as reliable,” said Russian Transport Minister Maksim Sokolov.
“We are in close contact with our Egyptian colleagues and aviation authorities. They currently have no information that could confirm such allegations,” he added.
British Prime Minister David Cameron has extended his sympathies to the families and friends of the plane crash victims in his Twitter post.
Egypt’s security forces have disproved reports a diversion could have caused the Airbus A321 crash.
The Egyptian president expressed his deepest condolences to Vladimir Putin in a telephone conversation. The Egyptian leader assured the Russian president his country will give Russia all the necessary assistance in the crash investigation.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has expressed her “sincere condolences” in a telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The Russian Investigative Committee said it was examining fuel samples from the crashed plane’s last refueling stop in the Russian city of Samara.
Investigators are carrying out searches in Moscow’s Domodedovo International Airport after the plane crash in Sinai. Russian Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin also confirmed searches had been made at Kolavia's headquarters.
Another probe into “provision of services that do not meet security requirements” has been launched over the plane crash, Markin added.
According to Egypt's security forces, as cited by Reuters, a technical fault was to blame for the crash.
Search and rescue teams are finding bodies in a radius of up to 5km (3.1 miles) from the crash site. Approximately 150, some burnt, have been pulled out of the wreckage so far.
The sources say the aircraft took almost a vertical trajectory as it plummeted down. Large parts of the fuselage burned in the process.
Police are currently at Kolavia's headquarters, collecting the necessary documentation to proceed with the investigation.
Kolavia believes human error was not behind the Saturday crash, according to RIA Novosti. The plane had been fully serviced and the pilot was an experienced one, with 12,000 hours under his belt.
Airbus will offer any and all technical assistance to investigators and aviation authorities, it said in a statement.
"According to preliminary information provided by the Embassy in Egypt, among the victims of the Russian plane crash is one Belarusian citizen," the Belorussian foreign ministry said.
US Secretary of State John Kerry has expressed his condolences to President Putin and the Russian people. "We don't know any details about it, but obviously the initial reports represent tremendous tragedy, loss, and we extend our condolences to the families and all those concerned,'' Kerry said on behalf of the US, while on an official visit to Kygyzstan.
Watch RT's latest report on Sinai crash
The Emergencies Ministry has published the passenger manifest for the crashed Kolavia flight.
Condolences keep pouring in from across the country for the bereaved.
As previously thought, no survivors were extracted from the Kolavia wreckage, TASS reports, citing Egyptian rescue workers.
Nearly all of the 217 passengers were Russian, aside from three Ukrainian citizens, Egyptian officials add.
Israel has offered to assist with extracting survivors, if any are found. The country is standing by with emergency medical personnel, after its foreign ministry spoke with Russia's, according to RIA Novosti.
DNA samples will be collected from the relatives of the deceased at Pulkovo, St. Petersburg's social policy committee says.
Russia's Transport Ministry says the plane was cleared for flying and that no technical irregularities were spotted prior to takeoff. But the carrier Kolavia will be facing a thorough investigation, minister Maksim Sokolov told reporters.
"The cause of the crash will be determined following an international investigation," Sokolov added.
President Putin has declared November 1 a day of mourning, the Kremlin's press office reports.
The bodies of all 17 children aboard the Kolavia flights have been pulled from the wreckage, Egypt's aviation authority reports.
Egypt's aviation authority is now refuting earlier claims that on-board recording devices were uncovered in the search of the crash site.
Reuters, however, says the black boxes were indeed found by the rescue workers, citing security sources at the site.
Relatives of the deceased are gathering at the Pulkovo airport. A help center has been set up to assist them.
The black boxes have been uncovered at the scene of the Kolavia A321 crash, Al Jazeera reports, citing sources on the ground.
The Russian Emergencies Ministry held an urgent meeting over the plane crash in Sinai to answer questions.
A total of five planes with specialists in various fields are now reportedly headed to Egypt.
Approximately 100 bodies have been pulled out of the wreckage by the search and rescue teams, TASS was told by an officer on-site.
Authorities say it is "too soon to determine the cause" of the crash, according to Reuters.
"I now see a tragic scene. A lot of dead on the ground and many died whilst strapped to their seats," the officer said. "The plane split into two, a small part on the tail end that burned and a larger part that crashed into a rock. We have extracted at least 100 bodies and the rest are still inside."
A criminal investigation has been launched to determine if any negligence or failures to observe proper procedure happened before takeoff, according to the Emergencies Ministry. The ministry's planes carrying investigators are currently on their way to Egypt.
At least five children have been found dead, out of a total of 17 aboard the plane, rescue teams report.
The aircraft split in two.
Other bodies can be seen still strapped to their seats.
President Vladimir Putin has expressed his deepest condolences to the families of those who perished in the tragic crash.
Voices of trapped passengers were reportedly heard in one section of the Russia-bound Airbus 320, according to an officer at the scene.
"There is another section of the plane with passengers inside that the rescue team is still trying to enter and we hope to find survivors especially after hearing pained voices of people inside," the officer, who chose to remain unnamed, told Reuters.
Egyptian authorities are reporting "casualties" at the crash site. The Prosecutor General has ordered a team of prosecutors to the site.
The Egyptian military told RT access to the crash site may be difficult for the press due to the volatile security situation in the Sinai. Large parts of the peninsula are dangerous due to the presence of militants, with only coastal areas in the north and south adequately guarded by security forces.
The notice boards at Pulkovo in Russia have reportedly not shown the arrival details for flight 7K 9269 from Sharm el-Sheikh. The board initially showed an estimated arrival time of 12:20 St. Petersburg time.
A state of emergency has allegedly been declared in north Sinai, a source tells RIA Novosti.
Russia's Emergencies Ministry is gathering a working group on the suspected crash of the Airbus 320 in Egypt's Sinai.
Three of the ministry's planes are awaiting orders for takeoff.
Egyptian authorities say the plane was traveling at an altitude of 31,000 feet when it vanished from radar.
The teams who located the plane say it was mangled almost beyond recognition. It would be difficult to imagine anyone surviving the impact, a security officer at the scene told Reuters.
The airliner does appear to have crashed. Egyptian rescue teams report finding debris in southern Arish, in the Sinai, according to the country's aviation authority.
Among the passengers were 17 children, according to RIA Novosti.
On takeoff, the pilot had sought a change of course and for a landing to be made in Cairo, a Sharm el-Sheikh airport source told RIA Novosti.
The Russian Embassy in Egypt has begin its own inquiry. Is says any new information will be reported to the media immediately.
Egyptian aviation authorities now say the Russia-bound plane is safe. After a brief radio silence, the pilot made contact with Turkish air traffic control, and is now believed to be flying in the country's air space.
"The ... Russian airline had told us that the Russian plane we lost contact with is safe and that it has contacted Turkish air traffic control and is passing through Turkish skies now," Ayman al-Muqaddam, the head of the central air traffic accident authority in Egypt, told reporters in a statement.
Egypt air traffic control loses contact with civilian airliner believed to be carrying 212 passengers on board, mainly Russian citizens. The plane took off from Sharm el-Sheikh and was headed to Russia, according to aviation sources speaking to Reuters.
A search operation has been launched.
Russian aviation sources still can't confirm the whereabouts of the passenger plane, despite earlier reports that the aircraft had made contact with Turkish air traffic control, according to TASS.
"Preliminary reports suggest that the Airbus 320, Kogalymavia flight 92-68 from Sharm el-Sheikh to St. Petersburg, set off at 6:51 Moscow time (4:51GMT) and failed to make contact with Larnaka air traffic control in Cyprus at 7:14, when the plane was last seen on radar. There were 212 passengers and seven crew on board," the agency's spokesman Sergey Izvolskiy said.
Different media were prematurely giving reports of plane debris and evidence of a crash, after first believing the plane disappeared somewhere over Cyprus, but the crash was never confirmed.