Body parts, luggage and airline debris have been retrieved from the Egyptair passenger jet that crashed into the eastern Mediterranean Sea while carrying 66 people, authorities said Friday.
Wreckage, personal belongings, suitcases and seats were found by Egyptian army teams around, EgyptAir said.
“Search is still going on,” the carrier added in a statement.
Earlier on Friday, the Egyptian military said its search aircraft and ships had found wreckage and personal belongings of the crash victims around 290 kilometres north of the coastal city of Alexandria.
The Airbus A320 vanished early Thursday shortly after leaving Greek airspace while en route from Paris to Cairo.
The European Space Agency said a satellite spotted a possible 2-kilometre-long oil slick about 40 kilometres south-east of the last-known location of the plane. It took an image of the area on Thursday.
The two black boxes from Egyptair Flight MS804 have yet to be discovered, and the cause of the crash is unknown.
Three French aviation accident investigators and a technical expert from Toulouse-based Airbus arrived in Cairo to join the Egypt-led investigation.
“The participation of the French investigators in the probe is because 15 of the 56 passengers who were on board were French citizens and France is the headquarters of the plane manufacturer,” an official at Cairo airport said on condition of anonymity.
The French investigators met with Ayman al-Moqadem, who is heading the Egyptian government’s inquiry into the crash, Egyptian state television reported without details.
Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sissi on Friday offered “deep condolences” to the victims’ family members, adding that the investigation was ongoing to determine the “causes of the regrettable accident.” Thirty of the passengers on the flight were Egyptian.
Senior Egyptair officials met with families of the victims to inform them about the latest developments and answer their questions, according to the national carrier.
Ships and planes from France, Greece and Egypt have been scouring the area where the airliner is thought to have come down, about 280 kilometres from the Egyptian mainland.
Search operations could be complicated by heavy rainfall and strong winds moving into the eastern Mediterranean on Friday, Greece’s weather service said.
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras vowed to cooperate closely with Egypt to find the plane. He offered condolences and support to al-Sissi during a phone call, Tsipras’ office said in a statement.
US Secretary of State John Kerry also pledged his country’s support in a phone call with his Egyptian counterpart Sameh Shukry, according to the State Department.
Multiple reports of debris in the hours after the apparent crash were found not to have been from the passenger jet, which was carrying 56 passengers, seven crew members and three security officers.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault told the France2 broadcaster that there were “absolutely no clues” to indicate the reason for the plane’s disappearance, adding that he would meet with victims’ families on Saturday in Paris.
The meeting is to review progress of the search and the actions taken by France alongside the Greek and Egyptian authorities.
Representatives from the Justice Ministry, the Paris prosecutor’s office, the civil aviation bureau, victims’ aid associations, as well as those from Egyptair, will also attend.
The jet was flying at a height of 37,000 feet (11,300 metres) when it disappeared about 45 minutes before its expected landing in Cairo.
Before disappearing from radar, data indicated that plane swerved sharply and then began to make a steep descent, the Greek defence minister said Thursday.
The likelihood that it was the victim of a terrorist attack was “far higher than the likelihood that the plane developed a technical failure,” Egyptian Civil Aviation Minister Sherif Fathy said.
