Media: Egypt Air’s contract on maintenance of Kogalymavia aircraft expired 3 months ago

A contract of Egypt Air on maintenance service of aircraft belonging to Russian airline company Kogalymavia, which lost its passenger jet in a fatal crash on Saturday in Egypt, expired three months ago, Egypt’s local daily Al-Masry Al-Youm reported on Monday citing an unnamed source in the Egyptian air company. According to the source in Egypt Air, the company operating at the Sharm el-Sheikh Airport, from where the ill-fated flight took off on Saturday morning, "had a contract for maintenance of the [Russian] company’s aircraft…, which expired three month ago." Therefore, according to the source, the technical "inspection of the aircraft [by Egypt Air] did not take place before its flight." Russian Kogalymavia’s A321 plane en route from Sharm el-Sheikh to St. Petersburg crashed on October 31 around 30 minutes after takeoff in North Sinai, 100 kilometers to the south of Al-Arish. Flight 9268 carried 217 passengers and seven crewmembers. Egyptian authorities said no one survived in the crash. Most passengers were Russian nationals. Among the people onboard were also four Ukrainian citizens and one Belarusian national. November 1 was declared a day of mourning in Russia. In Saint Petersburg mourning and memorial events to pay homage to those who died in the plane crash in Egypt will last till November 3.