KUALA LUMPUR: Debris suspected to be from inside the cabin of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 has been found on the Indian Ocean island nation of Mauritius, news portals reported yesterday.
Malaysian Department of Civil Aviation director-general Datuk Seri Azharuddin Abdul Rahman said the department was aware of the find and was in contact with its Mauritius counterparts.
He urged the public not to speculate on the find, pending further investigation.
“We do not know what it is yet. We have to wait until Mauritius aviation authorities take custody of the debris,” Azharuddin told the New Sunday Times yesterday.
He said the part was on an outlying island in Mauritius, and it would take time for the island nation’s authorities to reach it.
“Once we have better pictures of the suspected debris, we will decide on the next course of action.”
Australian news portal news.com.au reported that MH370 Independent Group (IG) expert Don Thompson saw photographs of the part, and said it appeared to match the bulkhead of an MAS Boeing 777 business-class cabin.
Another IG expert, Mike Exner, agreed with the assessment, and said the group had passed the information to the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB).
CNN cited ATSB spokesman Dan O’Malley as saying that Australian authorities were aware of the debris find, but he expected Malaysian authorities to take the lead in the investigation.
An employee of the Mourouk Ebony Hotel, where the debris was stored for safekeeping, told CNN that the part was found on Thursday on the coast of Rodrigues Island by two hotel guests from La Reunion.
La Reunion, another island in the Indian Ocean, was where a wing fragment from MH370 was discovered in July last year.
Last month, two pieces of debris were found on the coast of Mozambique, and were said by investigators to be “almost certainly are from MH370”.
Flight MH370 went missing on March 8, 2014, when it was en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
The search for the aircraft is focused on a 120,000 sq km area of the southern Indian Ocean.
The search is slated to end in June if no credible leads are found.