MH370 clues mount as wreckage identified as Boeing 777

A volunteer shows a plastic bottle of stain remover for laundry with Indonesian writing, produced in Jakarta, Indonesia, that was found on Jul 31 during search for more potential plane debris and items on the shore in Saint-Andre, Reunion Island. (Photo: AFP/Imaz Press Reunion/Ouissem Gombra)

SAINT-ANDRÉ: Malaysian authorities confirmed on Friday (Jul 31) that plane wreckage washed up on an Indian Ocean island was from a Boeing 777, meaning the part is may be from missing flight MH370.

The debris, part of a plane wing, could provide the first tangible clue towards unlocking the mystery surrounding the doomed Malaysia Airlines plane, which disappeared without trace in March last year with 239 people on board.

"I believe that we are moving closer to solving the mystery of MH370. This could be the convincing evidence that MH370 went down in the Indian Ocean," Malaysia's deputy transport minister Abdul Aziz Kaprawi told AFP.

However authorities have warned one small piece of plane debris was unlikely to completely clear up one of aviation's greatest puzzles.

The Malaysia Airlines flight was one of only three Boeing 777s to have been involved in major incidents, along with the downing of the MH17 over Ukraine last year and the Asiana Airlines crash at San Francisco airport in 2013 that left three dead.

The wing component found on the French island of La Reunion bears the part number "657 BB", according to photos of the debris.

"From the part number, it is confirmed that it is from a Boeing 777 aircraft. This information is from MAS (Malaysia Airlines). They have informed me," the minister told AFP.

Martin Dolan, chief commissioner of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, which is leading the MH370 search, said greater clarity on the origin of the part should be confirmed "within the next 24 hours".

"We are increasingly confident that this debris is from MH370," Dolan told AFP.

'BITTERSWEET FEELING'

Flight MH370 was travelling from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing when it mysteriously turned off course and vanished on March 8 last year.

An Australian-led search has spent 16 months combing the southern Indian Ocean for the aircraft, but no confirmed physical evidence has ever been found, sparking wild conspiracy theories about the plane's fate.

The fruitless search in January led Malaysian authorities to declare all on board were presumed dead.

For relatives of those aboard, torn between wanting closure and hoping beyond hope that their loved ones were still somehow alive, the discovery was yet another painful turn on an emotional rollercoaster.

Australian Jeanette Maguire, whose sister Cathy was on board, said the discovery of the wreckage was "a very bittersweet feeling for all of the family, it's quite emotional."

"We're really hoping for answers that we get from this wreckage that it is MH370 so that we have some idea and another part of our puzzle as to where our family and everyone else on board has gone, and have ended up, unfortunately," she added.

Speculation on the cause of the plane's disappearance has focused primarily on a possible mechanical or structural failure, a hijacking or terror plot, or rogue pilot action.

The discovery of the piece of plane debris by a cleaning team on Wednesday sparked fevered speculation which was heightened with the discovery on the same rocky beach of a piece of torn luggage, a detergent bottle with Indonesian markings and a Chinese bottle of mineral water.

Australian officials played down the discovery of the luggage saying it "may just be rubbish".

The wreckage is being sent to France for further analysis and is expected to arrive on Saturday.

MAIN DEBRIS AT BOTTOM OF OCEAN

Scientists say there are several plausible scenarios in which ocean currents could have carried a piece of debris from the plane to the island.

Australian Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss said while the part "could be a very important piece of evidence" if it was linked to MH370, using reverse modelling to determine more precisely where the debris may have drifted from was "almost impossible".

"After 16 months, the vagaries of the currents, reverse modelling is almost impossible," Truss said.

Australian search authorities, which are leading the hunt for the Boeing 777 aircraft in the Indian Ocean some 4,000 kilometres (2,500 miles) from La Reunion, said they were confident the main debris field was in the current search area.

Dolan said the discovery of the debris, which experts said could be a flaperon from a Boeing 777 aircraft, did not mean other parts would start washing up on La Reunion or at nearby locations.

"Over the last 16 or 17 months, any floating debris would have dispersed quite markedly across the Indian Ocean," he said.

Truss said accident investigators would be keen to examine the part to try to find out how it may have separated from the rest of the jet and "whether there's any evidence of fire or other misadventure on the aircraft."

But Dolan cautioned it would be difficult to determine why the plane disappeared just from the debris.

"There's limits to how much you can determine from just one piece of debris and we don't think it would give us sufficient reliability to speculate too much about the rest of the debris," he added.

"We know that the main debris field associated with MH370 is going to be on the bottom of the ocean, not floating on the surface."