Andy, and all:
I can confirm that the Embassy in Cairo is understandably preoccupied with the Gaza situation. I have that directly from the defence attaché.
He has also clarified the situation about the unfortunate lack of communication between the Embassy and the Italian team. We are not looking for blame here, and I can see little point in raking up the past, unless it can help us go forward. I am in contact with both parties and am hoping that they will now be able to exchange information to help conclude the business of the identity of the human remains found months ago.
My offer to participate in the final identification of the remains (if they are those of Dennis Copping) stands. If they are NOT his, then I would still hope that further detailed investigation at the site of the crash might be envisaged.

I still have no further information about the present whereabouts of the Kittyhawk. Is it still in its container at El Alamein? Does anyone here know?

As promised, I am reporting back on the note sent to me by the Defence Attaché in Cairo yesterday.

He states that he asked several times for the position of the human remains found by the Italian team so as to alert the Egyptian authorities, but as they were not given this information they are unable to proceed further. Any investigation of human remains in Egypt must be headed by the appropriate Egyptian authority. As recently as 1st November 2012 neither the Egyptian Police nor Army have any reports of the Italian group finding human remains in the Western Desert.

So it seems to boil down to a lack of communication on the one, the other, or both sides. I shall try to reconcile them to the best of my ability.

I have just received a detailed reply from Capt Paul Collins, Defence Attaché in Cairo, with whom I was finally able to make contact via the Ambassador, James Watt who kindly transmitted my message yesterday.
I shall need some time to digest the contents of the message, and will report back.

dko:
Do you KNOW what altitude he was at?
Visibility in the desert is often quite restricted due to dust haze.
40 km is optimistic to say the least.
In any case, our immediate problem is simple: to identify the bones that were found. They may indeed NOT be Dennis Copping’s, but we need to know.

That has been my point for some time: these bones were suggested to perhaps be those of Dennis Copping, then that was denied by the MOD for no good reason (as they seem to have admitted when challenged). I maintain that these human bones could easily be tested for age and relationship, IF WE CAN HAVE ACCESS to them.

It would be so, so easy to find out one thing: are the bones found 8 km from the crash site those of Dennis Copping or not? All we need is access to them.

If they are not, then the rest would be more complicated, but let’s do one thing at a time. If the embassy has this in hand, for goodness sake tell us!

Looks like maybe the weekend of 8 or 9 December. 9th would be better for me. Can we fix a date?