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The Egyptian government said on Thursday that it has deployed aircraft and naval vessels to continue the search for EgyptAir MS804 which crashed in the early hours of Thursday.

The plane which carried about 66 persons on board is suspected to have crashed near the island of Karpathos between Greece and Egypt in the early hours of Thursday.

"The National Security Council decided to continue with search efforts through Egyptian aircraft and naval vessels and work on unraveling the circumstances surrounding the disappearance of the plane at the soonest time possible in collaboration with countries including France and Greece", a statement by the Minister for Civil Aviation, Mr Sherif Fathy, said.

The statement said Egypt’s President, Abdel Fattah El Sisi, had chaired a meeting of the country’s National Security Council and "directed the government to provide all assistance possible to the families of the passengers and crew. It also directed EgyptAir crisis center to follow up on the development of the situation and announce the latest information."

The Egyptian government earlier Thursday morning sent a number of paramedics and family psychologists to psych the distressed families who had thronged the airport to meet their relatives on board the EgyptAir flight.

Answering questions from the press, the Aviation Minister said, "For now government considers the incident as a missing plane because no debris have been found".