An EgyptAir flight which disappeared from radar screens en route from Paris to Cairo early Thursday, crashed into the sea off the southern Greek island of Karpathos while in Egyptian airspace, a Greece aviation source told French news agency AFP, reports RFI.
"At around 0029 GMT (3:29 am) when it was in Egyptian airspace, the plane disappeared from Greek radars... it crashed around 130 nautical miles off the island of Karpathos," the source told AFP.
The official said the last communication with the pilot was three minutes before the plane disappeared, and that there had been no distress call.
The Greek defence ministry said it had dispatched two search planes and a frigate to the area.
EgyptAir had said it was informed by the military that it detected a "distress message" from the Airbus A320 which was en route from Paris to Cairo when it disappeared from radar screens.
Egyptian search teams combed the Mediterranean for signs of an EgyptAir flight that vanished from radar screens en route from Paris to Cairo on Thursday with 66 people on board, the airline said.
Twenty-six foreigners were among the 56 passengers, including 15 French citizens, a Briton and a Canadian, EgyptAir said.
France called a crisis meeting of top ministers as prime minister Manuel Valls said "no theory can be ruled out" to explain the plane's disappearance.
EgyptAir said contact was lost with the flight about 280 kilometres north of the Egyptian coast.
EgyptAir Holding Company vice president Ahmed Adel said there had been "no distress call" before it vanished, but the airline later said a "distress message" had been picked up by the military.
The Egyptian military said it had deployed search aircraft and naval vessels to locate the plane, in cooperation with Greece.
A tweet on the airline's official account said Flight MS804 left Paris at 11:09 pm heading to Cairo (and) has disappeared from radar".