Did Missing Malaysia flight DISINTEGRATE at 35,000 feet? Search team find what they believe is part of plane door and tail as Interpol probes claims four people boarded using stolen passports

Search team finds what it believes is part of a door and a plane's tail



Authorities say at least two people were travelling on stolen passports

Interpol said its database with information about them wasn't checked



The tickets they used were bought through through a Chinese airline

Flight MH370 declared missing nearly 90 minutes after it was due to land

The missing 227 passengers and 12 crew were from 14 different countries

No terrorist organisations have claimed responsibility for the attack



Debris from the missing Boeing 777 flight is believed to have been found off Vietnam as Interpol investigates whether up to four passengers boarded the plane using stolen passports.

A Vietnamese search team has found what they believe is part of a door and an airplane's tail in the first major breakthrough in the hunt for missing aircraft.

The suspected fragments have been located around 50 miles from south-west of Tho Chu Island, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Investigators are narrowing the focus of their inquiries on the possibility that the plane disintegrated in mid-flight, a senior source said on Sunday

'The fact that we are unable to find any debris so far appears to indicate that the aircraft is likely to have disintegrated at around 35,000 feet,' said the source, who is involved in the investigations in Malaysia.

It comes as Interpol criticised Thailand's lax airport security after it emerged at least two passengers' passports were stolen , prompting fears that terrorists might have used them to get on board the Malaysia Airlines flight MH307

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From above: A picture taken by personnel on a Vietnamese search aircraft and made available by Tienphong.vn shows what was believed to be a piece of debris of missing Malaysia Airlines airplane. No trace of the object has been found

Italian tourist Luigi Maraldi, 37, shows his current passport during a press conference at a police station in Phuket island, southern Thailand. One passenger on the missing plane travelled on the stolen passport of Mr Maraldi

Italian national Mr Maraldi had reported his passport stolen in August 2013

The possibility of a further two stolen passports used on the same flight is now being investigated as it emerges that no cross checks were carried out against Interpol's lost and stolen database.

Procedural checks would have revealed that at least two passengers were travelling on stolen passports stolen.

Malaysian authorities now believe they have CCTV images of the two men using the stolen passports to board the flights.



The images have been circulated across international intelligence agencies and will be cross-referenced with facial recognition software.

The passports were used to buy tickets booked in the names of Italian Luigi Maraldi and Austrian Christian Kozel on March 6, 2014, and issued in the Thai city of Pattaya, a popular beach resort south of the capital Bangkok.



Luigi Maraldi, 37, the owner of one of the passports, was listed as the sole Italian national on the missing flight. This afternoon he told how the document was stolen while he was on holiday in July last year on the island Phuket.

Mr Maraldi said it happened when a deal went wrong at a motorcycle shop in Patong.



Philip Wood, an IBM executive who had been working in Beijing over the past two years was aboard the the missing Malaysia Airlines jet liner

Missing: Philip Wood, an IBM executive was aboard the Malaysia Airlines flight that went missing over the South China Sea

Mr Maraldi reported his passport stolen in Thailand last August and was allowed to travel back to his native Italy on temporary documents.

On Sunday, his father Walter explained the original was stolen after he used it to hire a motorbike.

'Last summer he was in Thailand and handed over the passport so he could hire a scooter but when he brought it back, they said they had already given it back to someone else, so he reported it stolen,' he said.

Mr Maraldi added:'The whole thing is a mix up - we have no idea who the person was that used my son's passport. The first I knew something had happened was when my son rang from Thailand on Saturday morning to say he was alive.

He said he had seen his name on the news reports as being on the missing airplane and he wanted to let us know he was alive and well. To be honest, I had no idea whet he was talking about as I hadn't seen the news by then.

'Once everything was cleared up, we said goodbye and I went and watched the news - a few minutes later the Italian Foreign Ministry rang to ask if I was the father of Luigi Maraldi and to say that he was on the passenger list.

'They were amazed when I said they were mistaken as I had just spoken to him and he was fine. They asked me for his number so they could call and check for themselves.

'They said his passport had been used by someone and they needed to check for certain he was ok. We are delighted that he is ok but he was never really involved in the disaster directly.'



Risman Siregar (left) comforts his wife Erlina Panjaitan (centre). They are the parents of Firman Chandra Siregar, a 24 year-old passenger

Relatives of victims from the missing Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200 plane arrive for a meeting with airline officials in Beijing Relatives of those on board the missing Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200 arrive for a meeting with airline officials in Beijing on March 9 The owner of the other stolen passport was Austrian citizen Christian Kozel, 30, who's name also appeared on the passenger manifest. Mr Kozel discovered he had been listed when uniformed police officers turned up at his home in Salzburg at the weekend.

He said: 'I was pretty shocked when I saw them at my door, and was relieved to find out that although I was dead, at least it was only on paper.' But it still left him with a lot of worried friends and relatives that he had to reassure after it was reported that he was dead. He said he had reported the passport as stolen while he was in the same part of Thailand two years ago, and that it had apparently then been used by someone illegally. In a statement issued today, the France-based international police body said information about the thefts was entered into its database after they were stolen in Thailand. Officials from Italy and Austria also confirmed that the travel documents of both men were reported stolen in Thailand. Interpol said it was now investigating all other passports used to board flight MH370 and was working to determine the 'true identities' of the passengers who used the stolen passports.

'Whilst it is too soon to speculate about any connection between these stolen passports and the missing plane, it is clearly of great concern that any passenger was able to board an international flight using a stolen passport listed in Interpol's databases,' Interpol Secretary General Ronald Noble said in a statement. Noble expressed frustration that few of Interpol's 190 member countries 'systematically' search the database to determine whether documents being used to board a plane are registered as lost or stolen. 'This is a situation we had hoped never to see. For years Interpol has asked why should countries wait for a tragedy to put prudent security measures in place at borders and boarding gates,' he said.

Rescue operation: A Vietnamese air force pilot touches the controls of a transport plane today

Rescue vessel Rescue 101, loaded with a Chinese emergency response team, departs from Sanya Port

PILOT ENJOYED FLYING SO MUCH HE HAD HIS OWN SIMULATOR



The pilot of a Malaysia Airlines jet that went missing on Saturday enjoyed flying the Boeing 777 so much that he spent his off days tinkering with a flight simulator of the plane that he had set up at home, current and former co-workers said.

Zaharie Ahmad Shah, 53, captain of the airliner carrying 239 people bound for Beijing from the Malaysian capital, had always wanted to become a pilot and joined the national carrier in 1981. Airline staff who worked with the pilot said Zaharie knew the ins and outs of the Boeing 777 extremely well, as he was always practicing with the simulator. They declined to be identified due to company policy.

'He was an aviation tech geek. You could ask him anything and he would help you. That is the kind of guy he is,' said a Malaysia Airlines co-pilot who had flown with Zaharie in the past.

Zaharie set up the Boeing 777 simulator at his home in a suburb on the outskirts of the Malaysian capital where many airline staff stay as it provides quick access to the Kuala Lumpur International Airport. The security breach has led to fears that missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH307 may have been taken down by terrorists. But authorities have confirmed that no terrorist organisations have claimed responsibility and there has been no electronic 'chatter' to suggest any known terror group was behind the aircraft's disappearance. There is also no evidence of foul play and no mayday calls were received before the plane disappeared.

It comes as t he chief of the Malaysian Air Force said that radar indicated the missing plane may have turned back before it crashed. '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 turn back,' Rodzali Daud, the Royal Malaysian Air Force chief, told reporters at a news conference. Despite dozens of military and civilians vessels and aircraft criss-crossing waters to the east and west of Malaysia, no wreckage has been found, although oil slicks have been reported in the sea south of Vietnam. Malaysian Security officials earlier revealed they had footage of two passengers traveling on passports stolen in Thailand - one registered to an Italian and the other an Austrian - making their way through Kuala Lumpur passport control to the aircraft . The passengers being checked had all bought their tickets through China Southern Airlines. It appears the the tickets linked to the Italian and Austrian passports were bought together in Thai baht at identical prices, according to China's official e-ticket verification system Travelsky. The ticket numbers are contiguous, which indicates the tickets were issued together. It follows reports that an anonymous pilot told Malaysian newspapers that he had heard a 'mumbled' last transmission from the aircraft - although this is contradicted by air traffic controllers who say there was no distress call.

This oil slick was found in the Gulf of Thailand, about 90 miles south of Vietnam's Tho Chu Island - the same area where the flight disappeared from radar early Saturday morning

An aerial view of what is believed to be an oil slick aircraft stretching a length of about 80 km in the sea off the Vietnamese coast. Investigators are trying to determine whether there is a link between the slick and the missing 777

U.S. officials also confirmed they have dispatched a team of safety experts including FBI agents to Southeast Asia to assist in the investigation of the Boeing 777, which disappeared shortly after takeoff with 239 people on board.

While the wreckage of the plane has still not been found, new photos of oil slicks in the South China Sea have emerged and some evidence is beginning to point towards a terrorist attack.

And dramatically, a second pilot who was in the skies over the South China Sea when the 777 vanished has spoken about hearing 'mumbling' at the other end of communications with the plane.

The captain, who asked to remain anonymous, told Malaysian media outlets he was asked to get in contact with the pilot flying the missing plane on an emergency frequency and establish their position.

He said he believes he spoke to the co-pilot, but that there were 'interference' and 'mumbling' before they lost the connection.



Earlier on Saturday, two oil slicks were spotted by the Vietnamese air force in the Gulf of Thailand, about 90 miles south of Vietnam's Tho Chu Island - the same area where the flight disappeared from radar.

The plane - carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew members - took off from Kuala Lumpur at 12.21am (4.21pm GMT) Saturday bound for Beijing, where it was expected to land at 6.30am (10.30pm GMT).

But after reaching 35,000ft and 120 nautical miles off the coast of the Malaysian town of Kota Bharu the plane vanished.

IBM employee Philip Wood, 51, was identified as the only adult passenger traveling on a U.S. passport on Flight MH307.

Two other American travelers have been named as toddlers Leo Meng, two, and Nicole Meng, four.

Family members of passengers aboard a missing plane cry at a hotel in Putrajaya, Malaysia

Members of Fo Guang Shan rescue team offer a special prayer for passengers aboard a missing plane, at Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Sepang, Malaysia

Buddhist monks offer a special prayer for passengers aboard a missing plane Hugh Dunleavy (center), Malaysia Airlines head of commercial, speaks to media at Lido Hotel in Beijing, China Personnel inspect life jackets put inside a Soviet-made AN-26, used by the Vietnamese Air Force as a search and rescue aircraft, as it is refueled before making an other flight over the seas off Vietnam The emergency response team sent by China's Ministry of Transport set out early Sunday morning from Sanya to sea area where missing Malaysia Airline flight MH 370 may have crashed

And a U.S. technology firm says 20 of its employees were aboard. Jacey Zuniga, a spokeswoman for Freescale Semiconductor, of Austin, Texas, says 12 Malaysian and eight Chinese employees are 'confirmed passengers'.

She says no American citizen Freescale employees were on the flight.

'At present, we are solely focused on our employees and their families,' Gregg Lowe, president and chief executive of Freescale said. 'Our thoughts and prayers are with those affected by this tragic event.'

The company has assembled a team of counsellors for those affected by the tragedy.



Anxious: Families of those on board the Malaysia Airlines Flight MH307 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, face an anxious wait for news of the search mission at Kuala Lumpur airport

Grief: Family and friends waiting for the plane to arrive break down as they hear the jet has gone missing. The flight vanished off the coast of Vietnam around two hours after taking off Despair: There were 227 passengers and 12 crew members on board Flight MH370, from 14 different nations

Mr Mukherjee, the vice-president of operations in China for the Pennsylvania-based XCoal Energy and Resources, was one of five Indians on the flight Globetrotters: Catherine and Robert Lawton, from Brisbane, were named as one of three couples from Australia who were missing Victims: This photo released by Hamid Ramlan shows his daughter Norliakmar Hamid (second right) and her husband Razahan Zamani (right), who were passengers on a missing Malaysia Airlines flight On board: Co-pilot Fariq Abdul Hamid (left) and passenger Firman Siregar (right)

French teenagers Zhao Yan and Hadrien Wattrelos had enrolled together at the Lycee Francais International de Pekin. Both are believed to have been on board THE POSSIBLE CAUSES THAT COULD HAVE BROUGHT DOWN THE FLIGHT

The most dangerous parts of a flight are takeoff and landing. Incidents rarely happen when midflight. The disappearance of a Malaysia Airlines jet well into its flight has led experts to assume that whatever happened was quick and left the pilots no time to make a distress call. It initially appears there was either a sudden breakup of the plane or something that led it into a quick, steep dive. Some experts even suggested an act of terrorism. Possible causes for a crash include: Catastrophic structural failure This could have damaged the airframe or engines. Given the plane's impressive safety record, experts suggest this is unlikely. Bad weather Planes are designed to fly though most severe storms, but poor weather has caused crashes in the past. However, the skies were clear in this case. Pilot disorientation The pilots could have taken the plane off autopilot and somehow gone course. Failure of both engines In January 2008, a British Airways 777 crashed about 1,000 feet short of the runway at London's Heathrow Airport. There were no fatalities. Such a scenario is possible, but the plane could glide for up to 20 minutes, giving pilots plenty of time to make an emergency call. A bomb Several planes have been brought down by bombs. If the debris field is large it will indicate the plane broke apart high up.

Hijacking A traditional hijacking seems unlikely given that a plane's captors typically land at an airport and have some type of demand. But a 9/11-esque hijacking is possible, with terrorists forcing the plane into the ocean.



Pilot suicide There were two large jet crashes in the late 1990s that investigators suspected were caused by pilots deliberately crashing.



Accidental shoot-down There have been two previous cases of passenger jets being brought down accidentally by the military. The two Canadian passengers were identified as mining executive Muktesh Mukherjee and his wife Xiaomo Bai. According to their Facebook pages, the couple had two young sons, who were apparently not on the flight.

Also named among the passengers were Australian nationals Catherine and Robert Lawton, from Brisbane.

The husband and wife were reportedly traveling with their compatriots Mary and Rodney Burrows.

A third couple from Australia, Li Yuan and Gu Naijun, from Sydney, were also listed as missing.

The lack of an emergency call 'suggests something very sudden and very violent happened,' William Waldock, who teaches accident investigation at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Arizona, said. Scott Hamilton, managing director of aviation consultancy Leeham Co, added: 'Either you had a catastrophic event that tore the airplane apart, or you had a criminal act.

'It was so quick and they didn't radio.' Today, the UK offered assistance with investigations, Foreign Secretary William Hague said. Mr Hague said it was 'too early to speculate' on the significance of the presence on the flight of up to four passengers with suspect identities. 'It is a terrible tragedy and our thoughts are with the families and loved ones of people awaiting for definitive news,' Mr Hague told Sky News' Murnaghan programme. 'We have offered any assistance that we can give to the Malaysian authorities and of course we have been checking up on whether any British nationals were involved. 'We are not aware of any at the moment but we will continue that checking.' Asked about the significance of the suspect identities, he said: 'It is too early to speculate about what that means. 'The UK will assist the Malaysian authorities in any way we can with any investigation if it is relevant to do so in any way.' Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said search operations in an area about midway between Malaysia and Vietnam's southern coast were being intensified. It comes as the Vietnamese air force reported it has spotted two oil slicks, thought to be from the wreckage of the crash. A Vietnamese government statement said the slicks were spotted off the southern tip of Vietnam. They were each between six miles and nine miles long, officials said. The statement said the slicks were consistent with the kinds that would be left by fuel from a crashed jetliner, but it was not clear if they were connected to the missing aircraft.

'Vietnam rescue airplanes saw two oil spills and one smoke column in the area around 150 miles west of Tho Chu island, but we can't confirm it's from that Malaysia plane,' said Pham Quy Tieu, vice minister of transportation. 'We sent two maritime boats and some military boats there to clarify, each boat with about 20 people. The oil spills are about 15km (9.3 miles) long. Those boats will be there in about three to four hours.' Troubled waters: A fisherman works on his boat near a local naval base at Phu Quoc island, in the waters of southern Vietnam, where a Malaysian Airlines jet was presumed lost Search by sea: A Vietnam coast guard ship is seen anchored at a local naval base at Phu Quoc island

Concern: The arrivals board at Beijing Airport listed flight MH370 as being delayed Desperate: Relatives waiting for news have been booked into a hotel at Beijing Airport

Malaysian Airlines senior official Dr Hugh Dunleavy, left, speaks to Ignatius Ong, from the airline's crisis management team, in Beijing on Saturday

Hugh Dunleavy, left, and Ignatius Ong, right, of Malaysian Airlines, answer questions at a press conference

Less than one hour after Flight MH370 left Kuala Lumpur for Beijing, the plane disappeared from radar.

Malaysia Airlines CEO Ahmad Jauhari Yahya said there was no indication that the pilots sent a distress signal. The fact that there was apparently no call for help suggests that whatever happened to the flight occurred quickly.





'We are doing everything in our power to locate the plane. We are doing everything we can to ensure every possible angle has been addressed'

- Malaysian transport minister Hishamuddin H ussein

'We are doing everything in our power to locate the plane. We are doing everything we can to ensure every possible angle has been addressed,' Transport Minister Hishamuddin Hussein told reporters near the Kuala Lumpur International Airport.

'We are looking for accurate information from the Malaysian military. They are waiting for information from the Vietnamese side,' he said.



Ships in the area have been involved, scouring the vast site for signs of a wreckage.

The South China Sea is a tense region with competing territorial claims that have led to several low-level conflicts, particularly between China and the Philippines.



That antipathy briefly faded Saturday as China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Singapore and Malaysia all sent ships and planes to the region.

Clue in the water: A handout picture provided by Tienphong.vn shows what is believed to be an oil slick stretching a length of about 9 miles in the sea off the Vietnamese coast

Without a trace: This image courtesy of Flightradar24, shows the flight track of Malaysian Airlines flight 370 on March 7, 2014

Malaysia had dispatched 15 planes and nine ships to the area. The U.S. Navy was sending a warship and a surveillance plane, and Singapore said it would send a submarine and a plane. China and Vietnam also were sending aircraft to help in the search.



Malaysian Airlines has confirmed the majority of those on board are from Malaysia and China, with three Americans, two Canadians and seven Australians and passengers from France.

Vietnamese state media, quoting a senior naval official, had reported that the Boeing 777-200ER flight had crashed off south Vietnam, but those reports have been denied, with the plane listed as 'missing'.

The Vietnamese Navy confirmed it detected the aircraft's emergency locator signal 153 miles south of Phu Quoc island in the South China sea.

Admiral Ngo Van Phat told the Vietnamese newspaper Tuoi Tre that radar showed the aircraft had crashed into the sea off the southern tip of Vietnam, close to the border with Cambodia.

TIMELINE OF FLIGHT MH307

12.21am (4.21pm GMT): Flight MH307 takes off from Kuala Lumpur airport



1.21am (5.21pm GMT): The flight failed to check in as scheduled while flying between Malaysia and Ho Chi Minh city, Vietnam



2.40am (6.40pm GMT): The flight loses contact with air traffic controllers



6.30am (10.30pm GMT): The flight was scheduled to land at Beijing



7.54am (11.54pm GMT): The airline issued a statement saying it had not landed and was officially missing



The paper later reported the Admiral qualifying his statement, saying the radar had revealed the presumed crash site.

Malaysian naval vessels saw no immediate sign of wreckage when they reached the maritime area off the country's northeast coast this morning, a senior rescue official said.

Malaysia has sent three maritime enforcement ships and a navy vessel to the area, backed by three helicopters, a Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency official said.

' Our aircraft asset spotted an orange speck in the sea where the last signal came from. We sent a vessel to search the area and it was confirmed that it was nothing,' he said.

The signal picked up by the Navy is believed to be the Emergency Locator Transmittor, which can be activated manually by the flight crew or automatically upon impact.

Crying relatives of Chinese passengers on board the plane wept at Beijing airport as it became clear the jet had probably crashed.

An unconfirmed report on a flight tracking website said the aircraft had plunged 650ft and changed course shortly before all contact was lost.

The route would have taken flight MH370, a B777-200 aircraft, across the Malaysian mainland in a north-easterly direction and then across the Gulf of Thailand.

Shock: Distressed relatives wait for news of the Malaysia Airlines plane which was due to land in Beijing. Malaysia's Transport Minister said 14 hours into the massive search and rescue mission, that 'no crash site' has been located Missing: Flight MH370 was flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing when it lost contact over Vietnam Notice: A message written on a board at Beijing Airport tells relatives the Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 is delayed