A top American intelligence official has said that “no direct evidence” had yet emerged pointing to terrorism being involved in Saturday’s crash of a Russian Metrojet airliner in Egypt’s Sinai desert that killed all 224 people on board.
But adding to the continuing cloud of mystery surrounding the incident, James Clapper, the US director of national intelligence, said a terrorist attack could still not be ruled out.
Clapper’s comments came amid a day of contradictory statements, as claims by the airline’s operator that a technical fault could not be blamed were dismissed as premature by a senior Russian aviation official.
Russian officials have said the plane, carrying holidaymakers from Sharm el-Sheikh to St Petersburg, probably broke up in mid-air, but it was too early to say what caused it to crash, and investigators in Egypt had not begun sifting through the two flight recorders' data.
Addressing whether the Airbus A321 could have been brought down by Islamic State, as claimed in a video posted online, Clapper echoed the judgment of aviation and security experts who have suggested the group does not have a missile system capable of downing a jet flying at over 30,000ft. “It’s unlikely,” he told reporters, “but I wouldn’t rule it out.”
Search completed
The comments came as investigators continued to probe the cause of the crash, which occurred 20 minutes after take- off over Egypt’s northern Sinai – an area where Isis-affiliated militants are present – and as it was announced that rescuers had completed a search of the 20sq km crash site.
Russia’s investigative committee said 130 bodies and 40 body parts from the Metrojet plane crash in the Sinai have so far arrived in St Petersburg for identification.
Allegations over everything from the airworthiness of the aircraft to speculation that it was downed deliberately have been swirling since Saturday.
Clapper's comments came as the Irish Aviation Authority, where the plane was registered, said regulators there found its safety documentation in order earlier this year.
The Irish authority said it had conducted an annual review of the aircraft certifications in April/ May 2015 and found “all certifications were satisfactory at that point in time”.
Concerns about the airworthiness of the plane had heightened after it emerged that Metrojet had not paid its employees for at least two months. Representatives of the airline's owning company, Kogalymavia, insisted there were no financial problems that could have influenced flight safety.
Alexander Smirnov, the deputy general director of Metrojet, said the preliminary investigation had ruled out a technical fault. “We rule out a technical fault of the plane or a pilot error,” said Mr Smirnov. “The only explainable cause is physical impact on the aircraft.”
That claim was quickly contradicted by Alexander Neradko, the head of the Russian aviation agency – now in Cairo – who said it was premature of Metrojet to comment on the possible cause since investigators do not have enough data to reach any conclusions.
“The Egyptian commission is conducting the investigation, and is giving no records and transcripts, be it of the flight recorders or on-ground recorders or radar data, to anyone,” Mr Neradko told the Rossiya- 24 news channel, adding that the commission had yet to begin sifting through the data.
Contradicted
Mr Smirnov was also contradicted by a source in the Egyptian committee analysing the plane’s black box recorders, who told Reuters the plane had not been struck from the outside, as apparently suggested by the airline executive.
The source declined to give more details, but based his comments on the preliminary examination of the boxes.
Two of the few known facts regarding the disaster are the plane’s speed and altitude in the run-up to the crash. According to Mr Smirnov – and largely confirmed by a commercial air tracking service – the plane dropped 186mph in speed and about 5,000ft in altitude one minute before it crashed, having just reached its cruising altitude of around 32,000 feet.
“This isn’t flying, it’s falling. Apparently, the plane sustained damage before this [and] that became the reason for the fall,” Mr Smirnov said.
According to Mr Smirnov – and contradicting earlier comments attributed to Egyptian officials – the plane’s crew did not send a message saying there was an emergency on board or request permission to land at a nearby airfield. Mr Smirnov said this meant the plane had “completely lost operational capabilities when the catastrophic situation began to develop”. Passengers most likely died from stresses experienced after the plane broke up, he added.
A militant group affiliated to Islamic State claimed responsibility for bringing down the jet on the day of the crash, but Egypt and Russia disputed the claim, suggesting militants in northern Sinai did not have the weaponry to hit a flight at 9,000 metres (31,000ft).
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, who has not appeared in public since the plane went down, adopted a more active role on Monday. The Kremlin website published a photograph of him meeting his transport minister, Maksim Sokolov, who is leading the commission investigating the disaster.
Mr Putin called for "maximum attention" to be given to the families of the victims, declaring: "We are with you in heart and spirit," news agency Interfax reported. – (Guardian service)