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EgyptAir crash: Officials dispute explosion claims EgyptAir crash: Forensics chief denies explosion claim
(about 2 hours later)
Egyptian officials have disputed a claim that the condition of human remains found at the crash site of an EgyptAir plane suggests an explosion. Egypt's forensics chief has denied reports that an initial examination of the remains of victims of the EgyptAir crash points towards an explosion.
An unnamed forensic examiner quoted by the Associated Press said the remains were so small an explosion was the only "logical" explanation. "Everything published about this matter is completely false," Forensic Medicine Authority head Hisham Abdul Hamid said.
But an Egyptian justice ministry spokesman told the BBC no traces of explosives had been found. Earlier, a forensic official was quoted as saying the remains were so small a blast was the only logical explanation.
All 66 people onboard were killed when Flight MS804 crashed last Thursday. All 66 people on board Flight MS804 were killed when the plane crashed into the Mediterranean Sea on Thursday.
An independent aviation safety expert told the BBC that the condition of the remains could be the result of several scenarios. The Airbus A320 was flying overnight from Paris to Cairo when it vanished from Greek and Egyptian radar screens, apparently without having sent a distress call.
Officials from EgyptAir have said they will not speculate on the reports. Debris from the plane has been recovered from the sea, some 290km (180 miles) north of the Egyptian port city of Alexandria.
The Airbus A320 was en route from Paris to Cairo when it vanished from radar early on Thursday. Read more
Who were the victims? On Tuesday morning, the Associated Press quoted an unnamed senior Egyptian forensic official - whom it described as part of the Egyptian team investigating the crash - as saying: "The logical explanation is that an explosion brought it down."
Meanwhile Egyptian air officials have given a different account of the last moments of the plan's flight. The official said he had personally examined the human remains that had so far been brought to a mortuary in the capital, Cairo, and described them all as "small".
Greece's defence minister Panos Kammenos has said that military radar showed the Airbus A320 making two sharp turns and dropping more than 25,000ft (7,620m) before plunging into the Mediterranean Sea. "There isn't even a whole body part, like an arm or a head," the official said. "But I cannot say what caused the blast."
But Egyptian officials said on Tuesday they did not observe the doomed EgyptAir flight swerve and change direction before it disappeared. AP later quoted the same official as saying that at least one piece of an arm had signs of burns, an indication that it might have "belonged to a passenger sitting next to the explosion".
Ehab Azmy, the head of Egypt's state-run provider of air navigation services, told the Associated Press that the plane had been flying at its normal height of 37,000ft (11,280m) before dropping off the radar. But on Tuesday afternoon, the official Mena news agency quoted a statement by Mr Abdul Hamid denying that the Forensic Medicine Authority had already concluded there was an explosion.
"That fact degrades what the Greeks are saying about the aircraft suddenly losing altitude before it vanished from radar," he said. "Everything published about this matter is completely false, and mere assumptions that did not come from the Forensic Medicine Authority," the statement said.
"There was no turning to the right or left, and it was fine when it entered Egypt's FIR [flight information region], which took nearly a minute or two before it disappeared." An independent aviation safety expert also told the BBC that the condition of the remains could be the result of several scenarios.
Neither EgyptAir nor Egypt's Ministry of Civil Aviation have commented on the plane's final movements. Egypt's president has said that "all scenarios are possible" and the search continues for the plane's flight data and voice recorders, known as the black boxes.
The reason for the discrepancy between the Greek and the Egyptian aviation official's accounts of the crash is not clear. However, Egypt's minister of civil aviation said on Friday that a terrorist attack was more likely than a technical failure.
Greek aviation officials have said air traffic controllers spoke to the pilot when he entered Greek airspace and everything appeared normal. There are also conflicting reports over whether or not the Airbus A320 swerved before it plunged into the sea, as previously stated by the Greek authorities.
They tried to contact him again at 02:27 Cairo time, as the plane was set to enter Egyptian airspace, but "despite repeated calls, the aircraft did not respond". Egyptian officials have told the BBC that Egyptian radar equipment did not register any abnormal movement by the aircraft, but that they tracked the plane for only a moment before it disappeared.
Last week, the Aviation Herald reported that smoke detectors went off in the plane's toilet and the aircraft's electrics three minutes before it disappeared. Greece's defence minister said on Friday that, after leaving Greek airspace and before it disappeared from Greek radar, the plane abruptly turned 90 degrees left and then 360 degrees to the right, dropping from 11,300m (37,000 ft) to 4,600m (15,000ft) and then 3,000m (10,000ft).
In a statement to Egypt's al-Ahram newspaper, Mr Azmy also denied a report there had been contact between the pilot of the plane and Egyptian air traffic control. The Aviation Herald also reported that the plane sent a series of warnings indicating that smoke had been detected on board three minutes before it disappeared.
On Sunday, Egypt deployed a robot submarine to search for the flight data recorders of the missing EgyptAir plane. The warnings do not indicate what might have caused the smoke.
Air accident investigator Hani Galal told Reuters that, when found, the flight recorders would be analysed in Egypt, unless they were badly damaged.
They are believed to be in waters between 2,500m and 3,000m deep.
President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi said there was "no particular theory we can affirm right now" for what caused flight MS804 to crash.
Egypt's civil aviation minister has said the possibility of a terror attack was stronger than technical failure, but Mr Sisi said establishing the cause could take a long time, adding "all scenarios are possible".