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Here is an updated summary of what we now know about EgyptAir flight MS804, which disappeared from radar at 2.30am local time (04.30 GMT) on Thursday morning.

So far no confirmed wreckage of the missing plane has been found.

• EgyptAir has rowed back on an earlier announcement that wreckage belonging to MS804 had been spotted in the Mediterranean, close to the Greek island of Karpathos. “We stand corrected,” the airline’s vice-president Ahmed Adel said. The debris “is not our aircraft”.
• The Egyptian navy, air force and army are currently searching the sea to the north of Egypt’s coast, with French, Greek, British and USsupport.
• Egypt’s aviation minister Sherif Fathy said terrorism was more likely than technical failure to be the cause of the crash.
• No group has claimed responsibility for downing the aircraft.
• The plane made “sudden swerves” before dropping off radar over the Mediterranean, reportedly making a 90-degree turn left, and dropping from 37,000 feet to 15,000 feet before swerving 360 degrees right.
• The plane was carrying 56 passengers and 10 crew: two cockpit crew, five cabin crew and three security personnel. The airline said two babies and one child were on board. Among the passengers were30 Egyptians, 15 French, two Iraqis, and one person each from the UK, Belgium, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Chad, Portugal, Algeria and Canada.
• EgyptAir says the captain – named as Mohamed Said Shoukair –has 6,275 flying hours, including 2,101 on the A320; the copilot,Mohamed Mamdouh Ahmed, has 2,766. The plane was manufactured in 2003.

Source: The Guardian