Vietnam: Malaysia also to blame for tardy response

Latest developments:

• Vietnam denies slow response claim to MH370's disappearance

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

Finger pointing begins

10:30am: Vietnam is refuting allegations that its traffic controllers were slow in noticing Flight MH370 had gone missing after allegedly entering its airspace, based on the preliminary report released by the Malaysian government last week.

According to the report, which Malaysia had submitted to the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) in April, the plane went off radar at 1.21am on March 8 after which it was supposed to have entered Vietnamese airspace.

However, Vietnam air traffic controllers only alerted its Malaysia counterpart that the plane was lost at 1.38 am.

Department of Civil Aviation (DCA) director-general Azharuddin Abdul Rahman (above) had said last week that the 17 minutes that MH370 went off-radar broke convention as the protocol is 5 minutes.  

However, Lai Xuan Thanh, head of the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam, tells the Tuoi Tre newspaper that neither air traffic controllers in Kuala Lumpur and Ho Chi Minh City were able to determine whether MH370 had entered Ho Chi Minh flight information region (FIR) or not at the time.

So he says both Malaysia and Vietnam air traffic controller should share the blame.

Tripartite meetings begin

10am: To recap, tripartite meetings between Malaysia, China and Australia start today in Canberra to draw up the plan for next search phase of MH370 which is still missing, leaving many questions unanswered.

The team plans to go deeper and wider into south Indian Ocean, as the clearest clue so far remains satellite data and several ping transmissions heard last month.

Malaysia and Australia are also in talks with commercial firms to aid in search efforts with more specialised equipment.

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 and altered its course 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 that 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 will cease as it is highly unlikely any floating debris will be found at this stage.