ANKARA (Sputnik) — On Saturday, an Airbus A321 operated by Russian airline Kogalymavia crashed in the Sinai Peninsula en route from the Egyptian resort city of Sharm El-Sheikh to St. Petersburg. All 224 people on board have been confirmed dead by Russian and Egyptian authorities.
The tragedy is the largest civil aviation disaster in Russian and Soviet history.
"Our airline has carried out flights over the Sinai Peninsula en route from Istanbul to Amman and from Istanbul to Aqaba. After the incident, we use alternative routes for these flights that do not pass over the Sinai," Turkish Airlines spokesman Ali Genc told RIA Novosti.
Germany's second-largest airline, Air Berlin, has also changed its route to Egypt to avoid flying over northern Sinai due to the crash, the airline's press officer Janina Mollenhauer told Sputnik earlier in the day.