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Tragic EgyptAir victim only managed to board doomed Flight MS804 after desperate three-day hunt for his passport - which was eventually found lying in the street

Frenchman Pascal Hess, 51, almost cancelled ticket after losing passport
Amateur photographer was one of 15 French nationals on the Flight MS804
Friends said he didn't sleep for three days worrying over loss of passport
But neighbour eventually found it lying in street in his hometown of Evreux

Published: 00:01 GMT, 21 May 2016 | Updated: 01:48 GMT, 21 May 2016

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One of the 66 people who died on board EgyptAir Flight MS804 only made it on board the plane after a desperate last-minute hunt for his passport.

Amateur photographer Pascal Hess, 51, one of the 15 French passengers on board the flight, was close to cancelling his ticket after losing his passport last week.

But he decided to go ahead with the trip after a neighbour finally found the passport lying in the street of his hometown of Evreux, in the northern French region of Normandy.

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Desperate: Pascal Hess, 51, one of the 15 French nationals on board EgyptAir Flight MS804, almost cancelled his ticket to Cairo after losing his passport. But he decided to go ahead with the trip after a neighbour found the passport in the street of Mr Hess’ hometown of Evreux, Normandy

Friends praised Mr Hess as being ‘charming and endearing’ in French media, following the EgyptAir disaster.

‘It’s strange, but he wasn’t feeling this trip at all,’ one friend told Le Parisien.

‘It’s as though he had a premonition.’

Mr Hess is reported to have been travelling to Egypt to visit a friend who works as a diving instructor at a Red Sea resort.

According to French newspaper La Depeche d’Evreux, Mr Hess didn’t sleep for three days last week as he worried about the loss of his passport.

In a 2010 interview published on YouTube, Mr Hess spoke about his passion for photography.

It comes as leaked data from the plane appears to indicate a fire had broken out in the lavatory behind the cockpit, with smoke alarms sounding on board for a full three minutes before it disappeared.

Hunt for clues: The Egyptian army reported finding wreckage and personal belongings from the missing jet around 180 miles north of Alexandria. The discovery came a day after other debris found in another area near the African coast turned out not to come the plane

Gripped by grief: EgyptAir stewardesses console each other outside the Al Sedeq mosque where hundreds of mourners gathered to offer prayers for the crew of missing EgyptAir flight MS804

Aviation industry website The Aviation Herald reported that it had received the data from three independent channels, however there has as yet been no official confirmation.

The leaked data was filed through the Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS), a data link for sending messages between planes and ground facilities.

According to the leaked data, smoke alarms in the lavatory behind the cockpit first began sounding at 00.26GMT. Less than a minute later, smoke was also detected in the avionics [electronics].

The final two alerts from the plane indicate faults with the FCU - the flight control unit used by the pilot to input instructions into the flight computer - and the SEC 3 - the computer that controls the plane's spoilers and elevator computers.

Loss: Relatives of passengers on board the EgyptAir flight cry at Cairo Airport as they try to receive information on their loved ones

Leak: Data has emerged indicating the EgyptAir Flight MS804 was on fire before it plummeted into the Mediterranean. An ACARS screen grab (above) shows smoke alarms in the lavatory behind the cockpit sounded at 00.26GMT, three minutes before the plane lost contact

It sparked claims from experts that the comparatively slow-moving nature of the disaster unfolding on board the plane indicated that it was brought down by a fire rather than a bomb.

'Now if it it was a bomb, the characteristic bomb... would have ruptured the skin of the aircraft,' said David Soucie, aviation analyst for CNN.

'This is not the indication you would have had, because a bomb that would do that would be instantaneous, and these reports would not have gone over two minutes like they do.'