Malaysia Believes South Africa, Mauritius Debris Is From Missing Flight MH370
May 11 2016 - 11:40PM
Dow Jones News
SINGAPORE—Aircraft debris found earlier this year in South
Africa and Mauritius "almost certainly" came from missing Malaysia
Airlines Flight 370, Malaysia's Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai
said on Thursday.
The team investigating the mysterious disappearance of Flight
370 has examined two pieces of debris found in South Africa and
Mauritius and have concluded that both are consistent with panels
of a Malaysia Airlines Boeing Co. 777 jet, the type of aircraft
that operated the flight that went missing more than two years
ago.
Four pieces of recovered aircraft debris are so far believed by
experts to have belonged to Flight 370, though the main wreckage
and its black boxes still remain missing despite intensive searches
costing millions of dollars by an Australia-led team.
A part of a wing, called a flaperon, was discovered on French La
RĂ© union Island in July last year, and was later confirmed to have
come from the missing plane.
In March this year, a piece of an engine cowling that showed a
portion of the logo of engine manufacturer Rolls-Royce Holdings PLC
was found washed ashore in South Africa. Later, an interior panel
piece was found on the Mauritian island of Rodrigues.
A separate piece of debris discovered in Mozambique by an
amateur sleuth earlier this year is also believed to have come from
the plane, according to the Australian government.
Mr. Liow said the governments of Malaysia, Australia and China
remain committed to the search for Flight 370 and have so far
scoured over 105,000 square kilometers of ocean floor for the
missing plane. The current phase of the search is expected to end
this summer.
Flight 370 disappeared from radar in the early hours of March 8,
2014, while on a routine flight to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur.
The plane didn't send out a distress signal and all
communication with it was lost, baffling aviation experts because
modern passenger jets have several systems that ensure
near-constant communication. Flight 370's disappearance has
prompted calls for closer tracking of planes and regulators are
working on new rules.
Investigators analyzed satellite data to conclude that the plane
flew thousands of miles off-course to a remote part of the Southern
Indian Ocean before it possibly ran out of fuel and crashed.
The families of the 239 passengers and crew of Flight 370 are
still waiting for answers and have demanded that the search for the
missing plane continue.
Write to Gaurav Raghuvanshi at gaurav.raghuvanshi@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 11, 2016 23:25 ET (03:25 GMT)
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