Malaysia urges vigilance after debris found

A piece of aeroplane debris known as a flaperon from a Boeing 777 found washed up on the shore of the island of Saint-Andre in La Reunion. Photo / LINFO.RE

‘Plane door’ revealed to be ladder as treasure hunt fever grips Reunion.

Malaysia has asked the authorities in the islands surrounding Reunion to be vigilant for possible plane wreckage, as France confirmed the object washed up on the Indian Ocean isle was from a Boeing 777.

Mauritius, which is 225km from Reunion, has already ordered its coastguard plane to overfly the area and boats to be on the lookout. Other islands in the region - Madagascar, Comoros, Seychelles and Maldives - are expected to do the same.

"I urge all parties to allow this crucial investigation process to take its course," said Liow Tiong Lai, Malaysia's Transport Minister. "I reiterate this is for the sake of the next of kin of the loved ones of MH370 who would be anxiously awaiting news and have suffered much over this time. We will make an announcement once the verification process has been completed."

Liow said the French-led team analysing the wing fragment - known as a "flaperon" - which was found on Reunion last week, had confirmed it was from a Boeing 777. MH370 is the only Boeing 777 to have crashed in the Southern Hemisphere.

French authorities are expected to announce tomorrow whether the wing belonged to MH370, which vanished on March 8, 2014, en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.

Today, four Malaysian officials including the head of civil aviation were to meet in Paris with officials from Malaysia Airlines, three French magistrates and an official from France's civil aviation investigating authority.

The wing fragment is now at a military-run laboratory in Balma, near Toulouse.

Islanders on Reunion meanwhile excitedly continued their own hunt for clues, handing over bits of what they believe to be wreckage to police.

"There is a sort of 'treasure hunt' mentality that is taking hold and people are calling us for everything," said a source close to the investigation.

In the Chaudron district on the outskirts of the capital, Saint Denis, a small piece of twisted metal with Chinese characters etched on to it - which was initially described as a "plane door" - was handed to police on Sunday. But within hours investigators had categorically ruled out the object as being from a plane. Instead, said Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, Malaysia's director of civil aviation, the object was a domestic ladder.

Given the amount of debris littering Reunion's coast, police are bracing themselves for a flood of more supposed wreckage.

- AFP