Was it a terror attack? Two people on board Boeing 777 that disappeared over Vietnam were traveling on STOLEN PASSPORTS as missing U.S passengers identified as IBM exec and two toddlers



Ma laysia Airlines f light MH370 took off from Kuala Lumpur at 12.21am

Vietnamese Navy detected emergency signal 153 miles out to sea

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

Malaysian Transport Minister said 'no crash site has been found'

227 passengers and 12 crew were from 14 different countries including Malaysia, China, U.S., France, Canada, and Australia

Three Americans, including two toddlers, feared dead

IBM employee Philip Wood, 51, identified as sole adult American national aboard the missing plane



Two passengers believed to have been travelling on a stolen passports



Aviation expert Chris Yates said the aircraft will not have been carrying enough fuel to still be flying and 'will have crashed'

He said the investigation will look at two areas, the maintenance of the aircraft and possible terrorism

Vietnamese air force spot two oil slicks suspected to be from the wreckage



Missing American: The sole adult passenger traveling aboard the missing Malaysia Airlines flight on a U.S. passport has been identified as IBM executive Philip Wood, 51, who worked in Kuala Lumpur

An American national working for IBM in Malaysia has been identified as one of the passengers traveling on board the Malaysian Airlines plane that vanished off the coast of Vietnam as new information concerning stolen passports has raised fears that it may have been an act of terror.



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, 2, and Nicole Meng, 4.



Earlier today, two oil slicks were spotted by the Vietnamese air force that had joined a major search and rescue operation started when the aircraft disappeared shortly after losing contact with air traffic controllers.

The Boeing 777, with 227 passengers and 12 crew members, took off from Kuala Lumpur at 12.21am (4.21pm GMT) 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, prompting fears the aircraft 'could have crashed'.

As Malaysian Airlines released a full list of the passengers on board - including five children aged two to four years old - it emerged two passengers were traveling on stolen passports.

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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 Luigi Maraldi, 27, was listed as the sole Italian national on the missing flight, but according to his father, was not on the plane.

'Luigi called us early this morning to reassure us he was fine, but we didn’t know about the accident,' Walter Maraldi told NBC News. 'Thank God he heard about it before us.' The name of Austrian citizen Christian Kozel, 30, also appeared on the passenger manifest, but the European nation's foreign ministry stated that the man was safe back home, and that his passport had been stolen.

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Miracle escape for blind man who fell under Los Angeles... Share this article Share Officials from Italy and Austria confirmed that the travel documents of both men were reported stolen in Thailand. The Austrian passport was taken two years ago, and the Italian one last year.

A list of passenger names posted at the Beijing airport, apparently by Chinese authorities, listed three U.S. passport holders: Philip Tallmadge Wood, 51; Nicole Meng, 4; and Leo Meng, 2. Wood is believed to be an IBM technical storage executive who began working in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, only three months ago, according to his LinkedIn profile.

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 The two Canadian passengers were identified as mining executive Muktesh Mukherjee and his wife Xiaomo Bai. What may have caused the Malaysian Airlines plane to disappear

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-like 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. 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.

As the air search was abandoned overnight, aviation expert Chris Yates said the plane would not be carrying enough fuel to still be in the air and would 'definitely have crashed'. He told Sky News: 'Frankly the plane would not have been carrying enough fuel to stay aloft much longer than an hour after it was due to arrive in Beijing. 'We simply don't know the circumstances behind what caused that crash at the moment. 'There will be two areas for the investigation: the maintenance of the aircraft and also possible terrorism.' 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.' 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