Egypt Air flight MS804 crash: Airline says 'wreckage' found in search for plane in Mediterranean Sea -- Latest Updates

• Wreckage from an Egypt Air plane that crashed in the Mediterranean Sea has been found, the airline has said.
  A spokesperson said government officials had been informed of the discovery on Friday morning as searches for the Airbus A320 continued.
  “The Egyptian Ministry of Civil Aviation has just received an official letter from the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs declaring the finding of wreckage of the missing aircraft No. MS 804 near Karpathos Island,” a statement said.
  “Egypt Air sincerely conveys its deepest sorrow to the families and friends of the passengers on board.”

Medical charity the Egyptian Red Crescent says it is supporting relatives of the passengers.

A team of 11 counsellors are at Cairo Airport, where a crisis centre has been set up for families.  
Professor Moamena Kamel, Secretary General of Egyptian Red Crescent Society said:

All of us have been shocked by this tragic news, but for the Red Crescent, our immediate focus is on providing much needed support to the families and others who have been emotionally affected. Our teams will continue to provide psychosocial support in the days to come.”

• Debris found so far during the search for the missing Egypt Air flight MS804 does not belong to an aircraft, a senior Greek air safety official has said. Athanassios Binis, head of Greece's Air Accident Investigation and Aviation Safety Board, told state ERT TV "an assessment of the finds showed that they do not belong to an aircraft."

The vice president of Egypt Air, Ahmed Adel, has confirmed the airline's statement claiming wreckage had been found was incorrect.

We stand corrected on finding the wreckage because what we identified is not a part of our plane. So the search and rescue is still going on."

Despite widespread speculation that the plane's disappearance is terror-related, there has been no claim of responsibility.

There have been comparisons to the Metrojet crash on 31 October, which killed all 224 people on board. Isis' Egyptian affiliate, Wilayat Sinai, claimed responsibility for the disaster within hours of the plane going down in the Sinai Peninsula.

Supporters uploaded footage claiming to show the aircraft falling, while Isis released a propaganda statement celebrating the deaths of "Russian crusaders". The group later said it had planted a bomb on board.

Take a look at the footage of the search of the flight debris in the Mediterranean Sea here.

SOURCE: courtesy from INDEPENDENT UK