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August 8, 2015

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France hunts for more MH370 parts

Source: AFP | August 8, 2015, Saturday | Print Edition

FRANCE launched a hunt for more wreckage from the ill-fated MH370 plane off Reunion Island yesterday.

The tiny French Indian Ocean territory has been under intense scrutiny since a beach cleaner found a washed-up wing part last week. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak later declared it was from the Boeing 777 that mysteriously vanished 17 months ago.

The part, called a flaperon, is being examined by experts in France for clues as to the last moments of the Malaysia Airlines aircraft that veered off course on its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, and there are hopes that Reunion may yield more debris.

In nearby Mauritius, authorities are also searching for any parts that may have landed on their shores.

Dominique Sorain, the top government official on Reunion Island, told reporters that a military transport plane was patrolling the seas off the coast and a ship had left before it was forced to return because of bad weather.

He said helicopters would also be used, and soldiers and policemen will patrol the eastern part of the island where the flaperon was discovered.

The new hunt is due to last for a week.

Since the discovery of the flaperon, islanders have come forward with countless objects that they think look like plane parts.

Sorain said some had been placed under seal to wait for experts to determine whether they are bits of aircraft or not.

Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai said on Thursday that more possible MH370 objects had been discovered on Reunion, but any link “had to be verified by the French authorities.”

The Boeing 777 disappeared on March 8 last year, sparking the largest search operation in aviation history, now focused on the southern Indian Ocean.

Australian authorities, who are leading the search, expressed renewed confidence they were looking in the right area.

“The finding of this piece of wing gives us hope that we are searching in the right location, given the tides and currents and drift patterns,” Foreign Minister Julie Bishop told Australian television from Malaysia.

French prosecutors involved in the analysis of the flaperon have, however, been more cautious, saying only that there was a “very high probability” it came from the Boeing 777.

But Liow said that certain characteristics of the wing part, including its paint, matched MH370 maintenance records.

Some anguished family members nevertheless said any first concrete proof of the plane’s fate would help bring closure.

“We’ve had 17 months of nothing ... so actually finding something is the first step toward pinpointing where it is,” Sara Weeks, sister of MH370 passenger Paul Weeks, told reporters.

Analysts call the flaperon find a clear step forward by eliminating theories that the plane might have landed somewhere, and confirming that the search was roughly on the right track.

But they caution that only by locating a crash site and recovering the black box are authorities likely to help solve the mystery, unless new evidence emerges.

It is hoped that a more detailed examination of the wing part in the coming days may indicate how it detached from the aircraft and whether it showed traces of an explosion or fire.

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