U.S. officials are becoming increasingly more confident that a bomb was used to cause the explosion that brought down Metrojet Flight 9268. Intelligence experts are specifically interested in some private messages between ISIS affiliates that were intercepted and analyzed. The exact contents of these messages have not been made public but officials believe there is valuable information there that could give clues about the origins of the attack.
More evidence of an explosion is found on the audio recordings from the flight data recorder that was recovered from the crash. European officials that have examined the recording say that a sound can be heard right before the recording cuts off. The sound is possibly that of the initial bomb explosion. There were also no sounds of distress recorded before the explosion meaning that it was a complete surprise to everyone on board the plane. These officials feel strongly that this information indicates that there were no equipment malfunctions and there was most likely a bomb.
In response, Russia and Britain have suspended all flights to and from Sharm el-Sheikh. Many other countries are following suit and warnings have been issued about the belief of the attack. Thousands of stranded British and Russian travelers remain in the region and national officials are working to bring them home as quickly as possible. One issue travelers are dealing with is the inability to bring any luggage on the plane. All luggage is being flown separately on cargo planes because of the belief that a bomb was most likely planted in the luggage compartment of flight9268.