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Missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370: Plane 'may have flown for four hours after last-known contact' Missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370: Plane 'may have flown for four hours after last-known contact'
(35 minutes later)
US investigators have claimed that Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 flew on for four hours after it lost contact with air traffic controllers as the latest lead to find the missing airline fizzled out. US investigators are examining whether missing Flight MH370 was “intentionally diverted” from its planned route after new data revealed the plane may have flown for a further four hours from the point of its last confirmed location.
The suspicion is based on data from the plane's engines which is automatically downloaded and transmitted to the ground as part of routine maintenance programmes, the Wall Street Journal has reported citing two sources familiar with details of the search. A report in the Wall Street Journal said US counter-terrorism officials are examining the possibility the plane’s course was changed “with the intention of using it later for another purpose” and that its transponders were intentionally turned off to avoid radar detection.
The report raises questions why the Boeing 777 was flying for so long after its last known confirmed contact, and if anyone was in control during that time. The report said data downloaded automatically from the plane’s engines, suggests the plane flew for a total of five hours. Its final confirmed location was at 1.31am last Saturday, about 40 minutes after it took off from Kuala Lumpur International Airport. At that point it was heading north-east across the mouth of the Gulf of Thailand on what should have been a six-hour flight to Beijing.
US counter-terrorism teams are investigating the possibility that that the plane, and the 239 people on board, could have flown on for hundreds of additional miles. If true, the information downloaded from the plane’s Rolls Royce engines as part of a routine maintenance and monitoring programme, suggests the plane could have flown on for hundreds of miles and reached as far as India or even the north-west coast of Australia. It would expand the possible search area almost limitlessly.
It is claimed that someone on board the flight could have diverted the plane to an unknown location after disabling its transponders to avoid radar detection. Yet the report says the data has led investigators in the US to pursue the prospect that the plane may have been diverted by a pilot or someone else. It is unclear whether the plane reached an alternate destination or if it crashed, potentially hundreds of miles from where an international search effort involving 12 countries and more than 80 boats and planes has been focused.
The latest claims followed another wild goose chase for search teams who reported no sign of the missing Malaysian jetliner were found at a spot where Chinese satellite images showed what might be plane debris. Six days after the plane went missing, most reports had suggested that terrorism or hijacking had been largely discounted.  But the report said the new data raised a “host of new questions and possibilities about what happened” to the plane and its 239 passengers and crew.
Malaysia's civil aviation chief, Azharuddin Abdul Rahma,n told reporters in Kuala Lumpur earlier today Thursday: “There is nothing. We went there, there is nothing,” he said. The report said US investigators remained “fluid” as to the causes of the plane’s disappearance and that it remained unclear whether investigators had evidence indicating possible terrorism or espionage.
Vietnamese officials previously said the area had been “searched thoroughly” in recent days. The new revelations came as an effort to locate the plane spread out over more than 27,000 nautical square miles. Search planes had been dispatched to a site believed to be the location of where a Chinese government agency website said a satellite had photographed three “suspicious floating objects” on Sunday. It is unclear why it took China so long to share the information.
The hunt for the Boeing 777 has been punctuated by false leads since it disappeared just hours after leaving Kuala Lumpur for Beijing early on Saturday. The plane was heading north-east over the South China Sea when it disappeared, but authorities believe it may have turned back and headed into the upper reaches of the Strait of Malacca or beyond. The location was close to where the plane lost contact with air traffic control but by early Thursday afternoon local time, nothing had been found at the spot. The Associated Press said the head of Malaysia’s civil aviation authority, Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, had confirmed no debris had been located by the Vietnamese and Malaysian plans dispatched there.
The location where Chinese images showed possible debris is not far from where the last confirmed position of the plane was between Malaysia and Vietnam. The images and coordinates were posted on the website of China's State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense. Earlier on Thursday, China continued to put pressure on Malaysia. Of the 239 people on board, more than 150 were from China. China has criticised Malaysia for the slow pace of the operation and what it has called conflicting information about the search.
A Xinhua report said the images from around 11 am on Sunday appear to show “three suspected floating objects” of varying sizes in a 20km radius off the southern tip of Vietnam. Speaking in Beijing, Premier Li Keqiang, called for the “relevant party” step up coordination while China’s civil aviation chief. “We will not give up on any suspected clue that has been found,” he said. “This is an international and large-scale search operation involving many countries.”
Pham Quy Tieu, deputy transport minister, told The Associated Press news agency that the area had been “searched thoroughly” by forces from other countries over the past few days. Doan Huu Gia, chief of air search and rescue coordination centre, said Malaysian and Singaporean aircraft were scheduled to visit the area again Thursday. The last definitive sighting on civilian radar screens of MH370 came at 1.31am on Saturday, less than an hour after the plane took. On Wednesday Rodzali Daud, the Malaysian air force chief, said a dot was plotted on military radar at 2.15 a.m., 200 miles north-west of Penang Island off Malaysia’s west coast at the northern tip of the Strait of Malacca.
Li Jiaxiang, chief of the Civil Aviation Administration of China, said later China had yet to confirm any link between the suspected floating objects and the plane. But he stressed that there was no confirmation that the dot on the radar was Flight MH370. He said Malaysia was sharing the data with the US Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Security Board.
Malaysia has come under some criticism for its handling of the search, which currently covers 35,800 square miles (92,600 square kilometers) and involves 12 nations.
AP; Reuters