CAIRO, 4 January 2004 — A charter plane taking French holidaymakers home from the Egyptian resort of Sharm El-Sheikh crashed into the Red Sea yesterday, killing all 135 passengers and 13 crew.
The Egyptian military sent helicopters and small patrol boats into the area where the Boeing 737 jet went down a little before 5 a.m., but the emergency teams found only bodies and body parts amid floating debris including suitcases.
French Deputy Transportation Minister Dominique Bussereau told reporters at Charles de Gaulle Airport outside Paris that the pilot of Flash Airlines Flight FSH604 detected problems shortly after takeoff and tried to turn back.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher said the crash “is not related to any terrorist act” and the Civil Aviation Ministry called it an “accident” apparently caused by a mechanical problem.
France said it was sending junior foreign minister Renaud Muselier to Cairo to coordinate investigations with the Egyptian authorities.
Nonetheless, Paris asked prosecutors to open a preliminary inquiry for manslaughter. The ministry said the request “does not prejudge in any way the causes of the catastrophe”, but simply provides a legal framework for French and Egyptian investigators as they conduct their probe. The request allows France to send investigators to the scene to work with their Egyptian counterparts, judicial sources said.
A French Foreign Ministry spokesman said that 133 of the people aboard were French tourists. A French Embassy official in Cairo said he had seen a list of people aboard that showed one Moroccan tourist and 13 crew members who were Egyptian and Moroccan. Another passenger’s nationality was not known.
The plane was heading for Cairo to refuel, change crew and take on more passengers before flying on to Paris.
“There’s lots of personal stuff, small bags and toys. We have collected very small pieces of the plane but the body of the plane has sunk,” said one rescue worker.
“The chances of finding complete bodies look slim because of the force with which the plane hit the surface of the water,” said Yasser Imam, a spokesman for the local authorities. Nine hours after the crash, parts of only four bodies could be retrieved.
The plane crashed in the Strait of Tiran, between the Sinai Peninsula and Saudi Arabia, where the water is hundreds of meters deep — too deep for divers to reach the flight recording devices, diving school managers said.
Civil Aviation Minister Ahmed Mohamed Shafiq Zaki said evidence from witnesses and equipment on the ground suggested the crew lost control shortly after takeoff because of a technical fault and crashed while trying to bring the plane back on course at low altitude.
Most of the vacationers had been on a tour organized by FRAM, one of France’s largest travel operators. Flash Airlines said in a statement that the wreckage was found about 13 km (8 miles) from the airport.
