Every possible cause of missing Algeria jet examined–French FM

An arrival information screen shows the delayed Air Algerie flight 5017 (top) at the Houari Boumediene airport near Algiers, Algeria, Thursday, July 24, 2014. An Air Algerie flight carrying 116 people from Burkina Faso to Algeria’s capital disappeared from radar early Thursday over northern Mali and “probably crashed” according to the plane’s owner and government officials in France and Burkina Faso. AP PHOTO/SIDALI DJARBOUB

PARIS–French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Thursday authorities were looking into every possible cause for the disappearance of an Air Algerie plane over Mali with 51 nationals on board.

“We cannot, we must not exclude any hypothesis before having all elements (at our disposal),” he said on French television, reiterating that the pilot of the plane–which had at least 116 people on board in total–had diverted its route due to bad weather.