Russian plane that crashed in Sinai broke up in midair, aviation officials say

 

SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt --

Russia's top aviation official says the Russian passenger plane that crashed in Egypt had broken up at high altitude.

Alexander Fridlyand, an expert who leads a Moscow-based aviation research center, says in televised remarks Sunday that a quick plunge from high altitude may indicate that a plane was hit by a bomb explosion in its luggage compartment.

He says another possibility could be a malfunction in the plane's power system, which could have triggered a fire on board or the shutdown of both of the plane's engines.

The Metrojet A321-200 crashed in the Sinai Peninsula on Saturday morning 23 minutes after taking off from Sharm el-Sheikh en route to St. Petersburg. All 224 people on board were killed, the vast majority of them Russians.