Last update: 9.25am
EgyptAir flight MS804 has gone missing over the Eastern Mediterranean with 56 passengers and 10 crew on board.
According to reports the Airbus A320 was flying at 37,000ft from Paris to Cairo when it vanished from radar at 12.45am last night.
The carrier has confirmed search and rescue teams have been deployed to try to find the aircraft, which disappeared 10 miles inside Egyptian airspace.
The service left Paris at 9.09pm on Wednesday and was due to arrive in the Egyptian capital at around 3am local time today.
Reports suggest MS804 may have crashed near the Greek island of Karpathos, with authorities said to be investigating an account from the captain of a merchant ship who reported a ‘flame in the sky’ some 130 nautical miles south of the island.
The aircraft is understood to have had three security officers on board, which France’s junior minister for transportation said was “usual procedure for EgyptAir planes”.
Alarabiya.net has named the pilot as Mohammed Saed Ali Ali Shakier and the co-pilot as Mohamed Ahmad Mamdooh Ahmad Asem.
In March an EgyptAir aircraft was hijacked by a man with a fake suicide bomb and forced to fly to Cyprus.