On March 8, 2014, Flight MH370, with a total 239 persons (227 passengers and 12 crew) on board, departed the Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Sepang for a routine flight to Beijing, China.
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Martin Dolan, Chief Commissioner of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, tasked with finding the plane, has expressed confidence in the last week that, with the 120,000 square kilometre priority search area three quarters covered, the aircraft will be found soon.
Plainly, she has accepted the inevitable if brutal truth, borne out by the confirmed discovery of a wing flaperon from the aircraft on the island of Reunion past year, and is moving forward with her life.
Many families accuse the airline and Malaysian government of letting the plane slip away through a bungled response, withholding information on what happened, and treating grieving relatives insensitively.
He said the eight areas that were reviewed by the Malaysian ICAO Annex 13 Safety Investigation Team for MH370 were the Diversion from Filed Flight Plan Route; Air Traffic Services Operations; Flight Crew Profile; Airworthiness and Maintenance and Aircraft Systems; and, Satellite Communications.
“A Final Report will be completed in the event wreckage of the aircraft is located or the search for the wreckage is terminated, whichever is the earlier”, the report adds.
The countries have said it will end once the current search area has been completely covered, likely to be around June.
Min Huang, who is the mother of MH370 passenger Zhang Meng, was quoted in the statement as saying that the horror, fear, pain and hurt of the past two years have been indescribable.
Malaysia, Australia and China will hold a tripartite meeting to determine the next step if the current search fails to find the plane, said the prime minister.
Families of 32 other passengers, mostly Chinese, filed a separate lawsuit in Malaysia, their lawyer has said.
Recently, an American adventurer found a piece of debris on a beach on the African east coast nation of Mozambique.
The disappearance of MH370 was without precedent, and the search has been the most challenging in aviation history.
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The Malaysia-led worldwide team of aviation experts set up to investigate issued an annual progress report, but the brief statement contained no new insights into what caused the Malaysia Airlines jet to vanish. Voice370, A family support group, has urged authorities to continue search for the missing aircraft. “We are grateful for their efforts”, he said. With the second anniversary also the deadline for legal action against Malaysia Airlines, lawsuits have been filed on behalf of well over 100 next-of-kin in several countries’ courts in recent days.
