Malaysian jetliner may have turned back before vanishing

Monday, 10 March 2014 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Radar shows jet may have turned back, search area widened
Malaysia Airlines says “fearing the worst”
Flight lost contact hour after takeoff, no distress signal or sign of bad weather
KL-Beijing flight carried 227 passengers and 12 crew
Two passengers, possibly more, were travelling under false identities

REUTERS: A missing Malaysia Airlines jetliner may have turned back from its scheduled route before vanishing from radar screens, military officers said on Sunday, deepening the mystery surrounding the fate of the plane and the 239 people aboard. More than 36 hours after the last contact with Flight MH370, officials said they were widening the search to cover vast swathes of sea around Malaysia and off Vietnam, and were investigating at least two passengers who may have been using false identity documents.

Despite dozens of military and civilians vessels and aircraft criss-crossing waters to the east and west of Malaysia, no wreckage has been found, although oil slicks have been reported in the sea south of Vietnam. “What we have done is actually look into the recording on the radar that we have and we realised there is a possibility the aircraft did make a turnback,” Rodzali Daud, the Royal Malaysian Air Force Chief, told reporters at a news conference. There were no reports of bad weather and no sign of why the Boeing 777-200ER disappeared about an hour after it took off from Kuala Lumpur bound for Beijing early on Saturday. European officials said it appeared two people on board were using stolen passports and Malaysian Transport Minister Hishamuddin Hussein said authorities were also checking the identities of two other passengers. “All the four names are with me,” said Hishamuddin, who is also Defence Minister. “I have indicated to our intelligence agencies and I have also spoken to international intelligence agencies for assistance.” He said help was also being sought from the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). However, an attack was only one of the possibilities being investigated. “We are looking at all possibilities,” he said. “We cannot jump the gun. Our focus now is to find the plane.” Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, the head of the Department of Civil Aviation, later told reporters only two passengers were being investigated and that authorities were checking CCTV footage of the two as they boarded the aircraft. The search was being extended to the west coast of the Malay Peninsula, in addition to a broad expanse of the sea between Malaysia and Vietnam, Air Force Chief Rodzali said. Malaysia Airlines said it was “fearing for the worst” and that it had sought assistance from an Atlanta-based disaster recovery management specialist.

Stolen passports Vietnamese naval boats sent from the holiday island of Phu Quoc patrolled stretches of the Gulf of Thailand, scouring the area where an oil slick was spotted by patrol jets just before nightfall on Saturday. “Our two rescue boats have approached the two oil spills since 3 a.m. today but we haven’t found any sign of the Malaysian plane yet. Other boats are ready to go to support if needed,” Admiral Ngo Van Phat told Reuters. Besides the Vietnamese vessels, Malaysia and neighbouring countries have deployed 22 aircraft and 40 ships in the search. China and the United States have sent ships to help, and Washington has also deployed a plane. US officials from Boeing, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and the Federal Aviation Administration were on the way to Asia to help in investigations, NTSB said in a statement. The airline has said 14 nationalities were among the passengers, including at least 152 Chinese, 38 Malaysians, seven Indonesians, six Australians, five Indians, four French and three Americans. There were no indications of sabotage nor claims of an attack. But the passenger manifest issued by the airline included the names of two Europeans - Austrian Christian Kozel and Italian Luigi Maraldi - who, according to their foreign ministries, were not on the plane. Both had apparently had their passports stolen in Thailand during the past two years. US and European security officials said that there was no proof of foul play and there could be other explanations for the use of stolen passports. A Malaysian official with knowledge of the investigation said the passengers being checked had bought their tickets through China Southern Airlines, which was code-sharing the flight with Malaysia Airlines. “We’ve seen the statements about stolen passports, but we cannot validate that,” Hugh Dunleavy, Director of Commercial Operations at Malaysia Airlines, told reporters in Beijing. “As far as we’re aware, every one of the people onboard that aircraft had a visa to go to China. Which means those passports were in the possession of the Chinese embassy before those visas were issued.”

No mayday The 11-year-old Boeing, powered by Rolls-Royce Trent (RR.L) engines, took off at 12:40 a.m. (1640 GMT Friday) from Kuala Lumpur International Airport when it went missing without a distress call. Aboard were 227 passengers and 12 crew. It last had contact with air traffic controllers 120 nautical miles off the east coast of the Malaysian town of Kota Bharu. Flight tracking website flightaware.com showed it flew northeast after takeoff, climbed to 35,000 ft (10,670 metres) and was still climbing when it vanished from tracking records. Boeing said it was monitoring the situation but had no further comment. Paul Hayes, Director of Safety at Flightglobal Ascend aviation consultancy, said the flight would normally have been at a routine stage, having reached initial cruise altitude. “Such a sudden disappearance would suggest either that something is happening so quickly that there is no opportunity to put out a mayday, in which case a deliberate act is one possibility to consider, or that the crew is busy coping with what whatever has taken place,” he told Reuters. The disappearance of the plane is a chilling echo of an Air France flight that crashed into the South Atlantic on 1 June, 2009, killing all 228 people on board. It vanished for hours and wreckage was found only two days later. John Goglia, a former board member of the NTSB, the US agency that investigates plane crashes, said the lack of a distress call suggested that the plane either experienced an explosive decompression or was destroyed by an explosive device. “It had to be quick because there was no communication,” Goglia said. He said the false identities of the two passengers was “a big red flag”. If there were passengers on board with stolen passports, it was not clear how they passed through security checks.

FBI sending agents to probe disappearance of flight MH370

WASHINGTON (AFP): The FBI is sending agents and technical experts to assist a team probing the disappearance of a Malaysia Airlines jet that had several Americans aboard, US media reported. US officials told The Los Angeles Times that they are trying to determine whether there was any terror link to what caused Flight MH370 to go missing as it was carrying 239 people from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. The fact that at least three of the passengers are believed to be Americans “gives us entree” to the case”, a top federal law enforcement official told the newspaper on Saturday. “But so far, what happened is a mystery.” A US official told CNN that FBI agents stationed at the American Embassy in Kuala Lumpur, including an FBI legal attache, were monitoring the situation closely. Asked to confirm the reports, an FBI spokesman only replied: “We are ready to assist if needed.” Although two passengers appeared to have been using stolen EU passports, “there is no indication this is a terrorist attack; stolen passports are certainly not indicative of a terrorist attack”, a senior counterterrorism official told the Times. The official stressed there was “no evidence” of terrorism thus far. According to the federal law enforcement official, FBI personnel will help review video of the Kuala Lumpur airport for images of passengers at the ticket counter, security sections and the boarding area. The agents would then use counter-terrorism technology to find any possible matches with known members of Al-Qaeda or other terror groups. And the US National Transportation Safety Board may also join the investigation “because the jet was built by Boeing in this country,” the law enforcement official said. The stolen passports used by two passengers on the plane are believed to have come from an Italian and a an Austrian. “Just because they were stolen doesn’t mean the travelers were terrorists,” a Department of Homeland Security official said. “They could have been nothing more than thieves. Or they could have simply bought the passports on the black market.”

Fake passport bearers brought tickets together

KUALA Lumpur: The two people who travelled using passports belonging to an Italian and Austrian on the missing Malaysian Airlines (MAS) MH370 seemed to have bought their tickets together. CNN reported the tickets were issued together and bought from China Southern Airlines in Thai baht. The two tickets both started in Kuala Lumpur, flying to Beijing, and then onward to Amsterdam. The Italian passport ticket continues to Copenhagen, while the Austrian’s to Frankfurt, the report said. It has been reported on foreign media that Foreign ministry officials in Italy and Austria have confirmed the two nationals listed on missing the MAS flight were safe and well. Luigi Maraldi, 37, from Italy had called his parents from Thailand to inform that he was fine after hearing news reports. Christian Kozel, 30, from Austrian, also called his family to say he was not aboard the missing flight. Both Maraldi and Kozel had their passport stolen in Thailand. Defence Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein had confirmed that at least four names were under probe. He said the Malaysian intelligence agency was working with its overseas counterparts, including the United States’ Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and counter-terrorism units from neighbouring countries. Department of Civil Aviation (DCA) Director-General Datuk Azharuddin Abdul Rahman said that CCTV clips of the two men who boarded the flight with purportedly stolen passports were being investigated.