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Wednesday, May 21, 2014

Anwar: RMAF should've scrambled within 3mins


DAY 75

Latest developments:

  • Ministerial committee studying M'sian companies' role in search
     
  • Stupid to ask if RMAF must shoot plane down, says Anwar on Hisham
     
  • Anwar: RMAF SOP is to respond within three mins to unknown movements
     
  • Inmarsat, DCA to take one week to package data for release
     
  • Law firm denies telling MAS to cease contact with crew’s families

Follow us as we bring the latest updates and coverage for the search of Flight MH370:

M'sian companies' proposals being evaluated

5pm: The Committee for Assets Deployment has identified room for Malaysian companies to get involved in the MH370 search,Bernama reports this morning.

It has received several proposals from companies such as Petronas, Boustead Heavy Industries, Sapura Kencana and Deftech, and these assets include equipment related to side-scan sonars, multi-beam echo sounders and remotely operated underwater vehicles.

"The proposals are being evaluated based on suitability and costs that will arise," the committee is quoted as saying in a statement.

The companies will be coordinated by the Australia’s Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC), while the Malaysian auxiliary vessel Bunga Mas 6 (above) will serve as an administrative vessel to assist the Canberra-based agency.

Anwar lambasts Hisham's 'shoot plane down' response

4pm: It is “irresponsible and stupid” for Defence Minister and acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein to ask whether Malaysia is being asked to shoot down MH370, says PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim.

In various interviews, the minister had responded to queries regarding the air force’s inaction by asking, “Even if we sent them (fighter jets) up, are you going to say that we're going to shoot it down?” and similar responses.

However, in an interview with ABC published on Monday, Anwar says: “There is no question of shooting (it) down. It is a question of guiding them in the direction that you want them to go. This is done all the time.”

The opposition leader says the air force’s standard operating procedures - which had never been done before - is to take off within three minutes of detecting “unauthorised movements” in Malaysian airspace to either guide the aircraft to land, or out of Malaysian airspace.

Second-guessing of Inmarsat calculations 'misguided'

11am: It will take about a week for British satellite communications company Inmarsat and the Malaysia’s Department of Civil Aviation (DCA) to prepare an information “package” on raw data on MH370 and how the company arrived at its conclusions.

The information will be released to families of those onboard MH370 first, then members of the public, the New York Timesreports.

Spokesperson for the company Jonathan Sinnatt says this is because only a small amount of data is available from MH370 – seven ‘handshakes’ between the aircraft and a satellite overhead, and seven corresponding transmissions to a ground station in Perth.

“It’s literally just 14 numbers. It won’t make sense to anybody who doesn’t understand the technology, which is why we are now working with the investigation to put together an explanation about how you use that data and what it means,” he is quoted in the New York Times yesterday as saying.

The company had previously declined to respond to doubts and criticism over its conclusion that MH370’s final resting place is somewhere in the South Indian Ocean, the report states.

However, that changed on Monday when the government caved in to requests from families of MH370 victims to release the data for independent analysis.

The report also cited unnamed investigators justifying the withholding of the data fearing that it could be used by intelligence services to track other aircraft.

Meanwhile, the daily also reported that Inmarsat engineers have privately expressed frustration over what they perceive as “misguided second-guessing” of their work.

“I think there are a lot of well-meaning people out there who have made some very flawed attempts at doing the analysis, but they unfortunately haven’t understood the basic elements,” a Inmarsat employee reportedly says on condition of anonymity.
  
'MAS not told to cease communicating with families'

10am: The US law firm Ribbeck Law Chartered denies instructing Malaysia Airlines (MAS) to cut off communications with the families of MH370 crew members.

“Please be advised that at no time did Ribbeck Law Chartered contact Malaysia Airlines to stop providing information regarding the search for the missing MH370 plane or to stop providing any other kind of assistance to our clients,” says a lawyer at the firm, Monica R Kelly, in a statement today.

On Sunday, some of the next-of-kin (above) said they engaged Ribbeck Law to assist in clarifying documents that they are required to sign, and claims the airline had cut off communications between them and caregivers provided by MAS after it found out.

In response, MAS said: “foreign lawyers directed that MAS cease from any further direct communication with their clients, and that MAS direct all further communications regarding these crew member families to them.”

Background:

  • The Beijing-bound Boeing 777-200ER aircraft went missing not long after taking off from KL International Airport in the early hours of March 8, with 12 crew members and 227 passengers.
     
  • Authorities have determined that the plane intentionally turned back shortly after cutting communications with tower controllers for unknown reasons and, based on satellite data, have estimated its last position to be in the south Indian Ocean.
     
  • Australia leads the search in the south Indian Ocean. As of March 30, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC) is tasked with overseeing the operations, led by retired air marshal and former defence chief Angus Houston.
     
  • The autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) Bluefin-21 was deployed on April 14 to conduct an undersea search where the Australia Defence Vessel Ocean Shield had picked up two pings similar to black boxes on April 5 and two more on April 8 but failed to reacquire them again with the pinger locator.
     
  • However, by April 28, with no sign of the wreckage, authorities announced the search will move on the next phase, which will focus on a larger and deeper area of the sea floor, while the aerial search is ceased.

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