There were smoke alerts inside the cabin of
the EgyptAir passenger plane before it
crashed in the Mediterranean on Thursday,
reports say.
Smoke was detected in the toilet and the
aircraft’s electrics, just minutes before the
signal was lost, according to data published
on air industry website the Aviation Herald.
However, there has been no official
confirmation of the data.
Flight MS804 was en route from Paris to
Cairo with 66 people on board.
The Aviation Herald said it had received
flight data filed through the Aircraft
Communications Addressing and Reporting
System (ACARS) from three independent
channels.
It said the system showed that at 02:26 local
time on Thursday (00:26 GMT) smoke was
detected in the Airbus A320 toilet.
A minute later – at 00:27 GMT – there was
an avionics smoke alert.
The last ACARS message was at 00:29 GMT,
the air industry website said, and the
contact with the plane was lost four minutes
later at 02;33 local time.
ACARS is used to routinely download flight
data to the airline operating the aircraft.
Philip Baum, the editor of Aviation Security
International Magazine, told the BBC that
technical failure could not be ruled out.
“There was smoke reported in the aircraft
lavatory, then smoke in the avionics bay,
and over a period of three minutes the
aircraft’s systems shut down, so you know,
that’s starting to indicate that it probably
wasn’t a hijack, it probably wasn’t a struggle
in the cockpit, it’s more likely a fire on
board.
“Now whether that was a technical fire, a
short circuit, or whether it was because a
bomb went off on board, we don’t know,” he
added.
Greece earlier said that radar showed the
Airbus A320 had made two sharp turns and
dropped more than 25,000ft (7,620m) before
plunging into the sea.
Debris and body parts were found on Friday
by teams searching for the wreckage of the
Airbus320, Greek and Egyptian officials
said.
Items including seats and luggage have also
been retrieved by Egyptian search crews.
The debris was discovered about 290km (180
miles) north of Alexandria, the Egyptian
military said.
European Space Agency satellites spotted an
oil slick in the area where the flight had
vanished – but the organisation said there
was no guarantee it was from the plane.
The search is now focused on finding the
plane’s flight recorders, the Associated Press
news agency reports.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has
expressed his “utmost sadness and regret” at
the crash.
