An EgyptAir plane flying to Cairo from Paris with 66 people on board lost communication with radar Thursday morning.
The airline issued a statement which says Flight MS804, operating an Airbus A320, took off from Charles de Gaulle airport at 11:09 p.m. with 56 passengers, 7 crew and 3 security personnel.
The carrier had said in its earlier statement that the total number of people aboard was 69. The plane went missing at about 2:45 a.m. Cairo time, and search and rescue operations were under way in the Mediterranean Sea, a spokeswoman at the nation’s civil aviation ministry said.
“EGYPTAIR has contacted the concerned authorities and bodies and inspection is underway through the rescue teams,” the airline informed.
At Athens airport, Air-traffic controllers made several attempts to to contact the captain, but failed to get a response, state-run Ahram Gate news website reported. Passengers on the aircraft were citizens of Egypt, France, Saudi Arabia and the U.K.
EgyptAir Flight MS804 took off from Europe and authorities there have been on high alert ever since terror attacks in Paris and Brussels.