Malaysia releases prelim report on missing MH370
3 May 2014 5:00 AM IST
In addition to the five-page report, dated 9 April, the government also released other information from the investigation into the flight, including audio recordings of conversations between the cockpit and air traffic control, the plane’s cargo manifest and its seating plan.
Malaysia also released a map showing the plane’s deducted flight path as well as a document detailing actions taken by authorities in the hours after the Boeing 777 disappeared from radar. The reports were mostly information that has been released since the jet disappeared while flying near the border separating Malaysian and Vietnamese airspace. The plane went off Malaysian radar at 1.21 am on 8 March, but Vietnamese air traffic controllers only queried about it at 1.38 am, according to the report, which was sent last month to the International Civil Aviation Organization.
The report also said Malaysian authorities did not launch an official search and rescue operation until four hours later, at 5.30 am, after efforts to locate the plane failed. A separate report listing the actions taken by air traffic controllers showed Vietnamese controllers contacted Kuala Lumpur after they failed to establish verbal contact with the pilots and the plane didn’t show up on their radar.
That report also showed that Malaysia Airlines at one point thought the plane may have entered Cambodian airspace. The airline said in the report that ‘MH370 was able to exchange signals with the flight and flying in Cambodian airspace,’ but that Cambodian authorities said they had no information or contact with Flight 370. It was unclear which flight it was referring to that exchanged signals with MH370. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak last week appointed a team of experts to review all the information the government had regarding the missing plane, and to decide which information should be made public.
‘The prime minister set, as a guiding principle, the rule that as long as the release of a particular piece of information does not hamper the investigation or the search operation, in the interests of openness and transparency, the information should be made public,’ Defense Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said in a statement on Thursday. Hishammuddin said Malaysia’s military radar tracked the jet making a turn-back in a westerly direction across Peninsular Malaysia after playing back radar data the next morning, nearly seven hours after the plane vanished from civilian radar.
He said he was informed about the military discovery two hours later and relayed this to Najib, who immediately ordered a search in the Strait of Malacca. He defended the military’s inaction in pursuing the plane for identification. ‘The aircraft was categorized as friendly by the radar operator and therefore no further action was taken at the time,’ Hishammuddin said.
Malaysia also released a map showing the plane’s deducted flight path as well as a document detailing actions taken by authorities in the hours after the Boeing 777 disappeared from radar. The reports were mostly information that has been released since the jet disappeared while flying near the border separating Malaysian and Vietnamese airspace. The plane went off Malaysian radar at 1.21 am on 8 March, but Vietnamese air traffic controllers only queried about it at 1.38 am, according to the report, which was sent last month to the International Civil Aviation Organization.
The report also said Malaysian authorities did not launch an official search and rescue operation until four hours later, at 5.30 am, after efforts to locate the plane failed. A separate report listing the actions taken by air traffic controllers showed Vietnamese controllers contacted Kuala Lumpur after they failed to establish verbal contact with the pilots and the plane didn’t show up on their radar.
That report also showed that Malaysia Airlines at one point thought the plane may have entered Cambodian airspace. The airline said in the report that ‘MH370 was able to exchange signals with the flight and flying in Cambodian airspace,’ but that Cambodian authorities said they had no information or contact with Flight 370. It was unclear which flight it was referring to that exchanged signals with MH370. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak last week appointed a team of experts to review all the information the government had regarding the missing plane, and to decide which information should be made public.
‘The prime minister set, as a guiding principle, the rule that as long as the release of a particular piece of information does not hamper the investigation or the search operation, in the interests of openness and transparency, the information should be made public,’ Defense Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said in a statement on Thursday. Hishammuddin said Malaysia’s military radar tracked the jet making a turn-back in a westerly direction across Peninsular Malaysia after playing back radar data the next morning, nearly seven hours after the plane vanished from civilian radar.
He said he was informed about the military discovery two hours later and relayed this to Najib, who immediately ordered a search in the Strait of Malacca. He defended the military’s inaction in pursuing the plane for identification. ‘The aircraft was categorized as friendly by the radar operator and therefore no further action was taken at the time,’ Hishammuddin said.
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