Questions Remain Over What Happened To Egyptair Flight MS804

On Thursday afternoon, USA Today reported  that an international search and rescue effort led Egypt, Greece, and the United States (U.S.) found the wreckage of missing airliner Egyptair Flight MS804. The wreckage of missing Egyptair Flight MS804 was discovered near the Greek island of Karpathos, about 640 miles north of Egypt. While no cause for the flights demise has been made official, world leaders and media outlets believe it was a terrorist attack perpetrated by the Islamic State (IS).

Egyptair Flight MS804, was on route from Paris to Cairo with 56 passengers and 10 crew on board, Greek air traffic controllers said Captain Mohamed Shokeir was in good spirits, and thanked them as he was leaving Greek airspace around 2:24AM. However, Greek air traffic controllers noticed, as Egypt Air 804 entered Egyptian airspace around 2:45AM all communications ceased.

Air traffic controllers in Athens noticed the plane made two sharp turns before disappearing off the screen. Greek Defense Minister Panos Kammenos noted, “The plane made a 90 degree turn left and then a 360 degree turn right, dropped from 38,000 feet to 15,000 feet, and disappeared after it reached 10,000 feet.”

Egyptair Airlines noted that the captain of the downed plane had ample flying time on an Airbus A320, deemed one of the safest airplanes in the world.  Since it went into service in 1988, there have been 12 fatal incidents out of 98 million flights. All of the 12 fatal incidents were either pilot error or terrorism related. Egyptair Flight MS804 had accumulated 48,000 hours of flight time since 2003, considered normal for a plane of that age. That said, Egyptair has a long history of being involved in a number of incidents from deadly crashes and maintenance issues.  In 2009, a report from EU safety inspectors noted that Egypt Air had numerous “safety deficiencies” within its fleet. Later that year inspections found that Egypt Air had improved its overall safety, but there were still issues over maintenance and engineering of its fleet.

While Egyptair Flight MS804 made six stops prior to the disaster, authorities in France are questioning workers at its last stop, Charles De Gaulle Airport, a reflection of growing concerns about the safety of air travel thanks to suspected penetration of sensitive airport sites by employees sympathetic to jihad.

Last December, following the Paris attacks Augustin de Romanet, head of the Paris Aeroport Authority, noted that 4,000 employees had their lockers searched, and 70 of them lost their red cards and were terminated over terrorism concerns. Red cards granted airport employees access to restricted parts of the airport including access to the plane. Last October, six IS sympathizers working as baggage handlers at Sharm el-Sheikh Airport in Cairo, allegedly developed the explosives used to destroy Russian Metrojet 9268.

On March 22, 2016, IS members attacked the Brussels-Zaventem Airport in Brussels killing 32 people. Two of the suicide bombers Ibrahim el-Bakraoui and Najim Lachraoui had worked at the airport as a custodians. The Daily Mail reported that Brussels-Zaventem airport had 50 jihadist sympathizers among their employees.

U.S. airports have also seen breaches.  In 2015, multiple reports displayed security concerns at U.S. airports including hundreds of employee security badges from Hartfield and Dallas-Fort Worth airports went missing.  In addition, reports found 73 TSA workers in U.S. airports were found to have already been placed on the terror watch list, yet did not have their access to sensitive areas terminated.