MH370: Liow must explain to families of victims why Malaysia was so slow in responding to debris findings

MH370: Liow must explain to families of victims why Malaysia was so slow in responding to debris findings

Malaysia’s Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai should stop talking so much, trying to portray that he and his federal government have been working hard to solve the MH370 crash.

It is quite obvious that he and Malaysia are now under tremendous pressure to seriously unravel what went wrong with the MAS Boeing 777 and bring a closure to the insurance and compensation claims of the families of 239 passengers and crew who perished in the crash. (Read this for context: http://victorlim2016.blogspot.my/2016/09/mh370-flap-found-in-tanzania-confirmed.html)

It is only after more and more claims, especially from the Australian-led Search And Rescue/Recovery (SAR), that fragments or debris from the MAS-registered Boeing 777 had indeed been found that Liow is now confirming the debris findings.

The Malaysian government had been accused by the international SAR of showing no interest on the recovery of evidence before Liow’s “admission”.

It was reported that American MH370 sleuth Blaine Gibson and other searchers are finding credible evidence in the form of shattered debris almost every week. So it is deeply disturbing to discover from Gibson that Malaysia has failed to pick up six pieces recovered more than three months ago.

It is little wonder that the relatives are distraught over the actions or inaction of the Malaysians who have bungled this investigation from the start. It is time for the International Civil Aviation Organisation, the airline industry’s governing body, to step in to make Malaysia more accountable or hand this investigation over to either Australia or the US.

Here’s what Malaysia’s national news Bernama reported today as posted by online news portal Free Malaysia Today (FMT):

"M370 (sic): 22 pieces of debris found so far, says Liow

Bernama

| September 16, 2016

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) expert has confirmed that the drifting pattern of the debris shows that the search going on for the plane is in the right area.
BINTULUL (sic): Twenty-two pieces of debris have been found so far along South Africa, Mozambique, Mauritius and Tanzania.

Two have been confirmed while another four are almost certain to be from the missing MH370.

Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai said the confirmation on the debris, a flaperon found on Reunion Island in July last year and an outboard flap found on the island of Pemba, off the coast of Tanzania, in June this year, was important to determine how the incident could have occurred.

“This confirmation means a lot to us because we can ensure the next course of action to study the condition of the debris and how the incident had actually happened to MH370.”

Liow said four pieces of debris were highly likely to be of MH370 but the rest were hard to determine as there were no serial numbers nor any other details on them.

He was met by reporters after visiting the Bintulu Port Authority office in Tanjung Kidurong, here, today.

“The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) expert said the drifting pattern showed that the search we were doing was within the right area. That was why we found debris along the area,” he said.

He stressed that the search for MH370 in the remaining 10,000 square kilometres was expected to be completed by the year-end.

To date, the search for the missing aircraft has covered 110,000 square kilometres in the southern Indian Ocean, off Australia’s west coast.

Flight MH370 disappeared on March 8, 2014 while en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 passengers and crew on board.

The plane has yet to be found despite a massive search operation in the southern Indian Ocean where it is believed to have ended its flight."