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Malaysian PM: Jet Search Widens to Large New Areas
Malaysia’s prime minister on
Saturday said the search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 had
widened to two large corridors as far north as the
Kazakhstan-Turkmenistan border, based on more satellite data about the
plane's movements.
Those
corridors are from northern Thailand to the border of Kazakhstan and
Turkmenistan, and from Indonesia to the Southern Indian Ocean, Prime Minister Najib Razak said at a press conference.
“The investigation team
is making further calculations which will indicate how far the aircraft
may have flown after the last point of contact," he said. "This will
help us to refine the search.”
The last confirmed communication
between the plane and a satellite was at 8:11 a.m. Malaysian time on
Saturday, March 8 (8:11 p.m. EDT Friday, March 7). The plane, originally
headed to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur, did turn back as it approached
Vietnamese waters. Prior to that, the aircraft’s computer-assisted
reporting system was disabled and then its transponder was turned off.
“These movements are consistent with deliberate action by someone on the plane,” said Razak, who stopped short of calling it a hijacking.
Military
radar picked up the aircraft as it crossed Malaysia heading west and
then turned northwest up the Strait of Malacca, Razak said. Military
radar coverage ended then, but raw satellite data obtained from the
provider revealed the aircraft continued to make contact.
This
type of raw data, however, couldn't provide the precise location of the
jet when it last made contact with a satellite, leaving authorities
with the two large corridors.
“This
new satellite information has significant impact on the nature and the
scope of the search operation,” Razak said, noting search operations
would end in the South China Sea, which lies east of the Malaysian
peninsula and was in the original path of the aircraft.
To date, 14 countries, 43 ships and 58 aircraft have been involved in the search.
Razak said investigators will seek radar data from countries in the new corridors.
"With this new information we hope this brings us one step closer to finding the plane," he said.
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