[Misteri MH370] Malaysian government is incompetent’; to handle MH370 probe, says ex-US air safety chief

Already criticised for its handling of the search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, Putrajaya is now accused of being "incompetent" to conduct investigations into the passenger jet's mysterious disappearance into the Indian Ocean, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Former United States National Transportations Safety Board (NTSB)...

Already criticised for its handling of the search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, Putrajaya is now accused of being "incompetent" to conduct investigations into the passenger jet's mysterious disappearance into the Indian Ocean, the Wall Street Journal reported today.

Former United States National Transportations Safety Board (NTSB) chairman Jim Hall was critical in an interview with CNN on Monday evening when he was asked if public statements by the Malaysian authorities could be trusted. The US is half a day behind Malaysia.

"Regrettably, the Malaysian government is incompetent to handle this investigation," Hall was quoted as saying in the WSJ report.

Malaysian officials have not responded to the specific criticisms directed at them, the global business daily reported.

It has also been reported that Australian authorities have handed over any investigation on the search for the missing plane to Malaysia.

The daily also described the direction of the investigations by Malaysia as "unorthodox".

Malaysia's performance, it reported, was in contrast to the NTSB's strict protocols and systematic style last year when it released daily updates about the Asiana Airlines Boeing 777-200ER that crashed into a sea wall and broke apart while trying to land at the San Francisco International Airport.

The report also said Putrajaya's probe into the disappearance of Flight MH370 had at times contradicted traditional rules for conducting major air-crash investigations.

The Malaysian authorities had been blamed and criticised for keeping or delaying information and sometimes providing conflicting details in the early stages of the search efforts, the paper said.

But Putrajaya hastily called an emergency press conference last night, shortly after foreign experts briefed Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak about the conclusions of a new satellite-data analysis.

Najib told the world that the aircraft, which had 239 people onboard, went down in a remote part of the Indian Ocean, and stressed that the information was being released to inform families of the victims "at the earliest opportunity" and "out of a commitment to openness and respect".

The prime minister then indicated that an explanation of the specifics of the latest analysis, along with a host of other relevant details, would come the today.

But, less than two hours after his announcement, Inmarsat PLC vice-president Chris McLaughlin began giving interviews to various media outlets around the globe, revealing other major elements of the probe - a move that can be a major breach of the rules of virtually any air-accident investigation.

McLaughlin's comments were widely reported around the world as Inmarsat was the British firm that made the technical breakthrough in finding the last known location of the lost plane.

WSJ reported that McLaughlin freely discussed some of the central unresolved issues of the investigation, ranging from his view that the plane flew at cruise altitude for the final hours to unequivocal pronouncements that it ran out of fuel somewhere over the southern Indian Ocean.

In one interview, he said the massive international search for remnants of the Boeing 777-200 is "now looking in the right place".

McLaughlin also indicated yesterday that he is confident his team had projected the flight path to an accuracy of "plus or minus about 100 miles."

Such statements would be strictly prohibited in a typical air-crash investigation, where participating company officials are asked to provide behind-the-scenes technical expertise but ordered to refrain from all public comments.

In the United States, the paper said McLaughlin's comments would have led him and his company to be immediately taken off any NTSB probes, based on the board's rules and procedures.

Many countries like the United Kingdom have similarly strict rules, WSJ reported.

Boeing Co. and Rolls-Royce PLC, which made the Malaysian aircraft and its engines, have kept their silence and repeatedly refused to answer questions, citing restrictions of the continuing investigation.

The unorthodox direction of the Malaysian probe, WSJ reported, partly reflects the unprecedented facts and the international pressures at play. - March 25, 2014.

  ♞ Malaysia Insider