Malaysia asks authorities in nearby islands to be vigilant for possible plane wreckage, as France confirms that wing part washed up on Reunion was from Boeing 777.
Malaysia has asked the authorities in the islands surrounding Reunion to be vigilant for possible plane wreckage, as France confirmed that the object washed up on the Indian Ocean isle was from a Boeing 777.
Mauritius, which is some 140 miles from Reunion, has already ordered its coastguard plane to fly surveillance flights over the area, and their boats to be on the lookout.
Other islands in the region – Madagascar, Comoros, Seychelles and Maldives – are expected to do the same.
“I urge all parties to allow this crucial investigation process to take its course,” said Liow Tiong Lai, Malaysia’s transport minister. “I reiterate this is for the sake of the next of kin of the loved ones of MH370 who would be anxiously awaiting news and have suffered much over this time.
“We will make an announcement once the verification process has been completed.”
Mr Liow said that the French-led team analysing the wing fragment – known as a “flaperon” – which was found on Reunion on Wednesday, have confirmed it is from a Boeing 777. MH370 is the only Boeing 777 to have crashed in the southern hemisphere.
French authorities are expected to announce on Wednesday whether the wing belonged to MH370, disappeared on March 8, 2014, en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.
“We know the flaperon has been officially identified as being part of a Boeing 777 aircraft,” said Mr Liow. “This has been verified by French authorities together with aircraft manufacturer Boeing, US National Transportation Safety Board and the Malaysian team.”
On Monday, four Malaysian officials including the head of civil aviation will meet in Paris with officials from Malaysia Airlines, three French magistrates and an official from France’s civil aviation investigating authority.
The wing fragment is now at a military-run laboratory in Balma, near Toulouse, having been flown out of Reunion on Friday.
Local people on Reunion meanwhile excitedly continued their own hunt for clues on Sunday.
In the Chaudron district on the outskirts of the capital, Saint Denis, a small piece of twisted metal with Chinese characters etched onto it – which was initially described as a “plane door” – was handed over to police on Sunday morning.
But within hours investigators had categorically ruled out the object as being from a plane. Instead, said Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, Malaysia’s director of civil aviation, the object was a domestic ladder.
Given the amount of debris littering the black sands on the eastern coast of Reunion – warped metal, foam chair stuffings, Asian food packages, car tyres and clothes – police were bracing themselves for an influx of more “wreckage”.
“There will be plenty more of this to come,” a gendarme at Chaudron said, with a wry smile.
Oceanographers say that the currents in the surrounding waters could well have brought wreckage onto the isle.
“If the object found on Reunion is definitively part of the Malaysian plane which crashed in the Indian Ocean, other debris should be found in the area,” said Vassen Kauppaymuthoo, an oceanographer from Mauritius.
“Generally debris travels in groups. So it seems that in the next days or weeks to come more could well wash up in Reunion.”
source:telegraph.co.uk
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