Erin Seils |
It has now been over a week since a plane crash during the flight from the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh to St. Petersburg, Russia on October 31st. There is still no solid evidence to prove that the plane was brought down because of a bomb, but this outcome is suspected by British and U.S. authorities as well as other countries.
The UK Prime Minister, David Cameron has said that the cause of the crash is “more likely than not a terrorist bomb”. If it turns out that an explosive device was the cause, this will be the first successful terrorist attack on a passenger jet in over a decade.
Metrojet Flight 9268 left Sharm el-Sheikh at approximately 03:58 GMT and hit the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt at around 04:20 GMT when the plane dropped off the radar without making the scheduled contact with the air traffic control located in Larnaca, Cyprus. Everyone onboard was killed. The majority of the 224 victims were of Russian nationality.
Although it is yet to be confirmed as to whether this was in fact a terrorist attack, the incident is being thoroughly investigated and flights going in and out of the southern edge of Sinai, an area popular with tourists, have been terminated by the Home Office for the time being.
An Egyptian group who claim to be affiliated with Islamic State have taken responsibility for carrying out an attack on Airbus A321, operated by Kogalymavia, a Russian airline. However, analysts are doubtful of this as neither IS nor their Egyptian associates are thought to have missiles with the capability to hit an aircraft with an altitude of 10,000 metres. According to data released by the website “Flightradar24” the plane reached the aforementioned height before plummeting at a speed of about 1800 metres per minute.
US officials have said that no formal judgement has been provided by the CIA or any other intelligence agencies as of yet and that forensic evidence from the crash site is still being analysed.
