Australia 'looking in right area' for MH370

Australian authorities said Thursday they were confident they would locate Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 and that the search for the missing plane was being carried out in the right area.

Debris that washed up on the French island of Reunion, off the coast of Madagascar, last week was confirmed Wednesday to belong to Flight 370. Investigators determined it to be the plane's flaperon, which is part of the wing.

"[The La Reunion find] is consistent with all the work we've done, so we're confident that we're looking in the right area and we'll find the aircraft there," Martin Dolan, chief commissioner of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, told Australian broadcaster ABC.

Dolan cautioned, however, that it was "too early to tell" what happened to the Malaysia Airlines flight, and that "close examination [of the flaperon] is what's necessary to access how much we can learn."

Australia has been leading search efforts for the missing plane, which disappeared in March 2014 as it traveled from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board. Investigators believe the plane was flown thousands of kilometers off course before crashing in the Indian Ocean.

Authorities have been scouring more than 50,000 square kilometers (19,000 square miles) of ocean floor for evidence, but no trace of the missing plane had been found until part of the wing washed up on Reunion.

It's too early to say whether further examination of the wing will yield any clues into what caused the plane's disappearance.

'Conclusively confirmed'

Earlier Thursday, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak made a televised statement announcing that the debris found on Reunion belonged to Flight 370.

"Today, 515 days since the plane disappeared, it is with a very heavy heart that an international team of experts have conclusively confirmed that the aircraft debris found on Reunion Island is indeed from MH370," Razak said.

Relatives of the passengers have been critical of the Malaysian government's response, with some attacking Razak's administration for its inability to provide answers.

Malaysia Airlines issued a statement following Razak's announcement, saying that the families of passengers and crew members had been informed of the discovery.

bw/cmk (AFP, AP, Reuters)