Spotlight: Egypt sends submarine to search for evidence of crashed flight

Egypt has mobilized a robot submarine in the hunt for evidence of an EgyptAir plane that had crashed over the Mediterranean with 66 people aboard.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said Sunday that underwater equipment from Egypt's offshore oil industry was sent over to search for the black box recorders.

"They have a submarine that can reach 3,000 meters under water," he said in a televised speech.

Apart from the submarine, ships and planes from Britain, Cyprus, France, Greece and the United States were also combing through the sea off the Egyptian port of Alexandria.

On Friday, the Egyptian armed forces said they found some personal belongings and remains of the victims as well as debris of the plane in the Mediterranean, 290 km north of Alexandria.

However, the black boxes, critical to determine the cause of the crash, remained missing.

Sisi said the cause of the crash is yet to be established. "All assumptions are possible," Sisi said in Damietta governorate.

"Reaching the reasons behind the plane crash takes long time ... we will announce the results once we finish investigating," he said.

On Thursday, EgyptAir said that Flight MS804, an Airbus A320, disappeared from radar screens en route from Paris to Cairo at 2:45 a.m. Cairo time (0045 GMT).

Egyptian Civil Aviation Minister Sherif Fathy on Thursday indicated the possibility of a terrorist attack.

The flight had 66 people aboard, including 30 Egyptians, 15 French and two Iraqis.

A memorial service in honor of the victims of the crash was held on Sunday at the Al-Boutrossiya Coptic Church in Cairo.

Inside the church, mourners shared their grief with each other as they listened to the priest's speech.

The Bishop praised the government's efforts to find the bodies of the victims, saying "the mission is extremely difficult, but the government will exert all its efforts to find the bodies of the victims." Endi