Malaysia Airlines passenger jet goes missing, its fate still a ‘mystery’

PanARMENIAN.Net - The fate of a missing Malaysia Airlines jet is "a mystery".

The head of Malaysia's Civil Aviation Authority, Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, said officials had not ruled out hijacking as a cause of the plane's disappearance. He said all reported sightings of debris from the plane in the seas south of Vietnam were unconfirmed, according to BBC News.

Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 vanished almost two days ago en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur, with 239 people on board. Relatives of the missing passengers have been told by the authorities to prepare for the worst.

An investigation into the cause of the plane's disappearance is focusing on two passengers who boarded the flight using stolen passports.

Malaysian military officials said on Sunday, March 9, that the plane, a Boeing 777-200ER, may have turned back from its scheduled route shortly before vanishing from radar screens, further deepening the mystery surrounding its fate.

Flight MH730 left Kuala Lumpur for Beijing at 00:41 local time on Saturday (16:41 GMT on Friday). But radio contact was lost at 17:30 GMT, somewhere between Malaysia and Vietnam.

There are now 40 ships and 34 aircraft from nine different nations taking part in the search in the seas off Vietnam and Malaysia.

Late on Sunday, the Vietnamese authorities said two objects had been sighted in waters south of Vietnam which appeared to resemble aircraft parts, including a door. It was in a similar area to a possible oil slick seen by Vietnamese navy planes on Saturday. But the Malaysian authorities said on Monday that this sighting had never been officially verified and could not be confirmed.

U.S. Navy officials earlier said their aircraft had not seen any debris associated with commercial aircraft wreckage.

Officials say they still have no idea what happened to the aircraft. Investigators are looking at all angles, including a possible terror attack. Counter-terrorism agencies and the FBI are involved in the operation. The identities of some of the people onboard are being probed.

International police agency Interpol has confirmed that two passengers were travelling on passports registered on its databases as stolen.

The passengers - travelling with Italian and Austrian passports stolen in Thailand years ago - had purchased their tickets at the same time from China Southern Airlines, which shared the flight with Malaysia Airlines. They had consecutive ticket numbers and were both booked on the same onward flight from Beijing to Europe on Saturday.

Five passengers booked on the flight did not board, and their luggage was consequently removed.

The passengers on the flight were of 14 different nationalities. Two-thirds were from China, while others were from elsewhere in Asia, North America and Europe.

Malaysia Airlines is the country's national carrier, flying nearly 37,000 passengers daily to some 80 destinations worldwide.

On Monday, shares in Malaysia Airlines fell 18% to a record low.