Malaysia Airlines MH370: Military denies missing plane detected on radar far from flight path

Updated

The Malaysian air force has denied reports a passenger plane that vanished with 239 people on board was detected on radar far west of its flight path.

Interpol has all but ruled out terrorism as the cause of the disappearance of flight MH370, which went missing on Saturday while travelling from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, but the CIA says it is not ruling anything out.

In one of the most baffling mysteries in recent aviation history, a massive search operation has so far found no trace of the aircraft or its passengers, six of whom were Australian.

Air force chief General Rodzali Daud was this morning quoted by Malaysian media as saying that radar had last detected the plane over the Strait of Malacca off western Malaysia.

That location would have indicated the flight had banked far to the west of its intended flight path over the South China Sea.

But Mr Rodzali says he "did not make any such statements," and that newspaper Berita Harian published "what is clearly an inaccurate and incorrect report".

However, he says authorities have not ruled out the possibility the airliner inexplicably changed course before losing contact.

"The [air force] has not ruled out the possibility of an air turn-back on a reciprocal heading before the aircraft vanished from the radar," he said.

"This resulted in the search and rescue operations being widened to the vicinity of the waters [off the west coast of Malaysia]."

A spokesman for the Malaysian prime minister's office earlier said he had not been informed by the military of evidence showing the plane had reached the Malacca Strait.

The spokesman said all that had been confirmed to him was that military radar suggested it could have turned back from its scheduled flight path and the search of the Malacca Strait was in order to cover all possibilities.

At the time it lost contact with civilian air traffic control, the plane was roughly midway between Malaysia's east coast town of Kota Bharu and the southern tip of Vietnam, flying at 10,670 metres (35,000 feet).

The Strait of Malacca, one of the world's busiest shipping channels, runs along Malaysia's west coast, while Kota Bharu is on the north-east coast.

Reports the plane was detected near the strait appeared to undermine the theory that the aircraft suffered a sudden, catastrophic mechanical failure, as it would mean the plane flew at least 500 kilometres after its last contact with air traffic control.

A huge search operation for the missing plane has been mostly focused on the shallow waters of the Gulf of Thailand off Malaysia's east coast, although the Strait of Malacca has been included since Sunday.

The search was today expanded into the Andaman Sea, hundreds of kilometres to the north-west of the original search radius.

Navy ships, military aircraft, helicopters, coastguard and civilian vessels from 10 nations have criss-crossed the seas off both coasts of Malaysia without success.

China today added two planes to the search, while Vietnam announced it was suspending its search.

Police had earlier said they were investigating whether any passengers or crew on the plane had personal or psychological problems that might explain its disappearance, along with the possibility of a hijack, sabotage or mechanical failure.

There was no distress signal or radio contact indicating a problem and, in the absence of any wreckage or flight data, police have been left trawling through passenger and crew lists for potential leads.

Malaysian police chief Khalid Abu Bakar told a news conference that all passengers are being studied.

"Maybe somebody on the flight has bought a huge sum of insurance, who wants family to gain from it or somebody who has owed somebody so much money. We are looking at all possibilities," he said.

"We are looking very closely at the video footage taken at the KLIA (Kuala Lumpur International Airport), we are studying the behavioural pattern of all the passengers."

The airline said it was taking seriously a report by a South African woman who said the co-pilot of the missing plane had invited her and a female travelling companion to sit in the cockpit during a flight two years ago, in an apparent breach of security.

"Malaysia Airlines has become aware of the allegations being made against First Officer Fariq Ab Hamid which we take very seriously," the airline said.

"We are shocked by these allegations. We have not been able to confirm the validity of the pictures and videos of the alleged incident."

Investigators confirm two stolen passport holders are Iranian

The fact that at least two passengers on board had used stolen passports has raised suspicions of foul play, but Interpol says the pair have no link to any terrorist organisations.

Interpol says the Iranian nationals, aged 18 and 29, swapped their passports in Kuala Lumpur and used stolen Italian and Austrian passports to board flight MH370.

Passengers on flight MH370 Nationality Total China/Taiwan 153 (1 infant) Malaysia 38 Indonesia 7 Australia 6 India 5 France 4 USA 3 (1 infant) New Zealand 2 Ukraine 2 Canada 2 Russia 1 Netherlands 1 Italy 1 (stolen passport) Austria 1 (stolen passport)

Malaysian officials say one of the men, 18-year-old Pouria Nour Mohammad Mehrdad, was hoping to migrate to Germany.

They say his mother was waiting to meet him in Frankfurt.

The other Iranian has been identified as Delavar Seyed Mohammad Reza.

"The more information we get, the more we are inclined to conclude it is not a terrorist incident," Interpol secretary general Ronald Noble said.

However, Central Intelligence Agency director John Brennan said intelligence officials could not rule out terrorism as a factor.

"You cannot discount any theory," he said.

Police in Thailand, where the Italian and Austrian passports were stolen and the tickets used by the two men were booked, said they did not think the men were linked to the disappearance of the plane.

"We haven't ruled it out, but the weight of evidence we're getting swings against the idea that these men are or were involved in terrorism," Pattaya police chief Supachai Puikaewcome said.

Uncertainty, misinformation and rumour have dominated some reports over the four days since the plane vanished without a trace.

Two days ago, for instance, Malaysia's Civil Aviation chief reported to the press that five passengers failed to board the ill-fated aircraft, forcing the airline to remove their baggage from the plane.

But according to police chief Khalid Abu Bakar, that is not true.

"There is no such thing as five people who did not board the plane. There is no such thing," he said.

Family of missing Australians hoping for a miracle

About two-thirds of the 227 passengers and 12 crew now presumed to have died aboard the plane were Chinese.

Other nationalities included 38 Malaysians, seven Indonesians, five Indians, four French and three Americans.

The missing Australians are Brisbane couple Rod and Mary Burrows, Springfield Lakes couple Robert and Catherine Lawton and Sydney couple Gu Naijun and Li Yuan.

Mr Burrows's mother Irene Burrows says her heart is aching.

"I spoke to him a couple of days beforehand and he was very excited about going. It's not their first overseas trip but it was planned for a long time," she said.

She says family members will gather in Brisbane this morning.

"[We are] just waiting for some sort of news. If they've found the wreckage or if they can tell us ... how can a plane just disappear?"

Perth-based New Zealand man Paul Weeks was also on the flight, en route to Mongolia to begin a fly-in, fly-out role with mining contractor Transwest.

China has deployed 10 satellites using high-resolution earth imaging capabilities, visible light imaging and other technologies to "support and assist in the search and rescue operations".

US government officials from the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration have arrived in the region to provide "any necessary assistance" with the investigation, White House spokesman Jay Carney said.

The Boeing 777 has one of the best safety records of any commercial aircraft in service.

Its only previous fatal crash came on July 6 last year, when Asiana Airlines Flight 214 struck a seawall on landing in San Francisco, killing three people.

US plane-maker Boeing has declined to comment, beyond a brief statement saying it was monitoring the situation.

It has also joined the search.

ABC/wires

Topics: air-and-space, accidents, disasters-and-accidents, malaysia, asia, australia, nsw, qld, wa

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