The Airbus A321 operatd by Russian airline Kogalymavia was conducting flight 9268 between the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh and Saint Petersburg when it crashed in North Sinai shortly after take-off on October 31. But Ayman al-Muqaddam also says parts of the wreckage are still missing, and that it’s still too soon to determine a cause for the crash.
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His comments come astThe head of the Egyptian investigation team admitted a noise heard in the final second of the black box recording could be evidence of an explosion.
The investigation panel said in the statement that the VCR in the black box was successfully downloaded, and during the first listening “a noise was heard in the last second”, which requires spectral analysis that will be carried out by specialized labs.
He confirmed the plane was still ascending and auto-pilot was engaged when the plane crashed and debris was scattered over a 8 mile area (13km) in the Sinai desert which was “consistent with an in-flight breakup”. “It could be lithium batteries in the luggage of one of the passengers, it could be an explosion in the fuel tank”.
A British passenger jet headed to the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh narrowly avoided a missile in August, authorities said following a Russian jet crash in the same area this week.
Sameh Shoukry, speaking at a press conference, said that “European countries did not give us the co-operation we are hoping for”.
“At the moment we can only speak of the existence of ambiguous sounds recorded by the flight recorders”, Interfax quoted the officials as saying. Western intelligence sources have said British and US spies intercepted “chatter” from suspected militants suggesting that a bomb, possibly hidden in luggage in the hold, had downed the plane.
Egypt was checking video footage at the airport on Saturday for any suspicious activity linked to the plane crash in Sinai, officials said, the clearest sign yet that they believe it may have been targeted by militants.
Egypt’s foreign minister says his country did not receive the intelligence upon which other countries based their decisions to ground all flights to the Sharm el-Sheikh airport.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi’s office said he called Russian President Valdimir Putin and they agreed to bolster coordination to “strengthen security measures for Russian planes”.
Meanwhile, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich told reporters at a Moscow airport on Sunday that a few 11,000 Russian tourists had been repatriated in the previous 24 hours.
Several senior administration officials in the intelligence, military and national security community told CNN the United States is nearly positive a Russian passenger jet was brought down by a bomb.
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Islamic State claimed responsibility for blowing up the plane, but has not given any proof.
