On 31 October 2015, Metrojet Flight 9268 disintegrates in mid-air and crashes into the Sinai Peninsula during a routine chartered flight from Sharm El Sheikh International Airport to Pulkovo Airport, killing all 224 people on board.
Metrojet Flight 9268 was an international chartered passenger flight,operated by Russian airline Kogalymavia (branded as Metrojet). On 31 October 2015, at 06:13 local time EST (04:13 UTC), an Airbus A321-231 operating the flight exploded above the northern Sinai Peninsula following its departure from Sharm El Sheikh International Airport, Egypt en route to Pulkovo Airport, Saint Petersburg, Russia.All 224 passengers and crew on board were killed. The cause of the crash was most likely an onboard explosive device as concluded by Russian investigators.
Most of the people aboard the flight were tourists. There were 212 Russians, four Ukrainians, and one Belarusian passenger. There were also 7 crew members on board. Investigators believe that a bomb was put on the aircraft at Sharm El Sheikh, with the goal of causing airlines to suspend flights to that airport.
Shortly after the crash, the Islamic State's Sinai Branch, previously known as Ansar Bait al-Maqdis, claimed responsibility for the incident, which occurred in the vicinity of the Sinai insurgency.ISIL claimed responsibility on Twitter, on video, and in a statement by Abu Osama al-Masri, the leader of the group's Sinai branch. ISIL posted pictures of what it said was the bomb in Dabiq, its online magazine.
By 4 November 2015, British and American authorities suspected that a bomb was responsible for the crash.[18] On 8 November 2015, an anonymous member of the Egyptian investigation team said the investigators were "90 percent sure" that the jet was brought down by a bomb. Lead investigator Ayman al-Muqaddam said that other possible causes of the crash included a fuel explosion, metal fatigue, and lithium batteries overheating. The Russian Federal Security Service announced on 17 November 2015 that they were sure that it was a terrorist attack, caused by an improvised bomb containing the equivalent of up to 1 kilogram (2.2 lb) of TNT that detonated during the flight. The Russians said they had found explosive residue as evidence. On 24 February 2016, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi acknowledged that terrorism caused the crash.
In March 2020, an Egyptian appeals court ruled the crash was not an act of terrorism, and it dismissed lawsuits against government officials, Metrojet and Ingosstrakh. The appeals court ruled that the identities of the 224 victims had not been officially established and it was impossible to issue compensation to them as a result.
Aircraft
The aircraft was an 18-year-old Airbus A321-231, serial number 663. It first flew on 9 May 1997 and was delivered new to Middle East Airlines on 27 May 1997 with registration F-OHMP. In 2003, it was leased by Onur Air and, beginning in 2007, it was subleased to Saudi Arabian Airlines and other carriers and was registered as TC-OAE. In April 2012, Kolavia acquired the aircraft with a new registration of EI-ETJ and transferred it to Kogalymavia in May.
On 16 November 2001, while operating Middle East Airlines Flight 304, the aircraft suffered a tailstrike while landing in Cairo, Egypt. Neither the crew nor the passengers were injured, but the damage was severe. Within three months, the aircraft was repaired and returned to service.
At the time of the crash, the aircraft was owned by Dublin-based AerCap and leased to Kolavia. The aircraft had accumulated 56,000 flight hours on nearly 21,000 flights.
Crash
Flight 9268 left Sharm El Sheikh airport at 05:50 EST (03:50 UTC) for Pulkovo Airport in Saint Petersburg, Russia, with 217 passengers and seven crew members on board. The aircraft failed to make contact with Cyprus Air Traffic Control 23 minutes later.
The Islamic State's Sinai branch said that it brought down the airliner. Wassim Nasr, France 24's expert on jihadi movements, said that the IS group has never claimed an attack they did not commit.Russian media outlets said that the pilot reported technical problems and had requested a landing at the nearest airport before the A321 went missing. This claim was disputed by other sources, including the Egyptian authorities, and subsequent analysis of the flight recorder data confirmed that no distress or diversion request was given.The Egyptian Civilian Aviation Ministry issued a statement that indicated the flight was at an altitude of 31,000 ft (9,400 m) when it disappeared from radar screens after a steep descent of 5,000 ft (1,500 m) in one minute. Flightradar24 shows the aircraft climbing to 33,500 ft (10,200 m) at 404 kn (748 km/h; 465 mph) before suddenly descending to 28,375 ft (8,649 m) at 62 kn (115 km/h; 71 mph) approximately 50 km (31 mi; 27 nmi) north east of Nekhel, after which its position was no longer tracked.[39] A bomb exploded in the aircraft, causing uncontrolled decompression, and the aircraft disintegrated in mid-air.[additional citation(s) needed] All 224 passengers and crew died.
Reuters quoted an unnamed security officer as saying that the aircraft had been completely destroyed.Wreckage was scattered over 20 square kilometres (8 sq mi; 6 sq nmi), with the forward section about 5 kilometres (3.1 mi; 2.7 nmi) from the tail, indicating that the aircraft had broken up during flight. Aerial images of the wreckage broadcast on RT indicated that the wings were intact until impact. The debris pattern, combined with an initial interpretation of the aircraft's abrupt changes in altitude and airspeed, reinforced the presumption that the aircraft's tail separated during flight and fell separately.
Response
Unnamed Egyptian authorities indicated that the first parts of the wreckage had been located.Fifty ambulances were sent to the crash site near Housna, 300 kilometres (190 mi; 160 nmi) from Sharm El Sheikh. Unnamed Egyptian officials reported that the aircraft "split in two" and most bodies were found strapped to their seats. Initial reports indicated that voices of trapped passengers could be heard in a section of the crashed aircraft. At least 100 bodies were initially found, including at least five children.
Investigation
Ayman al-Muqaddam, the head of the central air traffic accident authority in Egypt, was appointed to investigate the cause of the crash. In a statement on 31 October, he indicated that the pilot had made contact with the civil aviation authorities and asked to land at the nearest airport. He suggested the aircraft may have been attempting an emergency landing at El Arish International Airport in northern Sinai. On the same day, Egyptian Civil Aviation Minister Hossam Kamel said that air traffic control recordings did not show any distress calls, nor change of route requests by the pilots. The President of Egypt, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, said that a probe of the crash would take months. Furthermore, on 31 October the International Charter on Space and Major Disasters was activated, providing for the humanitarian retasking of satellite assets.
The Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations sent three of its aircraft to the crash site. The Investigative Committee of Russia also started a legal case against Kogalymavia under legislation regulating "violation of rules of flights and preparations." Kogalymavia's employees were also questioned, along with those of the Brisco tour agency that had chartered the flight. Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry promised to work closely with Russian officials and investigators to find the cause of the accident. The aircraft had passed technical checks before taking off. Investigators would also view the security camera footage. Soon after the crash, Russia's regional transport prosecutors determined that the quality of fuel on the aircraft met required standards.
The aviation accident investigation agencies BEA (France), BFU (Germany), and AAIU (Ireland) participated in the investigation as representatives for the state of the aircraft's design, manufacture, and registration respectively. The BEA sent two investigators, accompanied by six representatives from Airbus, to Egypt on 1 November. According to the BEA, they joined two investigators from the BFU and four investigators from the Interstate Aviation Committee, their Russian counterpart, representing the state of the aircraft's operator.
Both the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder were recovered from the crash site on 1 November. Russian Transport Minister Maksim Sokolov and a team of specialist investigators arrived in Cairo to assist the Egyptian investigators in determining the cause of the crash. The flight data recorders were reported to be in good condition. On 4 November, Egypt's Civil Aviation Ministry Investigators reported that the cockpit voice recorder (CVR) was partially damaged and much work was required to extract data from it. The CVR indicated that everything was normal until a sudden disastrous event. An explosion or other sudden loud noise was heard very shortly before the recorder stopped recording.
The Egyptian search and rescue team had found 163 bodies by 1 November. As the search area widened, the Egyptian team found the body of a child about 8 kilometres (5 mi; 4 nmi) from the wreckage, indicating that the aircraft had broken up in mid-air, confirmed by Russian investigator Viktor Sorochenko.
An unnamed official quoted by Reuters said that Flight 9268's tail section separated from the main body of the fuselage and was burning, which could indicate an explosion. According to a senior US defence official speaking on 2 November, a US infrared satellite detected a heat flash at the time and place of the disaster, and the US intelligence community believed that it could have been an explosion on the aircraft, by either a fuel tank or a bomb and the satellite imagery also ruled out a missile attack. US Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said that there was not yet any "direct evidence of terrorist involvement".Some UK news outlets reported that an ISIL bomb was the most likely explanation for the crash.
Disruption to air traffic
All flights due to leave Sharm El Sheikh for Britain were delayed as a "precautionary measure" to allow experts to assess security. Emirates, Lufthansa and Air France–KLM announced they would avoid overflying the Sinai peninsula until the cause of the accident has been determined. The United States' Federal Aviation Administration had previously told carriers under its jurisdiction to operate above FL260 (26,000 feet [7,900 m]) while flying over Sinai. Germany's Luftfahrt-Bundesamt had told its airlines the same thing.[3] Air Arabia, Flydubai and British Airways also stopped their flights over the Sinai Peninsula in response to the crash. The latter stated that they planned to continue flights over Sinai, although the intended alternative route was not announced. EasyJet initially stated that they would not halt their flights to and from Sharm El Sheikh and Hurghada, but would actively review them; passengers who opted not to fly the route would be re-booked on another flight or given a flight voucher.
On 4 November, the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) changed their travel advice to advise against all but essential travel by air to Sharm El Sheikh. As a result, all British flights to and from the resort were cancelled from 4 November. On the same day, the Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) issued an order to all Irish airline operators not to operate to or from Sharm el‐Sheikh or fly over the Sinai Peninsula until further notice.
The decisions on 4 November by the British and Irish authorities to ground flights to and from Sharm El Sheikh came within minutes of each other.Patrick McLoughlin – UK Secretary of State for Transport – told Parliament that Ireland had investigators from the Air Accident Investigation Unit (AAIU) on the ground in Egypt reporting back to the Irish government, and the British and Irish governments have close security co-operation.
On the morning of 5 November Air France-KLM announced that it would not allow hold baggage on its flight out from Cairo that day; over half of the booked passengers refused to fly. There were an estimated 20,000 British citizens in Sharm El Sheikh on 5 November, almost half of whom were on holiday and stranded by the cancellation of flights. Flights to the UK were allowed again from 6 November, to enable people to travel home, but with restrictions and increased security measures. Passengers were permitted to travel home with only hand luggage, with hold luggage to be returned following a more stringent screening process. British officials at the airport provided extra security and approved aircraft as safe to travel.
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on 6 November that all Russian flights to and from Egypt were cancelled. Most British airlines serving the resort sent repatriation flights out to the resort to bring stranded British tourists back to the United Kingdom. On the afternoon of 6 November, Egyptian authorities placed restrictions on the number of flights due to overcrowding in the terminals; as a result, only eight of the planned 29 repatriation flights were able to leave on the day with various flights forced to divert or return to the UK whilst in the air.
By 8 November about 11,000 Russian tourists and about 5,300 British tourists had been flown back from the resort.
On 9 November, British airlines announced that all flights to the resort had been cancelled until at least 25 November. The British government and head of Emirates Airlines stated that airport security throughout the Middle East could be significantly overhauled as a result of the bombing.By 15 November, 16,000 British tourists had been flown back from the resort since the suspension of flights.
Aftermath
In March 2016, Metrojet filed for bankruptcy as a result of the bombing of Flight 9268 and the security situation in Egypt, both of which resulted in a subsequent fall in passenger numbers.
On 12 April 2018, flights between Russia and Egypt finally resumed. The flights, which are operated by both Aeroflot and EgyptAir, currently operate only between Moscow and Cairo.
Airports around the world tightened the security vetting for staff. About 70 employees lost their clearance to work in secure zones of Paris's Orly and Charles de Gaulle airports due to suspected extremist links.
On 8 August 2021, Russia removed its ban on flights to Egypt's resort cities.
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