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US ship, plane to search Bay of Bengal for missing jet

The Malay Mail Online
March 15, 2014

WASHINGTON, March 15 ― A US naval ship and surveillance plane are heading to the Andaman Sea and Bay of Bengal to search for a missing Malaysian airliner that vanished a week ago, officials said yesterday.

US media reports, meanwhile, suggested the plane experienced marked changes in altitude after it lost contact with ground control, and altered its course more than once as if still under the command of a pilot.

A P-8 Poseidon aircraft and a guided missile destroyer, the USS Kidd, were due to aid the international hunt for the jet as the search effort extended further west, Pentagon spokesman Colonel Steven Warren said.

“At Malaysia’s request, the USS Kidd is north of the Straits of Malacca in what we’re calling the western search area,” Warren told reporters in Washington.

The Kidd was preparing to search the Andaman Sea and the Bay of Bengal for the Malaysia Airlines plane. Continue reading “US ship, plane to search Bay of Bengal for missing jet”

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Could MH370 have landed?

The Malay Mail Online
March 15, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 15 ― With new evidence suggesting the possibility that missing jetliner MH370 had been deliberately piloted towards the Andaman Islands, another theory has now emerged out of the woodwork ― could someone have landed aircraft?

Reuters cited two sources yesterday as saying that investigators believe the plane had been directed between navigational waypoints after it lost contact with ground control, which indicated it was being flown by someone with aviation training.

It cited another source as saying that investigations are now looking at the possibility of foul play, with signs pointing increasingly to the likelihood that a person who knew how to fly a plane had deliberately swung the aircraft hundred of miles off its original course from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, towards the Andaman Islands.

“What we can say is we are looking at sabotage, with hijack still on the cards,” Reuters had quoted a “a senior Malaysian police official” as saying.

Although this is at best just conjecture for now, it may be one of the few working theories that could finally expose more conclusive leads to what experts have described as the most baffling of mysteries in aviation history.

But if the Malaysia Airlines aircraft had truly made the air turn-back as suspected, if it had headed to the Andaman Islands as satellite data and US officials have suggested, and if it indeed had landed, where in the remote Indian archipelago could it have parked itself so stealthily out of sight? Continue reading “Could MH370 have landed?”

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MH370 hijack theory includes intent to use plane for ‘nefarious purposes’, say US officials

The Malaysian Insider
March 15, 2014

With evidence showing a missing Malaysia Airlines (MAS) Boeing 777-200ER could still be intact, US officials have not ruled out that flight MH370 was flown to a secret site so that it could be used at a later date.

There has been no trace or debris field on land or sea that is linked to the plane carrying 239 people, which vanished while on a red-eye flight to Beijing last Saturday.

“I am keenly interested in resolving this mystery so we can discard the possibility, however remote, that the airplane can be used for nefarious purposes against us in the future,” ABC News quoted a US official as saying.

The official added that “all our intelligence assets” are being used to try to figure this out.

Investigators searching for the missing MAS passenger jet said that they could not rule out hijacking and are looking at whether one of the plane’s pilots or crew could have been involved. Continue reading “MH370 hijack theory includes intent to use plane for ‘nefarious purposes’, say US officials”

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Satellites scour earth for clues as missing jet mystery deepens

The Malaysian Insider
March 15, 2014

An unprecedented international effort is under way from space to track the missing Malaysia passenger jet as satellite operators, government agencies and rival nations sweep their gaze across two oceans in search of elusive debris or data.

Six days after the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 went missing with 239 people on board, the search has widened to the Andaman Sea, northwest of the Malay Peninsula, with only one precious clue – an ephemeral “ping” detected five or six times after the plane lost contact – picked up in orbit.

Disaster relief agencies and governments are co-operating across political divides, and in the absence of a formal probe are finding informal ways to share information, including via China’s weather agency, a person involved in the search said.

“I haven’t seen this sort of level of involvement of satellites in accident investigation before,” said Matthew Greaves, head of the Safety and Accident Investigation Centre at Cranfield University in Bedford, England. “It is only going to get more important until they find some wreckage.”

Several governments are using imagery satellites – platforms that take high definition photos – while data from private sector communications satellites is also being examined. Continue reading “Satellites scour earth for clues as missing jet mystery deepens”

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India scours uninhabited jungle islands for lost MH370 jetliner

The Malaysian Insider
March 14, 2014

Indian aircraft combed Andaman and Nicobar, made up of more than 500 mostly uninhabited islands, for signs of the missing Malaysia Airlines MH370 jetliner that evidence suggests was last headed towards the heavily forested archipelago.

Popular with tourists and anthropologists alike, the islands form India’s most isolated state. They are best known for dense rainforests, coral reefs and hunter-gatherer tribes who have long resisted contact with outsiders.

The search for flight MH370 turned west toward the islands after Malaysia’s air force chief said military radar had detected an unidentified aircraft suspected to be the lost Boeing 777 to the west of Malaysia early on Saturday.

Two sources yesterday told Reuters the unidentified aircraft appeared to be following a commonly used navigational route that would take it over the islands.

The Indian navy has deployed two Dornier planes to fly across the island chain, a total area of 720 km by 52 km, Indian military spokesman Harmeet Singh said in the state capital, Port Blair. So far the planes, and a helicopter searching the coast, had found nothing.

“This operation is like finding a needle in a haystack,” said Singh, who is the spokesman for joint air force, navy and army command in the Andaman and Nicobar islands. Continue reading “India scours uninhabited jungle islands for lost MH370 jetliner”

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Aviation experts question shift in search for MH370

The Malay Mail Online
March 14, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 14 — The dramatic expansion of the search for a missing Malaysian airliner suggests the plane flew thousands of miles off course, crossing — apparently undetected — a sensitive region bristling with military radar.

Aviation experts today queried the plausibility of such a scenario, but confirmation from US and Malaysian officials that the search was being widened into the vast Indian Ocean suggested it had credible underpinnings.

If there was a debate over what might have happened to Flight MH370, there was a general consensus as to the extraordinary nature of its disappearance without trace a week ago over the South China Sea.

“I would probably go ahead and say this is unprecedented,” said Anthony Brickhouse, a member of the International Society of Air Safety Investigators.

“In most investigations each day you move forward, you uncover more things, more clues,” Brickhouse told AFP. Continue reading “Aviation experts question shift in search for MH370”

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London-based satellite firm says MH370 registered signals on its network

The Malay Mail Online
March 14, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 14 — Global satellite company Inmarsat revealed today that it had registered “routine, automated signals” from missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 during its flight from Kuala Lumpur.

The news adds to the intrigue surrounding the aircraft’s disappearance, particularly as it appears to corroborate reports that said satellites had picked up faint, electronic pulses or “pings” from MH370 hours after it was last heard from.

Inmarsat, a London-based firm, reported its findings in a statement on its website but did not elaborate on when or how long the signals were received.

“This information was provided to our partner SITA, which in turn has shared it with Malaysia Airlines,” it said in the statement, adding that further information should be obtained from MAS, the owner of the Boeing 777 aircraft that went missing.

SITA is a global specialist in air transport communications and information technology. Continue reading “London-based satellite firm says MH370 registered signals on its network”

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Radar data suggests MH370 plane flown deliberately toward Andaman Islands

The Malaysian Insider
March 14, 2014

Military radar-tracking evidence suggests that the Malaysia Airlines MH370 jetliner missing for nearly a week was deliberately flown across the Malay peninsula toward the Andaman Islands, sources familiar with the investigation told Reuters today.

Two sources said an unidentified aircraft that investigators believe was Flight MH370 was following a route between navigational waypoints – indicating it was being flown by someone with aviation training – when it was last plotted on military radar off the country’s northwest coast.

The last plot on the military radar’s tracking suggested the plane was flying toward India’s Andaman Islands, a chain of isles between the Andaman Sea and the Bay of Bengal, they said.

Waypoints are geographic locations, worked out by calculating longitude and latitude, that help pilots navigate along established air corridors.

A third source familiar with the investigation said inquiries were focusing increasingly on the theory that someone who knew how to fly a plane deliberately diverted the flight, with 239 people on board, hundreds of miles off its intended course from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

“What we can say is we are looking at sabotage, with hijack still on the cards,” said that source, a senior Malaysian police official.

All three sources declined to be identified because they were not authorised to speak to the media and due to the sensitivity of the investigation. Continue reading “Radar data suggests MH370 plane flown deliberately toward Andaman Islands”

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Seismic event turns focus back to Vietnam waters

Malaysiakini
Mar 14, 2014

The search for the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 appears to be shifting back and forth between east and west of peninsula Malaysia, with latest information from scientists in China suggesting that the plane may have triggered a seismic event when it impacted the sea some 150km off the southern tip of Vietnam.

A team of seismologists at a top China research university said they detected a slight seismic event on the sea floor between Vietnam and Malaysia on March 8 which could be a result of an impact.

“It was a non-seismic zone, therefore judging from the time and location of the event, it might be related to the missing MH370 flight,” said a statement posted on the University of Science and Technology of China website.

This was also reported by the South China Morning Post. Continue reading “Seismic event turns focus back to Vietnam waters”

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Long haul ahead for answers to missing MH370

by Joseph Sipalan
The Malay Mail Online
March 14, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 14 — While investigators have doubled efforts in the search for the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, the chances of a swift recovery and more pertinently, answers to its sudden disappearance midflight, are looking more remote with each passing day.

US officials, who are aiding Malaysia in a multi-nation hunt for the Boeing 777-200 carrying 239 people, are pursuing a new lead west to the Indian Ocean, after its satellites picked up electronic pulses that signalled the plane remained airborne hours after it flitted off radar.

If proven true, it could make an already daunting operation even more difficult to conduct and coordinate as the sheer size of the Indian Ocean would increase the search area exponentially.

But the chances of finding the plane intact—seven days after flight MH370 was to hand landed in Beijing—in the world’s third largest water body are looking slim.

The Indian Ocean has an average depth of 13,002 feet (3,963 m) while its deepest point, the Java Trench is believed to be at -23,812 feet (-7,258 m), according to information in the CIA World Factbook.

The Boeing 777 aircraft had enough fuel to fly up to 8.30am on March 8, leaving it with some seven hours of fuel in its tanks when it lost contact with Subang Air Traffic Control (ATC). Continue reading “Long haul ahead for answers to missing MH370”

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India Looking for Malaysian Jet as U.S. Sees Air Piracy

By Alan Levin, Kartikay Mehrotra and Anurag Kotoky
Bloomberg News
Mar 14, 2014

India’s navy set up a search zone for the missing Malaysian airliner in the Andaman Sea, hundreds of miles off the course of Flight 370, as evidence mounted that the plane may have flown long after controllers lost contact.

India has sent five ships and four aircraft to search for the plane, V.S.R. Murthy, commander for Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Indian Coast Guard, said by phone today. Aviation investigators are compiling signs the Boeing Co. (BA) 777-200 veered off its route and traveled west over Malaysia (MAS), beyond the limits of the country’s radars, according to two people who asked not to be identified with the probe active.

A satellite transmitter on the plane was active for about five hours, indicating the plane was operational after its transponder shut down less than an hour after takeoff, said three U.S. government officials. The 777 can cruise at 500 miles (805 kilometers) an hour or more, meaning it may have flown for as far as 2,500 miles beyond its last point of contact if it was intact and had enough fuel.

The information adds to the mystery surrounding the March 8 disappearance of the Malaysian Airline System Bhd. plane carrying 239 people. With no evidence of a mechanical failure or pilot error, U.S. investigators are treating the disappearance as a case of air piracy, though it remains unclear by whom, one person said. Continue reading “India Looking for Malaysian Jet as U.S. Sees Air Piracy”

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Controversy as shaman performs ritual to help find missing Malaysia Airlines plane

Lindsay Murdoch
Sydney Morning Herald
March 14, 2014

Kuala Lumpur: As Malaysia’s government struggled to defend its handling of the search for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane, controversy has erupted over a witch doctor who carried out a ritual at the capital’s international airport, who claimed he was trying to find it.

Opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim said the government had never before embarrassed itself to this extent on the international stage by allowing Ibrahim Mat Zin, the witch doctor or shaman, to perform a ritual in public that was an affront to Islam. Continue reading “Controversy as shaman performs ritual to help find missing Malaysia Airlines plane”

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US experts: MH370’s last ‘ping’ sent over water

The Malay Mail Online
March 14, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 14 — Flight MH370 had sent a series of “pings” or electronic pulses, with the last transmitted from a location over water at a cruising altitude, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported today as searchers cast their eyes further west towards the Indian Ocean in the hunt for the missing Malaysia Airlines (MAS) passenger plane.

Citing several unnamed US military and space industry officials who had been briefed on the investigation, the US daily reported that the satellites had also received speed and altitude information about the aircraft from the five or six “pings” before the pulses disappeared, which the experts believe could help them decipher its route and location.

But the people involved in the matter had declined to divulge the specific flight path the plane had transmitted, WSJ reported.

According to the report, an industry official said it was possible that the system sending them had been turned off by someone onboard the plane.

The report follows new evidence showing the Boeing 777-200 jumbo jet carrying 239 people had continued its flight hours after it supposedly left radar detection. Continue reading “US experts: MH370’s last ‘ping’ sent over water”

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US: Search may extend to Indian Ocean

Malaysiakini/Reuters
Mar 14, 2014

A new search area for Malaysia Airlines (MAS) Flight MH370 may be opened in the Indian Ocean, the White House said, significantly broadening the potential location of the plane, which disappeared nearly a week ago with 239 people on board.

Expanding the search area to the Indian Ocean would be consistent with the theory that the Boeing 777 may have detoured to the west about an hour after take-off from the Malaysian capital Kuala Lumpur en route to Beijing.

“It’s my understanding that based on some new information that’s not necessarily conclusive – but new information – an additional search area may be opened in the Indian Ocean,” White House spokesperson Jay Carney told reporters in Washington.

Carney did not specify the nature of the new information and Malaysian officials were not immediately available to comment.

The disappearance of the MAS plane is one of the most baffling mysteries in the history of modern aviation. There has been no trace of the plane nor any sign of wreckage despite a search by the navies and military aircraft of more than a dozen countries across Southeast Asia. Continue reading “US: Search may extend to Indian Ocean”

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Rare but sometimes, plane crash sites are not found, says aviation expert

The Malaysian Insider
March 14, 2014

If efforts to find the missing flight MH370 fail as the search enters its first week, it might be that the crash site simply cannot be found, says a former aviation safety and security writer.

Citing a 1972 crash involving a Pan Alaska Airways flight, Sylvia Adcock, writing in CNN’s website, said a Cessna took off from Anchorage bound for Juneau in bad weather. The plane never arrived.

The search for the missing aircraft was intense and covered an area of 325,000 square miles, with up to 3,600 flight hours involved in the search for the wreckage. It was never found and the search was called off 39 days later. Continue reading “Rare but sometimes, plane crash sites are not found, says aviation expert”

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Pentagon convinced of ‘manual intervention’ in MH370 transponder, communications shutdown

The Malay Mail Online
March 14, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 14 — Seven days since flight MH370 fell off the radar, two senior US defence officials are now convinced there was “manual intervention” that led to the shutdown of two communication systems aboard the jumbo jet that happened separately.

US broadcasting network ABC News cited one of the military officials as saying the information indicates the Malaysia Airlines (MAS) plane did not fall out of the sky due to a catastrophic failure of its systems, a theory that had been previously floated after the Boeing 777-200 vanished without a trace.

The report also cited US investigators saying the two modes of communication were “systematically shut down”.

That means the US team “is convinced that there was manual intervention”, ABC News reported on its website this morning, citing anonymous sources—bolstering speculation of a hijack. Continue reading “Pentagon convinced of ‘manual intervention’ in MH370 transponder, communications shutdown”

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US says lost MH370 flew on for hours, flight data given by Malaysia

The Malaysian Insider
March 14, 2014

Evidence that flight MH370 flew on for another four hours after vanishing early Saturday morning came from data shared by Malaysian authorities, not from engine maker Rolls-Royce, Washington Post reported today.

As a result of unspecified “new information,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said authorities searching for the Boeing 777-200ER may expand the hunt into the Indian Ocean, which extends hundreds of kilometres further west.

Obama administration officials later said the new information was that the plane’s engines remained running for approximately four hours after it vanished from radar early Saturday en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. There were 239 people on board.

One senior administration official said the data showing the plane engines running hours after contact was lost came from the Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System, or ACARS, a way that planes maintain contact with ground stations through radio or satellite signals.

The official said Malaysian authorities shared the flight data with the administration. Continue reading “US says lost MH370 flew on for hours, flight data given by Malaysia”

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Apakah kejayaan yang dicapai oleh Perdana Menteri dari segi membanteras “rasuah besar-besaran” sejak April 2009?

Tuan Lim Kit Siang [ Gelang Patah ] minta PERDANA MENTERI menyatakan kejayaan yang dicapai dari segi membanteras “rasuah besar-besaran” sejak beliau memegang jawatan Perdana Menteri pada April 2009 dan jumlah serta nama-nama “jerung besar” yang didakwa dan disabit kesalahan kerana rasuah.

JAWAPAN: YB SENATOR DATUK PAUL LOW SENG KUAN
MENTERI DI JABATAN PERDANA MENTERI

Tuan Yang di-Pertua,

SPRM tidak pernah membezakan sesuatu kes samada kes itu besar ataupun tidak. SPRM sebagai sebuah agensi penguatkuasa sentiasa melaksanakan tugas menyiasat kes-kes rasuah tanpa mengira kedudukan, status dan fahaman politik seseorang individu.

Besar atau kecil sesuatu kes rasuah bergantung kepada impak buruk yang diterima oleh negara dan seluruh masyarakat akibat perlakuan rasuah tanpa mengira nilai rasuah yang terlibat samada kecil atau besar.

Namun begitu, tidak dinafikan terdapat beberapa kes yang menarik perhatian ramai kerana beberapa sebab, antaranya melibatkan individu yang berprofil tinggi, melibatkan kepentingan awam ataupun amaun yang besar. Antara kes-kes yang mendapat perhatian sejak penubuhan SPRM adalah:-
Continue reading “Apakah kejayaan yang dicapai oleh Perdana Menteri dari segi membanteras “rasuah besar-besaran” sejak April 2009?”

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Distrust adding to Malaysian jet confusion, say analysts

The Malaysian Insider
March 13, 2014

Deep distrust between Asian neighbours and sensitive security issues are jamming essential communication lines in the chaotic hunt for a Malaysia Airlines plane, analysts said today.

Bickering between Malaysia, China and others involved in trying to solve the baffling weekend disappearance of the jet has exposed longstanding tensions and prevented a coordinated response, they said.

“There clearly are communication problems on multiple levels. There is an underlying lack of trust in these matters,” Bridget Welsh, an associate professor of political science at Singapore Management University, told AFP.

“The issues of protecting territory, security intelligence and interests are starting to win over the common goal of finding the plane and closure.” Continue reading “Distrust adding to Malaysian jet confusion, say analysts”

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Amid Search for Plane, Malaysian Leaders Face Rare Scrutiny

by Thomas Fuller
New York Times
MARCH 12, 2014

SEPANG, Malaysia — Malaysia’s governing elite has clung to power without interruption since independence from Britain almost six decades ago through a combination of tight control of information, intimidation of the opposition and, until recently, robust economic growth.

But worldwide bafflement at the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has challenged the country’s paternalistic political culture and exposed its coddled leaders to the withering judgments of critics from around the world.

Civilian and military leaders on Wednesday revealed that they had known for the past four days, but did not publicly disclose, that military radar had picked up signals of what may have been the missing aircraft. It appeared to be flying on a westerly course sharply off its intended flight path to Beijing.

If the radar readings were from the missing plane, it could mean a radical reinterpretation of where it ended up. And it was only under a barrage of intense questioning on Wednesday from a room packed with reporters who had arrived from many countries that officials acknowledged that the last recorded radar plot point showed the jet flying in the direction of the Indian Ocean — and at a cruising altitude, suggesting it could have flown much farther.

That raised the question of why the information had not been released earlier. Continue reading “Amid Search for Plane, Malaysian Leaders Face Rare Scrutiny”