International

Malaysia military may have traced missing jet

(Reuters) – Malaysia’s military has traced what could have been the jetliner missing for almost five days to an area south of the Thai holiday island of Phuket, hundreds of miles to the west of its last known position, the country’s air force chief said on Wednesday. His statement followed a series of conflicting accounts of the flight path of the Boeing 777-200ER with 239 people on board, which left authorities uncertain even which ocean […]

New York City buildings explosion kills 2, at least 22 more missing

(Reuters) – Two New York buildings collapsed on Wednesday in an explosion believed to be caused by a gas leak, killing two people, injuring at least 22, and setting off a search for more feared trapped in the debris, officials said. A blast that scattered debris onto nearby rooftops brought down neighboring five-story buildings with a total of 15 apartments at about 9:30 a.m. (1330 GMT) on the largely residential block at East 116th Street […]

Malaysia military source says missing jet veered to west

(Reuters) – Malaysia’s military believes a jetliner missing for almost four days turned and flew hundreds of kilometers to the west after it last made contact with civilian air traffic control off the country’s east coast, a senior officer told Reuters on Tuesday. In one of the most baffling mysteries in recent aviation history, a massive search operation for the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200ER has so far found no trace of the aircraft or the […]

Missing Malaysian jet may have disintegrated in mid-air: source

(Reuters) – Officials investigating the disappearance of a Malaysian jet with 239 people on board suspect it may have disintegrated in mid-flight, a senior source said on Sunday, as Vietnam reported a possible sighting of wreckage from the plane. International police agency Interpol confirmed that two passengers on the flight had used stolen Austrian and Italian passports, raising suspicions of foul play. An Interpol spokeswoman said a check of all documents used to board the […]

Radar showed missing plane may have turned back-Malaysia military

(Reuters) – Radar tracking a missing Malaysia Airlines flight indicated that it may have turned back from its scheduled route to Beijing before disappearing, and Malaysian rescue teams have expanded their search to the country’s western coast, Malaysian military officials said on Sunday. “What we have done is actually look into the recording on the radar that we have and we realised there is a possibility the aircraft did make a turnback,” Rodzali Daud, the Royal Malaysian […]

Malaysian jet’s disappearance among rarest of aviation disasters

BY Niluksi Koswanage, Siva Govindasamy and Tim Hepher (Reuters) – The sudden disappearance of a Malaysia Airlines jetliner with 239 people aboard represents one of the rarest kinds of aviation disaster, and the mystery is compounded by uncertainty about which country’s jurisdiction the plane came down in. Take-off and, in particular, final approach and landing are the most inherently hazardous parts of a flight, and the periods when most accidents occur. Saturday’s red-eye flight, by contrast, vanished at cruising […]

Chinese Warships On Way To Rescue Mission

(Reuters) — Two warships of the Chinese navy, “Jinggangshan” and “Mianyang”, are on their way to sea area where the Malaysia Airline flight MH 370 was out of touch. The vessel “Jinggangshan”, loaded with life-saving equipments, underwater detection facilities and supplies of water and food, set out from Zhanjiang city of south China’s Guangdong Province at about 03:00 on Sunday for search and rescue mission. Two helicopters, 30 medical personnel, 10 divers and 52 marines are on board. Another Chinese […]

Malaysian plane presumed crashed; questions over false identities of 2 people on board raised

BY ANURADHA RAGHU AND NGUYEN PHUONG LINH (Reuters) – A Malaysia Airlines flight carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew was presumed to have crashed off the Vietnamese coast on Saturday, and European officials said two people on board were using false identities. There were no reports of bad weather and no sign of why the Boeing 777-200ER would have vanished from radar screens about an hour after it took off from Kuala Lumpur for Beijing. “We are […]

Malaysia Airlines missing jet: Two listed on passenger manifest not on board

(Reuters) – Two men from Austria and Italy, listed among the passengers on a missing Malaysia Airlines flight, were not in fact on board, officials in both European countries said on Saturday, and at least one of them had had his passport stolen. A passenger manifest issued by Malaysia Airlines after its plane went missing off the Vietnamese coast with 227 passengers and 12 crew included the names of Christian Kozel, 30, from Austria, and […]

Malaysia Airlines plane missing at sea off Vietnam, presumed crashed

(Reuters) – A Malaysia Airlines flight carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew went missing off the Vietnamese coast on Saturday and was presumed to have crashed. There were no reports of bad weather and no sign why theBoeing 777-200ER would have vanished from radar screens about an hour after it took off from Kuala Lumpur for Beijing. There were no signs of sabotage nor claims of a terrorist attack. However, in Europe, news reports and officials […]

Malaysia Airlines missing jet: Searchers spot oil slicks

Vietnamese rescue planes have spotted two oil slicks in the area where a Malaysia Airlines jet carrying 239 people disappeared over the South China Sea. The jet was en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. The oil slicks were spotted late on Saturday off the southern tip of Vietnam by air force planes dispatched to search for the missing Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 flight. “Two of our aircraft sighted two oil slicks around 15 to […]