Grieved families of MH370 victims hope for answers from official-report
Relatives of people aboard Malaysian Flight MH370 said today they hoped a long-awaited report into the plane's disappearance might give them answers about one of the world's most enduring aviation mysteries. The family members were being given the official investigation team's report in the morning at the Malaysian transport ministry and were set to be briefed by officials.
The mysterious disappearance of MH370
The Malaysia Airlines jet vanished in March 2014 with 239 people aboard, mostly from China, en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. No sign of it was found in a 120,000 sq km Indian Ocean search-zone. The Australian-led hunt was suspended in January last year.
Malaysian govt to release the official report soon
US exploration firm Ocean Infinity resumed the hunt at the start of 2018 on a "no find, no fee" basis, using high-tech drones to scour the seabed. But it was called-off after failing to find anything. Malaysia's new government, which took power in May, says the final report by the official safety investigation team, a 19-member body, will be released unedited in the afternoon.
A family member hopes to get some closure
Arriving at the transport ministry, Nurlaila Ngah, whose husband Wan Swaid Wan Ismail was an MH370 crew-member, said she was hoping for a "solid answer" to get some closure. "In the airline industry, tragedies happen but there are clues as to what could have happened. It makes no sense if the investigators say there are no-hints as to what could have happened," she said.
Another family member is not very hopeful
However, Calvin Shim, whose wife was a stewardess on the flight, was skeptical the report would tell families anything new after more than four years of fruitless searching. "I do not expect any fresh revelations from this report. The black box has not been found. The plane wreckage has not been found," he said. He, however, hoped the government would consider resuming the search.
The disappearance had given birth to many theories
Only three confirmed fragments of MH370 have been found, all of them on western Indian Ocean shores, including a 2m wing part (flaperon). There have been a host of theories about its disappearance, ranging from an accident to a hijacking or even a terror plot.
