FLIGHT MH370 - Hishammuddin dismisses report on ‘mysterious power’ behind missing MH370

The Malaysian Insider

Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein has brushed aside reports of a claim by Australian air crash investigators that a mysterious power was involved in the disappearance of the Malaysia Airlines flight MH370.

Calling it speculation, the Defence Minister said the government of Malaysia would only rely on reports released by the Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC), Bernama reported today.

"Any issues, we have panel experts to verify it. The report is not from JACC... JACC is Australia's counterpart to the Malaysian government, and we are linked up with China.

"Anyway, I will treat any latest information the same way as I have done in the past, let it be verified by JACC.

"All this while we have not stopped our search for the black box and for any new information on the flight," Bernama quoted him as saying after a special Cabinet briefing on the missing plane, in Parliament, today.

Also present was Transport Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai.

The report had stated that the plane's satellite data unit made an unexpected "log-on" request to a satellite less than 90 minutes into its flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. The reports says the log-on request - known as a "handshake" - appears likely to have been caused by an interruption of electrical power on board the plane.

"A log-on request in the middle of a flight is not common," the Australian Transport Safety Bureau said, Bernama reported.

"An analysis was performed which determined that the characteristics and timing of the logon requests were best matched as resulting from power interruption."

Beijing-bound flight MH370 vanished from civilian radars on March 8, slightly more than an hour after departing from the Kuala Lumpur International Airport.

Malaysian authorities had later said that radar data indicated that the plane with 239 people on board had diverted from its intended path and headed towards the southern Indian Ocean, which is where the Boeing 777 is believed to have ended its flight but an international air, sea and underwater search has failed to find any wreckage. – July 1, 2014.