KUALA LUMPUR, July 31 — A volcano eruption on the French island of Reunion in the Indian Ocean today has temporarily halted ongoing search efforts for the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 in the area, called following the discovery of airline debris there.
According to Australian news portal News.com.au, 10 Malaysian aviation experts were among those evacuated from the island earlier today, just moments after they arrived, due to the threat of the World Heritage-listed Le Piton de la Fournaise volcano.
The volcano is located south of Saint-André, where the debris was located.
Local media L’info à La Réunion tweeted two hours ago that the volcano had begun erupting, 24 hours after the island’s volcanic observatory issued its first warning, to the delight of visitors and tourists.
200 metres of lava and a crater formation was already visible at the Le Piton de la Fournaise volcano, which is erupting for the third time this year, local media added.
A 2.7m-long piece of debris was discovered on Réunion Island in the Indian Ocean yesterday morning (local time), which is believed to be a piece from the missing MH370 jetliner.
The piece of wreckage is on its way to French authorities in Toulouse, the closest site to the BEA (Bureau d’Enquêtes et d’Analyses pour la Sécurité de l’Aviation Civile), to verify if it did indeed originate from the Boeing-777 that went missing on March 8, 2014.
Prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak said yesterday that two teams were being deployed to look into the discovery of the “flaperon”, a portion from a plane’s wing — one team to France where the debris has been transported to, and a second team to Réunion Island, off the Indian Ocean, where the wreckage was first found.
Najib also said that it was “very likely” that the piece of wreckage originated from a Boeing-777 jetliner, but advised against speculating until an official confirmation.
This comes after Deputy Transport Minister Datuk Abdul Aziz Kaprawi told newswire Reuters yesterday that they were “almost certain” that the debris originated from a Boeing-777.
Australian deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss also said yesterday there is a “realistic possibility” that the debris found on the island of La Réunion is from the wreckage of flight MH370.
Malaysia Airlines was operating a Boeing 777 on the ill-fated flight, which vanished without a trace in March last year while en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing in one of the biggest mysteries in aviation history. The plane was carrying 239 passengers and crew.
Search efforts led by Australia have focused on a broad expanse of the southern Indian Ocean off Australia, roughly 3,700km from France’s Reunion Island.
