France- New Debris Found On Island In MH370 Hunt
(MENAFN- Arab Times) Investigators probing missing flight MH370 collected more debris on an Indian Ocean island Sunday as Malaysia urged authorities in the region to be on alert for wreckage washing up on their shores.
Locals on La Reunion island have been combing the shores since a Boeing 777 wing part was found last Wednesday, sparking fevered speculation that it may be the first tangible evidence that the Malaysia Airlines plane crashed into the Indian Ocean.
However authorities cast doubt on whether the new debris was linked to MH370, and a source close to the investigation in Paris said "no object or debris likely to come from a plane" had been placed into evidence on Sunday.
An AFP photographer early Sunday saw police collect a mangled piece of metal inscribed with two Chinese characters and attached to what appears to be a leather-covered handle.
The debris, measuring about 100 square cms (15 square inches), was placed into an iron case.
Also on Sunday a man handed police a piece of debris measuring 70 cms (27 inches), guessing it was part of a plane door.
Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai said civil aviation authorities were reaching out to their counterparts in other Indian Ocean territories to be on the lookout for further debris.
"This is to allow the experts to conduct more substantive analysis should there be more debris coming onto land, providing us more clues to the missing aircraft."
He also confirmed in a statement that the wing part found Wednesday on the French island had been "officially identified" as from a Boeing 777 - making it virtually certain that it was from missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370.
Lost
Flight MH370 is the only Boeing 777 to ever be lost at sea. A spokesman for Australia's Transport and Infrastructure Minister Warren Truss said that more "objects are being brought to local stations but nothing 'obvious' so far. And no door."
While the wing part - known as a flaperon - has been sent to France for further analysis, locals on La Reunion are scouring the beach for more debris in what a French source close to the investigation likened to a "treasure hunt".
The discovery comes after a gruelling 16-month search that has yielded no evidence of what happened to the plane that disappeared on March 8, 2014, en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.
The flight's mysterious disappearance, which saw it vanish off radars as a key transponder appeared to have been shut off, has baffled aviation experts and grieving families and given rise to a myriad conspiracy theories.
Speculation on the cause of the plane's disappearance has focused primarily on a possible mechanical or structural failure, a hijacking or terror plot, or rogue pilot action.
Scientists say it is plausible that ocean currents carried a piece of the wreckage as far as La Reunion.
Malaysia's deputy transport minister Abdul Aziz Kaprawi told AFP that the Boeing 777 wing part "could be the convincing evidence that MH370 went down in the Indian Ocean."
"I believe that we are moving closer to solving the mystery of MH370," he said. The flaperon will be examined in a lab near the French city of Toulouse that specialises in plane crash investigations.
Meeting
Four Malaysian officials including the head of civil aviation are in Paris together with officials from Malaysia Airlines for a meeting on Monday with three French magistrates and an official from France's civil aviation investigating authority BEA.
Truss has warned that even if the debris confirmed to come from MH370 it is unlikely to completely clear up one of aviation's greatest puzzles. The mystery of what happened to the plane and where it went down exactly are still likely to persist unless the black box is found.
Australian search authorities leading the hunt for the aircraft some 4,000 km (2,500 miles) from La Reunion are confident the main debris field is in the current search area. For the families of the victims, torn between wanting closure and hoping that their loved ones are somehow still alive, the discovery of the part has been yet another painful twist on an emotional rollercoaster.
"It has been hurting for so long. We need the closure and all the evidence possible so that we can go ahead with our lives. It's been so long," said Nur Laila Ngah, the wife of the flight's chief steward Wan Swaid Wan Ismail. As experts on the Indian Ocean island Reunion studied plane debris for clues in the search for missing flight MH370, scientist Nicolas Villeneuve was making his own discovery: the island's volcano was about to erupt.
Reunion, a part of France that lies in the Indian Ocean around 370 miles east of Madagascar, gained newfound notoriety last week when a beach cleaner stumbled across a barnacled piece of an airplane wing known as a flaperon.
The wreckage was flown on Friday to mainland France where experts hope forensic analysis will uncover if it was part of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, which vanished without trace in March 2014 along with 239 passengers and crew.
Hopes that the piece of debris could help solve one of the biggest mysteries in aviation history and end 16 months of painful uncertainty for relatives has briefly turned the global media spotlight on Reunion.
Many of the 800,000 residents have been overwhelmed by the attention placed on their island, where big local stories are usually about shark attacks and volcanic eruptions.
"Before, the only people who knew about this island were scientists and surfers," Villeneuve, 43, told Reuters from the island's volcano observatory, where he is studying the after effects of the latest eruption.
The Piton de la Fournaise, one of the world's most active volcanoes, erupted at 10:00 a.m. local time (0600 GMT) on Friday, opening up a 800-metre-long crack in its crater and sending hot jets of molten lava spewing up from the peak.
"We heard about the plane but we have our own investigation here," Villeneuve added, pointing at images of glowing lava and thick plumes of smoke.
It could end up being one of the biggest eruptions since 2007 when tremors in the crater lasted weeks and magma reaching temperatures above 1,000 centigrade flowed all the way into the Indian Ocean.
The volcano poses little danger to visitors or residents because the area is evacuated when early warning signs appear and no one lives on the path where lava flows.
Locals on La Reunion island have been combing the shores since a Boeing 777 wing part was found last Wednesday, sparking fevered speculation that it may be the first tangible evidence that the Malaysia Airlines plane crashed into the Indian Ocean.
However authorities cast doubt on whether the new debris was linked to MH370, and a source close to the investigation in Paris said "no object or debris likely to come from a plane" had been placed into evidence on Sunday.
An AFP photographer early Sunday saw police collect a mangled piece of metal inscribed with two Chinese characters and attached to what appears to be a leather-covered handle.
The debris, measuring about 100 square cms (15 square inches), was placed into an iron case.
Also on Sunday a man handed police a piece of debris measuring 70 cms (27 inches), guessing it was part of a plane door.
Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai said civil aviation authorities were reaching out to their counterparts in other Indian Ocean territories to be on the lookout for further debris.
"This is to allow the experts to conduct more substantive analysis should there be more debris coming onto land, providing us more clues to the missing aircraft."
He also confirmed in a statement that the wing part found Wednesday on the French island had been "officially identified" as from a Boeing 777 - making it virtually certain that it was from missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370.
Lost
Flight MH370 is the only Boeing 777 to ever be lost at sea. A spokesman for Australia's Transport and Infrastructure Minister Warren Truss said that more "objects are being brought to local stations but nothing 'obvious' so far. And no door."
While the wing part - known as a flaperon - has been sent to France for further analysis, locals on La Reunion are scouring the beach for more debris in what a French source close to the investigation likened to a "treasure hunt".
The discovery comes after a gruelling 16-month search that has yielded no evidence of what happened to the plane that disappeared on March 8, 2014, en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.
The flight's mysterious disappearance, which saw it vanish off radars as a key transponder appeared to have been shut off, has baffled aviation experts and grieving families and given rise to a myriad conspiracy theories.
Speculation on the cause of the plane's disappearance has focused primarily on a possible mechanical or structural failure, a hijacking or terror plot, or rogue pilot action.
Scientists say it is plausible that ocean currents carried a piece of the wreckage as far as La Reunion.
Malaysia's deputy transport minister Abdul Aziz Kaprawi told AFP that the Boeing 777 wing part "could be the convincing evidence that MH370 went down in the Indian Ocean."
"I believe that we are moving closer to solving the mystery of MH370," he said. The flaperon will be examined in a lab near the French city of Toulouse that specialises in plane crash investigations.
Meeting
Four Malaysian officials including the head of civil aviation are in Paris together with officials from Malaysia Airlines for a meeting on Monday with three French magistrates and an official from France's civil aviation investigating authority BEA.
Truss has warned that even if the debris confirmed to come from MH370 it is unlikely to completely clear up one of aviation's greatest puzzles. The mystery of what happened to the plane and where it went down exactly are still likely to persist unless the black box is found.
Australian search authorities leading the hunt for the aircraft some 4,000 km (2,500 miles) from La Reunion are confident the main debris field is in the current search area. For the families of the victims, torn between wanting closure and hoping that their loved ones are somehow still alive, the discovery of the part has been yet another painful twist on an emotional rollercoaster.
"It has been hurting for so long. We need the closure and all the evidence possible so that we can go ahead with our lives. It's been so long," said Nur Laila Ngah, the wife of the flight's chief steward Wan Swaid Wan Ismail. As experts on the Indian Ocean island Reunion studied plane debris for clues in the search for missing flight MH370, scientist Nicolas Villeneuve was making his own discovery: the island's volcano was about to erupt.
Reunion, a part of France that lies in the Indian Ocean around 370 miles east of Madagascar, gained newfound notoriety last week when a beach cleaner stumbled across a barnacled piece of an airplane wing known as a flaperon.
The wreckage was flown on Friday to mainland France where experts hope forensic analysis will uncover if it was part of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, which vanished without trace in March 2014 along with 239 passengers and crew.
Hopes that the piece of debris could help solve one of the biggest mysteries in aviation history and end 16 months of painful uncertainty for relatives has briefly turned the global media spotlight on Reunion.
Many of the 800,000 residents have been overwhelmed by the attention placed on their island, where big local stories are usually about shark attacks and volcanic eruptions.
"Before, the only people who knew about this island were scientists and surfers," Villeneuve, 43, told Reuters from the island's volcano observatory, where he is studying the after effects of the latest eruption.
The Piton de la Fournaise, one of the world's most active volcanoes, erupted at 10:00 a.m. local time (0600 GMT) on Friday, opening up a 800-metre-long crack in its crater and sending hot jets of molten lava spewing up from the peak.
"We heard about the plane but we have our own investigation here," Villeneuve added, pointing at images of glowing lava and thick plumes of smoke.
It could end up being one of the biggest eruptions since 2007 when tremors in the crater lasted weeks and magma reaching temperatures above 1,000 centigrade flowed all the way into the Indian Ocean.
The volcano poses little danger to visitors or residents because the area is evacuated when early warning signs appear and no one lives on the path where lava flows.
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