MH370: Rolls-Royce Engine Cowling Found on a Beach in South Africa
A piece of what appears to be a Rolls-Royce engine cowling has been found on a beach in South Africa, officials told.
Neels Kruger, a South African archaeologist found the piece of debris, which has a logo of aircraft engine manufacturer on it.
“When I flipped it around, I didn’t know immediately what it was but just thought, ‘Oh my word!”‘ he told The Associated Press in a telephone interview.
On the other side, Kruger said he recognised what remains of the black Rolls Royce logo, the manufacturer of aircraft engines.
The piece is about 70 centimetres by 70 centimetres “with chunks gone from the side,” said Kruger.
The unidentified fragment was picked up near Mossel Bay, a small town in Western Cape province, the South African Civil Aviation Authority (SACAA) told AFP.
“The necessary arrangements are underway for the evaluation and collection of the part, which, if it indeed belongs to an aircraft, will then be handed over to Malaysian authorities,” the statement said.
Malaysia’s transport minister said on Tuesday (Wednesday NZ Time) that authorities will examine it to see if it is from the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.
“Based on early reports, there is a possibility of the piece originating from an inlet cowling of an aircraft engine, but a further examination and analysis are needed to verify whether it belongs to Flight 370,” said Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai. A team will be dispatched to retrieve the debris, Liow said in a statement.
A South African teenager, Liam Lotter, 18, said earlier that he thinks he found part of a wing from missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, which his family dismissed as “rubbish” and his mother nearly threw away.
Liam told he found the metre-long debris on a beach in Mozambique while he was on holiday with his family in December.
The debris arrived in Australia for testing on Monday.
A wing fragment confirmed to be from the plane was also found on the Indian Ocean island of Reunion last year.
The disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, 9M-MRO, on flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing in March, 2014, remains one of the biggest mysteries in modern aviation.
Investigators believe the plane rerouted to the southern Indian Ocean, where it crashed.
No crash site has been identified which could help solve the baffling mystery.
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