(MENAFN- Qatar News Agency) ala Lumpur April 24 - The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) is confident the unidentified material that was washed ashore in Augusta southwest coast of Western Australia was not from the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370. The Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC) on Thursday said the ATSB after having examined the detailed photographs of the material was satisfied that it was not a lead in relation to the search for the ill-fated flight. The JACC which oversees the search operation said this in a statement Thursday. ATSB spokesman Martin Dolan in an interview with the CNN on Wednesday said the material appeared to be a sheet metal with rivets. "It is sufficiently interesting for us to take a look at the photographs but the more we look at it the less excited we get" he said. The ATSB had also provided the photographs to the Malaysian investigation team the JACC said in a statement Malaysia's News Agency (Bernama) reported. The Western Australia Police had attended a report of the material washed ashore 10 kilometres east of Augusta about 322 km south from here and have secured the material before it was examined by the ATSB. Meanwhile JACC said the visual and underwater search operation continued today with up to 11 military aircraft and 11 ships to be involved in a planned visual search area approximately 49567 square kilometres with the centre located about 1584 km north west of Perth. While the Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) Bluefin-21 which is currently on its 12th mission has completed 90 per cent of the focused underwater search area with no contacts of interest being found to date. Flight MH370 with 239 people aboard left the KL International Airport at 12.41 am on March 8 and disappeared from radar screens about an hour later while over the South China Sea. It was to have arrived in Beijing at 6.30 am on the same day. A multinational search was mounted for the Boeing 777-200 aircraft first in the South China Sea and then after it was learnt that the plane had veered off course in the southern Indian Ocean.
Legal Disclaimer:
MENAFN provides the information “as is” without warranty of any kind. We do not accept any responsibility or liability for the accuracy, content, images, videos, licenses, completeness, legality, or reliability of the information contained in this article. If you have any complaints or copyright issues related to this article, kindly contact the provider above.