[國際新聞] Investigators pursue 'every angle' searching, yellow, people, turned, angle

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Investigators pursue 'every angle' on missing Boeing 777 as search fails to find any trace
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — Rescue helicopters and ships searching for a Malaysia Airlines jet rushed Monday to investigate a yellow object that looked like a life raft. It turned out to be moss-covered trash floating in the ocean, once again dashing hopes after more than two days of fruitless search for the plane that disappeared en route to Beijing with 239 people on board.
With no confirmation that the Boeing 777 had crashed, hundreds of distraught relatives waited anxiously for any news. Thai police and Interpol questioned the proprietors of a travel agency in the resort town of Pattaya that sold one-way tickets to two men now known to have been travelling on flight MH370 using stolen passports.
There has been no indication that the two men had anything to do with the tragedy, but the thefts of the passports fueled speculation of foul play, terrorism or a hijacking gone wrong. Malaysia has shared their details with Chinese and American intelligence agencies.
Malaysia's police chief was quoted by local media as saying that one of the men had been identified. Civil aviation chief Azharuddin Abdul Rahman didn't confirm this, but said they were of "non-Asian" appearance. He said authorities were looking at the possibility they were connected to a stolen passport syndicate, but declined to give any more details.
The search operation has involved 34 aircraft and 40 ships from several countries covering a 50-nautical mile radius from the point the plane vanished from radar screens between Malaysia and Vietnam, he said.
Experts say possible causes of the apparent crash include an explosion, catastrophic engine failure, terrorist attack, extreme turbulence, pilot error or even suicide.
Selamat Omar, a Malaysian whose 29-year-old son Mohamad Khairul Amri Selamat was a passenger on the flight, expected a call from him at the 6.30 a.m. arrival time. Instead he got a call from the airline saying the plane was missing.
"We accept God's will. Whether he is found alive or dead, we surrender to Allah," Selamat said.
There have been a few glimmers of hope, but so far no trace of the plane has been found.
On Sunday afternoon, a Vietnamese plane spotted a rectangular object that was thought to be one of the missing plane's doors, but ships working through the night could not locate it. Then on Monday, a Singaporean search plane spotted a yellow object some 140 kilometres (87 miles) southwest of Tho Chu island, but it turned out to be some sea trash.
Malaysian maritime officials found some oil slicks in the South China Sea and sent a sample to a lab to see if it came from the plane. Tests showed that the oil was not from an aircraft, Azharuddin said.
As relatives of the 239 people on the flight grappled with fading hope, attention focused on how two passengers managed to board the aircraft using stolen passports. Interpol confirmed it knew about the stolen passports but said no authorities checked its vast databases on stolen documents before the jet departed.


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This photograph made available by The Straits Times on March 10, 2014 shows personnel from the Republic of Singapore Air Force (RSAF) scanning the seas about 140 nautical miles north-east of Kota Baru, Malaysia, for any signs of the Malaysia Airlines plane which went missing.

A vendor prepares newspapers carrying a headline story and pictures of Saturday's missing Malaysian Airlines plane, in Shah Alam, outside Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Sunday, March 9, 2014. An international fleet of planes and ships scouted the waters between Malaysia and Vietnam for any clues to the fate of the Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777, which disappeared less than an hour after taking off from Kuala Lumpur bound for Beijing. (AP Photo/Lai Seng Sin)

Ships are seen from a flying Soviet-made AN-26 of the Vietnam Air Force during a search operation for the missing Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777 over the South China Sea Monday, March 10, 2014. Dozens of ships and aircraft have failed to find any piece of the missing Boeing 777 jet that vanished more than two days ago above waters south of Vietnam as investigators pursued “every angle” to explain its disappearance, including hijacking, Malaysia’s civil aviation chief said Monday.

family member of passengers aboard a missing Malaysia Airlines plane speaks to journalists at a hotel in Putrajaya, Malaysia, Monday, March 10, 2014. Vietnamese aircraft spotted what they suspected was one of the doors of the missing Boeing 777 on Sunday, while questions emerged about how two passengers managed to board the ill-fated aircraft using stolen passports