Several different alerts on this plane went off immediately prior to the plane disappearing from the radar, including 1) issues with the windows on the co-pilot’s side of the plane; 2) two smoke alerts, the first one “SMOKE LAVATORY SMOKE” at 00:26 a.m. local time; 3) the second one “AVIONICS SMOKE” at 00:27 a.m. The second alert refers smoke in the avionics bay, which is located below the cockpit, and is where the electronics are housed.
This is also the same plane that was vandalised two years ago at Cairo Airport. In Arabic someone, presumably Cairo Airport workers, wrote on its belly, “We will bring this plane down.”
It is a special concern that the plane had flown to Eritrea.
The US State Department has a standing travel warning for Eritrea, and is quoted as saying “security at the Asmara airport ‘can be unpredictable,’ and had a ‘lack of efficiency and consistency” in screening passengers.'”
The search for Egyptair is still underway.
On the search for Egyptair Flight MS804
According to AV:
“on 2016/06/01, Egypt’s Civil Aviation Authority reported “Laplace” located pings presumably from one of MS804’s black boxes. The vessel “John Lethbridge” of DOS will be joining the search team to retrieve the black boxes. The BEA (FR)confirmed that Egyptian Authorities have confirmed a “signal that may come from one of the recorders” of flight MS-804. The BEA did NOT confirm that a black box has been located.”
Debris has been found.
It is June 15, three days after Eritrea’s Nabo volcano erupted, and traffic is still being disrupted. Ethiopian Airlines announced flights to Northern Ethiopia, Dijbouti and Kartoum are still disrupted by the ash cloud, although their other flights are running smoothly. Care is being taken because the ash, which is mainly made up of silicates melts at about 1100°C and fuses inside the engine, often to catastrophic results.
