Suspected wreckage of MH-370 to be examined by Australian team

Melbourne: Australian experts have traveled to France to help examine the recently found aircraft wreckage and determine if it belongs to the Malaysian Airlines flight MH370, an official said on Wednesday.

The expert from Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) will join the French and Malaysian-led investigation team on Wednesday in Toulouse, France, to work on this issue together, a Chinese news agency quoted Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss as saying.

The aircraft wreckage was found last Wednesday on Reunion island in the Indian Ocean.

The debris is about 2-2.5 meters long, and will be checked by experts at the military-run General Directorate of Armaments in Toulouse suburbs.

Malaysian authorities, who are responsible for investigating the disappearance of MH-370, have confirmed the wreckage retrieved is a flaperon from a Boeing 777 aircraft.

Based on the drift modelling commissioned by the ATSB, material from the current search area could have been carried to La Reunion, as well as other locations, as part of a progressive dispersal of floating debris through the action of ocean currents and wind, said Truss.

"Thorough and methodical search efforts will continue to be focused on the defined underwater search area, covering 120,000 sq km, in the southern Indian Ocean," he said.

Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 went missing en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, 2014, with a total of 239 passengers on board.

(IANS)