Likely piece of doomed flight MH370 found in Mozambique?

Washington, Mar 2: A piece of wreckage from a Boeing 777, likely from Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 that mysteriously vanished nearly two years ago with 239 people, was found washed ashore on the coast of Mozambique, a media report on Wednesday quoted a US official as saying.

The newly discovered debris, found over the weekend, is on its way to Malaysia for further examination. The wreckage is a piece of horizontal stabilizer skin, CNN reported, quoting an unnamed US official as saying.

A second aviation source told the network that there is no record of any Boeing 777 missing other than Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, which disappeared on March 8, 2014, with 239 people on board, including five Indians. But Malaysia Airlines called the identification "speculative."

"It is too speculative at this point for MAS to comment," the airline said, using its initials. The mystery of what happened to the plane remains unsolved. The search has turned up some aircraft debris, but also false leads.

In September, French investigators confirmed that aircraft debris found on Reunion Island in July was from the missing Malaysia Airlines plane. Debris found in Thailand in mid-January turned out not to be from MH370.

The disappearance of MH370 remains one of aviation's greatest mysteries. The Beijing-bound flight took off from Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia early in the morning.

At 1:19 a.m., as the plane was flying over the South China Sea, Malaysian air traffic controllers radioed the crew to contact controllers in Ho Chi Minh City for the onward flight through Vietnamese airspace. Shortly afterward, air traffic controllers in Malaysia lost contact with the plane somewhere over the sea between Malaysia and Vietnam.

The aircraft's transponder, which identifies the plane and relays details like altitude and speed to controllers, stopped transmitting and Flight MH370 seemingly disappeared without a trace.

Malaysian authorities revealed later that military radar had tracked the plane as it turned back to the west and flew across the Malaysian Peninsula, up the Strait of Malacca, before flying out of radar range at 2:14 a.m. and vanishing once again over southern Indian Ocean.

Last week, next-of-kin of some passengers filed a slew of lawsuits over the plane's disappearance, with some hopeful that court scrutiny will help reveal answers about what befell the ill-fated plane.

Investigators believe the plane was diverted and crashed in the southern Indian Ocean, but neither a crash site nor cause have been found so far though millions of dollars have been spent to scour the seas to recover the wreckage.

PTI