So was it a bomb? Experts reveal Russian passenger plane which crashed and killed all 224 on board broke up at high altitude 

• Sergei Trukhachev spoke to his daughter minutes before taking off and expressed concerns about the jet's safety
• His wife Natalya told Russian television he believed the 'technical condition of the aircraft left much to be desired'
• Egyptian aircraft engineers said they spent 35 minutes with the aircraft before it took off at 3.50am yesterday 
• They claimed the aircraft was 'good' when it left, yet it broke up in mid-air only 23 minutes later killing 224 people
• See our full news coverage of Russia and the Russian plane crash at www.dailymail.co.uk/russia  

By Darren Boyle for MailOnline

Published: 08:11 EST, 1 November 2015 | Updated: 21:03 EST, 1 November 2015

Russian air crash investigators have confirmed that an Airbus A321 which vanished from radar some 23 minutes after taking off from Sharm el-Sheikh broke up at high altitude. 

Alexander Neradko, head of Russia's federal aviation agency, confirmed that the jet disintegrated at high altitude in a remote area where Egypt is fighting ISIS and Al Qaeda-backed terrorists. 

Mr Neradko refused to comment on the cause of the crash, claiming the investigation was ongoing, but terrorism experts believe that a bomb could have been responsible.

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Aviation sources claim the tail section of the aircraft shows evidence of 'the fuselage skin peeling outwards possibly indicative of a force acting outwards from within' - possibly a bomb - which could be linked to the earliest moments of the aircraft's disaster sequence

The co-pilot of the doomed Russian Airbus expressed concerns about the jet's safety with his daughter shortly before take off

The jet broke up in mid-air above territory in northern Sinai, Egypt which is home to Al Qaeda and ISIS-affiliated Islamic terrorists

Alexander Neradko, head of Russia's federal aviation agency confirmed that the jet disintegrated at high altitude in a remote area of Egypt

The jet, carrying 224 passengers and crew disappeared from radar screens 23 minutes after it left Sharm el-Sheikh, en-route to St Petersburg. Pictured: Debris from the Airbus can be seen scattered across a large swathe of remote Egyptian farmland after the crash

Most of the major components, starred, landed within a one-mile radius in two large debris fields, but smaller parts and bodies have been recovered from more than five miles from the main impact zones suggest that the aircraft broke up at a high altitude 

Russian investigators have released satellite imagery showing the two main debris zones which are almost a mile apart 

Russian investigators said the fact large sections of the aircraft are so far apart is evidence of an in-flight break up

Professor Michael Clarke, Director General of the Royal United Services Institute told BBC Radio Five Live: 'There’s no sign of a distress call, so the idea that the aircraft was undergoing an mechanical problem, or an engine problem, or a fire, or something like that, you would expect that there would be some sort of distress call beforehand.

‘So the fact that there was a catastrophic failure at 31,000 feet, with the aircraft falling in two pieces, suggests to me an explosion on board. So was this caused by some form of terrible accident, which is unlikely, or a bomb, which is much more likely, my mind is moving in that direction rather than anything that happened on the ground.'

Prof Clarke said the area was in an area with large numbers of Islamic terrorists and is not under the full control of the Egyptian government.

He said: 'But also it is a transit area because there are a great many weapons coming over from Libya, because of the Libyan revolution in 2011. About 600 arms dumps were left open and unguarded. These arms dumps are weapons that Colonol Gaddafi had and those weapons are just moving around the Middle East, so a lot of them end up going through Sinai on their way to Syria and other places. 

'So it is a very difficult area and it is an area in which, I have to say, government writ simply does not run. Despite being in Egyptian territory, the government in Cairo does not have much control about what goes on there.

‘It does look coincidental, but the technical issue is an important one. This aircraft was 200km north of its take-off zone, that means it was flying at around 31,000 feet. Terrorists, as far as we know, don’t have equipment to take down an aircraft at that height. They have shoulder-launched missiles, known as man-portable missiles. They can get aircraft when they are taking off or landing, when they are going low and slow. But anything above 8,000 or 9,000 feet is out of the range of the weapons that they’ve got.

‘Now, an aircraft at that height was brought down last year, of course, while over Ukraine, but that was using, almost certainly, Russian official army equipment, a BUK missile, which are designed as anti-aircraft missiles against military aircraft. There is no sign that the jihadists in the Middle East have got hold of any of that equipment.  

An Egyptian engineer claimed he checked the aircraft for 35 minutes before it took off and did not find any technical problems

Air crash examiners are trying to map the debris field to help determine the exact sequence of events and discover what went wrong

Amid the wreckage of the crashed jet is a small pink girls' shoe belonging to one of the 25 children who perished in the disaster

Egyptian troops gathered the belongings of passengers and crew from the crashed jet which was strewn across a nine-mile are

'So it is very hard to think that this plane was brought down by terrorist action from the ground, on the other hand, early reports said it split into two and that suggests a catastrophic failure, not a mechanical failure, but perhaps an explosion on board, so I would be much more inclined to think, if we have to guess at this stage, it is much more likely to have been a bomb on board than a missile fired from the ground.

‘And there’s no sign of a distress call, so the idea that the aircraft was undergoing an mechanical problem, or an engine problem, or a fire, or something like that, you would expect that there would be some sort of distress call beforehand.

‘So the fact that there was a catastrophic failure at 31,000 feet, with the aircraft falling in two pieces, suggests to me an explosion on board. So was this caused by some form of terrible accident, which is unlikely, or a bomb, which is much more likely, my mind is moving in that direction rather than anything that happened on the ground.

The co-pilot of the aircraft complained about the safety of the jet on the morning of the disaster.

Sergei Trukhachev was speaking to his daughter before he departed at 3.50am yesterday. The jet, carrying 224 passengers and crew disappeared from radar screens 23 minutes after it left Sharm el-Sheikh, en-route to St Petersburg.

The aircraft was flying at 31,000 feet when it plummeted at 6,000 feet per minute and broke up in mid-air scattering debris over more than a five-mile radius.

Head of the crash investigation Viktor Sorochnko said: 'The disintegration happened in the air and the fragments are strewn over a large area.' It is understood that the jet started breaking up at very high altitude.  

Russian TV quoted Natalya Trukacheva, wife of the co-pilot who said their daughter 'called 'called him up before he flew out. He complained before the flight that the technical condition of the aircraft left much to be desired'.  

Russian minister for civil defence Vladimir Andreevich toured the scene disaster scene as a helicopter gunship monitored from above

Some parts of the debris suffered extensive fire damage, while others show no evidence of any inferno proving an in-flight break up 

A life jacket is left strewn on the desert floor only a few yards away from some badly charred wreckage  

An Egyptian man lays a flower in the centre of the debris field to honour the 224 victims who died in the tragedy  

However, the aircraft, pictured here leaving Moscow last month, suffered serious damage to its tail following an incident in 2001

Aircraft today appear to be routing around the northern Sinai region heading further west over the Suez straights and Cairo 

An Egyptian aircraft engineer said he spent more than half-an-hour with the Airbus before it departed at 3.50am. 

He said: 'He are all shocked. It was a good plane. Everything checked out in 35 minutes.' He admitted the same aircraft was forced to abort a takeoff three months ago due to a technical issue, but 'that's almost routine though' 

The aircraft, which was delivered in 1997, had flown more than 56,000 flight hours during 21,000 flights.

However, in November 2001, while flying into Cairo, the aircraft suffered a serious tail strike while landing.

According to a report on Flight Global, on November 16 2001 the aircraft struggled to keep to the glide slope as it approached Cairo airport.  

The incident report said: 'Following a daylight instrument landing approach on which the aircraft had diverged both above and below the glide slope, which had led the pilot to make large manual corrections. The aircraft suffered a hard tail-strike on landing, causing serious damage. 

'Passengers disembarked normally at the gate.'  

The jet was repaired and returned to service but air crash investigators will try and determine whether the damage from 2001 weakened the airframe and led to its mid-air break up.

Russians light candles near The Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow in memory of the victims who died when the Airbus crashed

Dozens of candles outside the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow, Russia, pay tribute to the 224 onboard the doomed MetroJet

Families and those young and old gathered in Moscow tonight to leave flowers, teddies and candles in memory of those who died

Dozens of Russians gathered in front of a memorial paying tribute to the victims who were on board the jet when it came down over Sinai

Children lit candles and placed them in a memorial in the centre of St. Petersburg in Russia this evening in memory of those who died

Russian airline regulators have grounded Metrojet's fleet of Airbus A321s following yesterday's crash. The air safety agency said Metrojet needs to thoroughly analyse the situation and weigh all risks before a decision is made tomorrow on whether to allow the airline to resume flights.

The airline insisted that all its aircraft were serviced 'in a timely manner' and tested before take off. The airline also said it could not doubt the professionalism of the pilot and crew of the jet.

Egyptian authorities have extended the current search zone to nine miles after they recovered the body of a three-year-old girl some five miles from the main debris field.  

Flight tracking information showed the aircraft took off from Sharm el-Sheikh at 3.50am yesterday and stopped broadcasting data at 4.13am. Egyptian authorities located the wreckage in a remote region about 40 miles south of Arish around 8.30am.

Commenting on the disaster, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said: 'This is a complicated matter and requires advanced technologies and broad investigations that could take months.' 

Parts of the aircraft were scattered over a wide distance with Egyptian authorities expanding the search area to some nine miles

Egyptian and Russian air crash experts will be joined by their French counterparts because the Airbus was manufactured in France

Two teams of Russian crash investigators have arrived in Egypt and have begun working on the site in a bid to discover what happened

Egyptian security officials have placed the crash zone under heavy guard because of the presence of ISIS and Al Qaeda elements

Large sections of the fuselage have been spread over a wide area with bodies found some five miles from the main zone 

The aircraft was flying at 31,000 feet when it got into difficulties and crashed without the pilot broadcasting a mayday call or setting emergency code on his transponder, which warns air traffic controllers and other aircraft of a difficulty. 

However, on May 25, 2002 a Boeing 747 operated by China Airways disintegrated in mid air after departing Chiang Kai-shek International Airport. 

Air crash investigators discovered that 22 years earlier, the aircraft suffered a significant tail strike and was repaired incorrectly. That repair failed as the aircraft reached 35,000 feet, killing all 206 passengers and 19 crew on board. 

Another Egyptian official had previously said that before the plane lost contact with air traffic controllers the pilot had radioed and said the aircraft was experiencing technical problems and that he intended to try and land at the nearest airport, although the aircraft did not broadcast a mayday signal before it crashed. 

As a result of the disaster, ISIS has claimed responsibility for bringing down the jet, but this has been dismissed by Russia's transport minister and Egyptian authorities. 

Despite the assurances, major airlines have begun avoiding the northern Sinai region due to the threat posed by Islamic militants. 

UK-based airlines were warned not to fly through the region at a height lower than 25,000 feet due to the threat posed by 'dedicated anti-aircraft weaponry'.   

Dubai-based Emirates, the Middle East's largest carrier, said on Sunday it has stopped flying over Egypt's Sinai until more is known about the crash of the Russian airliner.

'The burning plane': ISIS yesterday released a video purporting to show the moment the burning Airbus A321 plummeted through the sky before hitting the ground. The horrific footage - which was posted online and cannot be verified by MailOnline - shows a large structure resembling a plane falling through the air (left), before being consumed by a mass of smoke (right) and eventually splitting in two (right)

The aircraft's nosecone, pictured, broke away from the rest of the cockpit during the violent disintegration as the jet plummeted down 

Egyptian authorities guarded some of the personal belongings of the flight's victims which were strewn across the desert

It joins two major European airlines, Germany's Lufthansa and Air France, that announced following the crash Saturday that they would immediately stop flying over Sinai for safety reasons until the cause of the crash was determined.

Russian Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov and Emergencies Minister Vladimir Puchkov arrived in Egypt late Saturday to join their Egyptian counterparts overseeing the investigation at the crash site, a remote mountainous region in northern Sinai. Authorities had already recovered the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder. 

Also joining the effort on Sunday were officials from France's BEA accident investigation agency, involved because the Airbus A321-200 jet was designed in France. The team included two BEA investigators and six technical advisers from Airbus. The BEA said the team would be joined by two investigators from its German counterpart BFU, because the plane was manufactured in Germany, and four investigators from its Russian counterpart MAK, because the plane was operated by a Russian company.

Two Russian teams of search and rescue experts have also arrived in Egypt and were headed to the crash site to assist in the recovery of bodies. 

Parts of the fuselage clearly showed evidence of fire from among the twisted sections of aluminium  scattered across the wasteland

This section of wing, which would have contained a large amount of fuel was badly burned as the jet broke up at high altitude 

ISIS tried to claim responsibility for the plane crash which claimed the lives of some 220 mostly Russian passengers and crew suggesting their action was in response to Russia's decision to bomb Islamic fighters in Syria in a bid to prop up Basher al-Assad's regime

An Egyptian Apache gunship helicopter patrolled over the crash scene to protect rescuers from any insurgent attacks  

Russian investigators examined the scene in incredibly close detail looking for the smallest clue which could solve the mystery

So far, only 163 bodies of the 224 people on board have been recovered. As a result, authorities are expanding the search perimeter to nine miles.

An Egyptian security official said: 'We found a three-year-old girl eight kilometres from the scene.' He said many of the bodies are missing limbs. 

It comes as it has emerged that the burning Airbus A321 did not lodge an SOS call before it plummeted to he ground in the restive Sinai Peninsula. 

Egypt's civil aviation minister Hossam Kamal said communications between the pilot and air traffic controllers were 'normal' ahead of the disaster.

'There was nothing abnormal... and the pilot didn't ask to change the plane's route,' he said, adding that the controllers recorded no distress calls.

His comments contradicted earlier claims that the pilot had reported technical difficulties and made clear his intention to land at the nearest airport. 

Family and friends were yesterday pictured grieving for their loved ones - as harrowing images of the plane's mangled wreckage were released.

The photos were distributed by the office of Egyptian Prime Minister Sharif Ismail, who visited the crash site following the devastating crash.

They show the destroyed interior of the Irish-owned aircraft, which split apart upon impact, killing 192 adults, 25 children and seven crew members.

Yesterday afternoon, officials said they had recovered the aircraft's black box, which is now being examined to determine the cause of the crash. 

Egyptian authorities have almost doubled the search area to find the remains of victims and any missing parts of the aircraft  

Egyptian security forces discovered the wreckage in a remote area in an area containing many ISIS-affiliated terrorists

Remains: This evening, the prime minister's office said: 'The black box was recovered from the tail of the plane and has been sent to be analysed by experts.' Above, Mr Ismail (far right, in a black suit) is seen looking at the remains of the crashed passenger jet in Hassana

Recorder: In this image released by the Prime Minister's office, Mr Ismail, third right, observes the plane's flight data recorder with officials

The Irish-registered jet, EI-ETJ broke up at high altitude according to Russian officials who are assisting Egyptian authorities 

Egyptian authorities have removed the first bodies from the scene by a military Chinook helicopter to Kabrit airport in Suez, pictured

Last night, the prime minister's office said: 'The black box was recovered from the tail of the plane and has been sent to be analysed by experts.'

It added that more than 45 ambulances have been dispatched to the crash site, with rescuers having recovered 129 victims' bodies so far.

The jet, which was leased by a Russian airline and carrying package holiday passengers back to St Peterburg in northern Russia, plummeted to the ground less than 25 minutes after it took off from the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheik. It crashed in the Hassana area, south of Arish, officials said. 

Its passengers included a 10-month-old baby girl flying home with her parents, as well as two siblings aged two and three. Numerous other children aged under 11 also perished in the disaster, according to a manifest of passengers published by the Association of Tour Operators of Russia. 

The victims' bodies were spread over a three-mile radius, according to reports. 

Security forces discovered the plane wreckage in a remote mountainous area in a region containing many ISIS-affiliated terrorists.

Ismail told reporters that experts will 'start examining the information in the plane's black box, and based on this we will study the causes of the crash'.

He also expressed scepticism about ISIS's claim that it carried out the attack in response to Russian strikes in Syria.

Egyptians took to the streets yesterday to express solidarity with the 25 Russian children who died in yesterday's horrific plane crash

In Moscow, the Russian presidential banner flew at half-mast after Vladimir Putin declared a national day of mourning for the victims

The ISIS statement read: 'The soldiers of the caliphate succeeded in bringing down a Russian plane in Sinai.'

However, Islami claimed: 'Experts have affirmed that technically planes at this altitude cannot be shot down, and the black box will be the one that will reveal the reasons for the crash,' according to state news agency MENA.

Russian transport minister Maksim Sokolov also dismissed the ISIS claims. He said: 'This information cannot be considered accurate. We are in close contact with our Egyptian colleagues and aviation authorities in the country. At present, they have no information that would confirm such insinuations.' 

Neither official mentioned the terror group's video purporting to show the falling plane. 

While the use of a surface-to-air missile has been dismissed as a potential cause of the crash by officials, an on-board bomb could be a possibility. 

Yesterday, German airline Lufthansa said they will no longer fly over the Sinai peninsula 'as long as the cause for [the] crash has not been clarified'. A spokeswoman for the airline said that 'security is our highest priority' claiming that they would use detours to service airports in the region.

Air France has also confirmed that it will not be flying through the Sinai until the reasons behind the crash become clear.  

A spokesperson told AFP the measure was taken 'as a precaution' while 'clarification' was sought over the cause of the incident. 

And today, it was reported that British Airways has ordered its pilots to avoid low flying over Egypt in the wake of the crash.

Hundreds of flights, carrying British passengers to tourist hot spots such as Sharm el-Sheikh, will continue to fly over the region.

But pilots have been secretly told to be more cautious about their altitude amid concerns of a terror attack,The Sun reports.

The maximum height that a surface-to-air missile could strike is generally thought to be around 25,000 feet.

Most of the bodies recovered from the crash site have been burned. At the time, the aircraft would have been carrying a very heavy fuel load.

Ayman al-Mugadem of the Aviation Incidents Committee said the pilot warned air traffic controllers that aircraft had developed 'a technical problem'  and he needed to land as soon as possible. 

However, he then lost contact with controllers - and the plane vanished from radar screens, he said.

Al-Mugadem's comments were later contradicted by Kamal, who insisted communications were 'normal' before the crash. 

According to radar data, the aircraft was descending at more than 6,000 feet per minute shortly before the impact. 

A statement from an ISIS-linked group being broadcast on jihadist propaganda channels said: 'A Russian plane was dropped with the destruction of more than 220 Russian Crusaders, thankfully.' 

However, the aircraft vanished from radar screens at 30,000 feet, more than double the effective range of a shoulder-carried ground-to-air weapon system.

The group known as A3'Maq News used the headline: 'fighters of the Islamic State down a Russian passenger plane in the sky over the Egyptian Sinai.'

It quoted a source as saying: 'This operation came in response to raids by Russian planes that have caused the deaths of hundreds of Muslims on Syrian territory, most of them women and children.'

The head of Egypt's civil aviation authority, Mahmud al-Zinati. said there were 'many dead' including 17 children. Officials said 214 of the passengers were Russians with three Ukrainians on board.

Adel Mahgoub, chairman of the state company that runs Egypt's civilian airports, said the plane had successfully undergone technical checks at Sharm el-Sheikh's airport before taking off. 

He said experts were going there to view security camera footage of the Metrojet plane at the airport. 

The aircraft was leased by Kogalymavia. Airline spokeswoman Oxana Golovina  said the airline's pilot Valery Nemov had more than 12,000 hours of flying experience with 3,860 on the Airbus A321.

She said: 'Our aircraft was in full working order, our crew was experienced, our pilot had a great deal of flying experience, so we don't know (what caused the crash).' They stressed that human error was not at fault for the crash.  

The aircraft was manufactured in 1997 and has been operated by Metrojet since 2012. Since leaving the Airbus factory it has flown some 56,000 flight hours completing almost 21,000 journeys.  

Russia's state transport regulator Rostransnadzor found violations when it last conducted a routine flight safety inspection of Kogalymavia

But after the inspection, which took place in March 2014, the airline addressed the safety concerns.  

An Egyptian soldier stands guard over a section of one of the aircraft's jet engines which was ripped off during the crash 

A Russian investigator looks closely at a large section of fuselage to inspect the nature of damage which led to the disaster 

However, the RIA Novosti news agency said that the pilot's had expressed concerns about one of the aircraft's engines. 

A source told the agency: 'This board (crew) had several times requested help from technical services due to an engine not starting up several times this week.

'Russian president Vladimir Putin has ordered his own team of experts to the crash site to determine the cause of the disaster. 

He has also declared a day of national mourning. 

He has already sent five aircraft to Egypt to assist with the investigation. 

The first of his team arrived in Cairo last night before heading to the crash scene today.

The Israeli Defence Forces confirmed they had intelligence assets in the region at the time of the crash. According to a statement: 'Since this morning the IDF assisted with aerial surveillance in the efforts to locate the Russian airplane that lost contact over the Sinai Peninsula. 

'The IDF has offered continued assistance to both Russia and Egypt if required.'

The wreckage was found roughly 60 miles south of the North Sinai town of El-Arish, Egyptian officials said.

'Military planes have discovered the wreckage of the plane... in a mountainous area, and 45 ambulances have been directed to the site to evacuate dead and wounded,' a cabinet statement said.

One official at the scene said: 'I now see a tragic scene. A lot of dead on the ground and many died whilst strapped to their seats. The plane split into two, a small part on the tail end that burned and a larger part that crashed into a rock. We have extracted at least 100 bodies and the rest are still inside.' 

The Egyptian Aviation Ministry said there were 63 men and 138 women on board. The victims range in age from ten-months old to 77.  

Yulia Zaitseva said her friends, a newlywed couple named Elena Rodina and Alexqander Krotov, were on the flight. Both were 33. 

Zaitseva said her friend 'really wanted to go to Egypt, though I told her "why the hell do you want to go to Egypt?" She added: 'We were friends for 20 years. She was a very good friend who was ready to give everything to other people. To lose such a friend is like having your hand cut off.'

She said Rodina's parents feel 'like their lives are over.' 

The bodies of the first victims have arrived at the Zeinhom morgue in Cairo where they will undergo a postmortem examination

The official said the plane was flying at an altitude of 30,000 feet when communication was lost.

A senior official in Egypt air traffic control said that the pilot told him in their last communication that he was having trouble with the plane's radio system.

Russian aviation official Sergei Lzvolsky told Interfax news agency that the Kogalymavia Russian airline had departed Sharm el-Sheikh at 5:51 am local time.

He said the Airbus 321 did not make contact as expected with air traffic controllers in Cyprus.

Reports suggest the pilot was attempting an emergency landing at El-Arish international Airport. 

The aircraft took off from Sharm el-Sheikh at 3.51GMT and was due to land in St Petersburg at 09:12GMT.

The Russian Investigative Committee has launched its own probe and is looking for possible 'violations of flight safety procedures'.  

Russia's Investigative Committee, the country's top investigative body, has opened an investigation into the crash of a Russian passenger jet in Egypt's Sinai peninsula for possible violations of flight safety procedures.

Hundreds of grieving relatives arrived at the airport in St Petersburg where they were told there were no survivors following the crash

Russian crash experts are on their way to the scene to find answers for the families stunned by news of this morning's tragic crash

Russian president Vladimir Putin has announced that he is sending his own team of crash investigators to the scene of the disaster

As well as launching his own investigation, President Putin has announced that tomorrow will be a national day of morning in Russia

The aircraft took off from Sharm el-Sheik on the Red Sea and was on a flight to St Petersburg in Northern Russia when it crashed 

Committee spokesman Sergei Markin made the announcement in a statement yesterday.

Egyptian authorities confirmed that 'casualties' were being evacuated to local hospitals.

The aircraft is believed to have broken into two sections after the jet crashed. 

Early reports said that the bodies of five children have been recovered, still strapped to their seats. 

According to Flight Radar 24, the jet was plunging at 5,760 feet per minute when it lost contact with air traffic controllers.

Reports suggest the pilot had warned air traffic controllers of a technical issue on board the aircraft.

Weather conditions were said to be poor at the time of the crash. 

The jet was carrying 214 Russian passengers and three Ukrainians according to Egyptian authorities with a Russian crew of seven 

The aircraft went missing some 23 minutes after take off in a remote region in northern Sinai, pictured, according to local authorities 

According to flight data trackers, the aircraft plunged rapidly and lost speed before it lost radar contact

Egyptian prime minister Sharif Ismail, pictured, has formed an emergency committee to deal with the crash

Russian media claimed that pilots on the doomed jet had complained earlier this week about engine problems and it is reported they may have sought to divert the aircraft before it plunged to the earth. 

The aircraft suffered a 'tail strike' in November 2001 as it attempted to land at Cairo International Airport from Beirut according to an aviation safety website.  

The Egyptian prime minister Sharif Ismail said: 'Russian civilian plane... crashed in the central Sinai.'

His office confirmed that a cabinet level crisis committee has been established to deal with the crisis.

It is understood that the aircraft had just taken off on a four-hour flight to St Petersburg when it went missing shortly after take off. 

The Airbus A321-231 is believed to have been manufactured in 1997 and is owned by a Dublin-based company.    

AIRBUS STATEMENT ON THE CRASH 

Airbus regrets to confirm that an A321-200 operated by Metrojet was involved in an accident shortly after 6:17 local time (04:17 GMT) over the Sinai Peninsula today.

 The aircraft was operating a scheduled service, Flight 7K-9268 from Sharm el Sheikh (Egypt) to St. Petersburg (Russia).

The concerns and sympathy of the Airbus employees go to all those affected by this tragic accident of Flight 7K-9268.

The aircraft involved in the accident, registered under EI-ETJ (pictured right) was MSN (Manufacturer Serial Number) 663, was produced in 1997 and since 2012 operated by Metrojet. The aircraft had accumulated some 56000 flight hours in nearly 21000 flights. It was powered by IAE-V2500 engines. At this time no further factual information is available.

In line with ICAO annex 13, an Airbus go-team of technical advisors stands-by ready to provide full technical assistance to French Investigation Agency – BEA – and to the Authorities in charge of the investigation.

The A321-200 is the largest member of the Airbus twin-engine A320 Family seating up to 240 passengers. The first A321 entered service in January 1994. By the end of September 2015, some 6500 A320 Family aircraft were in service with over 300 operators. To date, the entire fleet has accumulated some 168 million flight hours in some 92.5 million flights.

Airbus will make further factual information available as soon as the details have been confirmed and cleared by the authorities for release.

The aircraft went down in an area where pilots are warned against flying at less than 24,000 feet because of the danger of 'dedicated anti-aircraft weapons'.  

The probe into the crash is being headed by Ayman Al-Mokadem according to Ahram.org. 

He said the pilot had requested a diversion before the incident for a 'technical failure'. 

He claimed the pilot had asked for the nearest airport and may have been heading to Al-Arish in northern Sinai. 

Reports from local journalists claim that local tribesmen near the remote crash site claimed that the aircraft was 'burning' as it fell from the sky. 

US Secretary of State John Kerry offered his condolences during a visit the former Soviet republic of Kyrgyzstan. 

He said: 'We don't know any details about it, but obviously the initial reports represent tremendous tragedy, loss, and we extend our condolences to the families and all those concerned.'  

POIGNANT PHOTOGRAPHS OF SOME OF THE 224 VICTIMS OF THE METROJET PLANE CRASH HAVE EMERGED 

Olga Sheina, pictured, was among those who died on board the doomed passenger jet which crashed yesterday

Heart-breaking: This 10-month-old baby (pictured, left, gazing out of an airport window ahead of the disaster) was among those killed - as were Aleksei Gromov and his wife Tatiana (both right). It is unclear whether Mrs Gromov was pregnant at the time of the deadly crash

Haunting images: Viktoria Sevryukova (pictured, left, in an Instagram snap) also perished in the crash - as did Yury Shein and his young daughter Anastasia (pictured, right, boarding the Metrojet aircraft not long before it plummeted to the ground, killing everyone on board)

Yulia Buleyeva, pictured, was on her way home to St Petersburg from Sharm el-Sheikh when the jet developed a technical fault and crashed

Alena Moiseeva, pictured, aged five, was among 17 children who were killed with the jet crashed 60 miles south of el-Arish in Sinai

Teenager Maria Ivleva (left) also died in yesterday's disaster - as did Valeria Kantcerova (right)

Aleksandra Illarionova, pictured, also died on the aircraft, which was leased by Kogalymavia. Little Anton Bogdanov, right, was also killed

Valeria Bogdanova, left and Anastasia Bogdanova were both among the 220 victims as a major investigation is launched into the crash

Elena Moiseeva, 39, pictured, was among the victims. Russian and Egyptian authorities have agreed to jointly investigate the claim

Denis Glidyaev, 33, left, and Yulia Gerasina, 42, also lost their lives in the tragedy which has been claimed by an ISIS affiliate

Aleksandr Semenov, left, and Aleksei Sayapin were killed when the jet broke up in mid air and plummeted to the ground 

Armen Vishnev, left, and Anna Tishinskaya, right, were both killed in the disaster 

Aleksandra Panina, left, Alla Radlevich, right, both perished with the Metrojet they were flying on was destroyed shortly after take off

Evgeny Shulginov and his three-year-old son Kirill (right, and together left) were among those who died in the Russian plane crash

Olga Shulginova with her son Kirill, who were both killed in the crash, alongside husband and father Evgeny Shulginov

Dmitri Orleansky (left) and Nadezhda Ponomareva (right) died when the Airbus A321 disintegrated and crashed 23 minutes after take-off

Evgenia Vinogradskaya (left) and Roman Pulyanov (right) were also among those killed in the tragedy which occurred on Saturday

Vlada Sakerin (left) and newlyweds Ilya Sakerin and wife Vlada Vkontakte (together right on their wedding day) also died in the crash

Nellya Pyatochenko (left) and Irina Sokolova (right) also died in the tragedy which occurred just 23 minutes after take-off from Egypt

Tatyana Panina (left) and Nataliya Sayapina (right) were also among those to be killed when the plane came down over Egypt yesterday

Tourist hot spot that's a soft target, by John R. Bradley

A passenger jet plummets from the sky, killing all 224 on board. Islamic State gloats that it is to blame. 

No wonder thousands of Britons planning winter holidays in the hugely popular tourist destination of Sharm El Sheikh – with its famed five-star hotels and year-round sun – are pondering whether they should cancel their plans.

Though a number of British and European airlines are taking unprecedented steps to avoid flying over the Sinai Peninsula where Sharm is located, there have been strenuous denials from both the Russian and Egyptian authorities that the plane was brought down deliberately.

It seems those airlines are worried this may yet prove to have been a terrorist attack – the opening salvo, perhaps, of the swift revenge promised by IS for Russia’s month-long bombing campaign in Syria in support of their enemy President Bashar al-Assad.

Russian Minister Vladimir Puchkov (pictured third from left) inspects the crash site of the Russian passenger jet in Sinai, Egypt, yesterday

All 226 passengers and crew on board the Airbus A321 were killed when it disintegrated at a high altitude over Egypt early on Saturday

Notwithstanding Russia’s infamous record for poor aviation safety, with an accident rate more than three times the average, almost all experts have discounted the possibility of a technical fault causing such a devastating mid-air disintegration while the plane was on autopilot and so soon after take-off.

And, contrary to initial reports, there was no SOS distress signal sent from the cockpit and the plane had not diverted towards the Egyptian capital Cairo to make an emergency landing.

A cynic would argue that the Egyptian government, the only Arab regime to back Russia’s campaign in Syria, will do whatever it takes to protect a tourism industry already decimated by fears of terrorist attacks. And that includes putting out deliberately confusing and contradictory information, until media interest dies down and an investigation is allowed to drag on for months.

There is no denying, though, that it would be an extraordinary coincidence for a Russian plane inexplicably to fall from the sky over Sinai. 

This area, just a few hours’ drive from the Sharm resort and bordering the Gaza Strip, has for years been the centre of a little-reported but ferocious Islamist insurgency against the Egyptian regime, led by heavily armed local terrorists who have pledged allegiance to IS.

It was from here that terrorists who bombed hotels in the Sinai town of Taba in 2004, killing dozens, originated. 

Their fellow fighters have since grown in strength, killing hundreds of Egyptian soldiers, police and judges, and even reportedly downing an Egyptian fighter jet. 

Suicide bombs, roadside bombs, light weapons and truck-mounted anti-aircraft guns are the weapons of choice, and a state of military emergency and night-time curfews pass for normality in the area. 

The situation was made even more dangerous after the fall of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, when massive caches of weapons from Libya made their way into Egypt.

Soon, they were flooding the black markets in Sinai, including many of the estimated 20,000 shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles that Gaddafi’s government had amassed. Ironically they are Russian-made, and their range is more than 10,000ft, meaning that potentially they could down a passenger liner.

A woman lights a candle in Simferopol, on the Crimean peninsula, on November 1 in memory of the victims of the Russian plane crash

Russia is currently mourning its biggest ever air disaster after all 226 people on board the Metrojet Flight KGL9268 were killed in the crash

This, presumably, is why the UK Department for Transport issued its warning to British pilots about the dangers of flying low over the region.

Following an unprecedented assault by Egyptian soldiers on terrorist strongholds earlier this year, most of the IS fighters fled with their weapons to the nearby hills – exactly where the Russian plane disintegrated. While they cannot be certain, terrorism experts doubt that these fighters somehow acquired more advanced surface-to-air missiles than those bought from Libya, which do not have the range needed to down an aircraft flying at well above 20,000ft.

Yesterday, a video purporting to show the plane being blown from the sky was dismissed as fake even by the Sinai-based IS group which took credit for the attack. 

That, though, leaves another – just as terrifying – possibility: that a jihadist sympathiser managed to sneak a bomb on to the plane at Sharm El Sheikh. Tellingly, when IS’s media channel claimed responsibility, it did not specify how the attack was carried out.

The Egyptian government has poured massive resources into securing its vital tourism sector. But the country is one of the most corrupt in the world and is still reeling from the chaos brought about by the 2011 uprising against former president Hosni Mubarak.

Flowers and teddy bears lay in front of the Russian embassy in Cairo, Egypt, to commemorate victims of the Russian airplane crash

Stuffed animals, a candle and flowers were laid down in front of the Russian embassy in Berlin yesterday in tribute to those who died

People laid flowers, candles and toys at the Russian embassy in Berlin to remember the victims of the crash, which occurred on Saturday

Just how chaotic things are, and how potentially dangerous, was illustrated earlier this year when Egyptian aircraft pursuing terrorists mistakenly attacked vehicles carrying tourists, killing eight Mexicans and four local guides. This should prove food for thought for British tourists planning to visit any time soon.

It is a grim fact that planes taking off and landing at Sharm El Sheikh are within striking range of the missiles we know the IS terrorists in this benighted corner of Egypt have in abundance.

Sadly, having failed in their attempt to defeat the Egyptian military in their Sinai stronghold, it is now only a matter of time before they fix their attention, once again, on the soft targets of the nearby tourist resorts.

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