Plane missing with 236 people on board

[freakiness]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-03-08/malaysia-airlines-lost-contact-with-plane/5307888

Malaysia Airlines says one of its planes has gone missing on the way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.

A statement from the airline says flight MH370 lost contact with air traffic controllers at 2:40am local time, just over two hours into the flight.

The plane, a Boeing 777-200, left Kuala Lumpur at 12:41am on Saturday, and had been due to arrive in Beijing at 6:30am local time.

The company says the plane was carrying 227 passengers, including two infants, and 12 crew members.

The airline says it is contacting the next-of-kin of all passengers and crew, which includes people of 13 different nationalities.

In a statement on the airline's website, group chief executive officer Ahmad Jauhari Yahya said the airline was working with authorities to locate the aircraft.

"Focus of the airline is to work with the emergency responders and authorities and mobilise its full support," the statement said.

"Our thoughts and prayers are with all affected passengers and crew and their family members."

The airline says it will provide regular updates on its website.

The ABC understand Malaysia Airlines will hold a press conference on the incident shortly.

[purple_haize]

On channel 9 news they said it wasnt debris from the missing plane.

[azureline**]

and now I hear there are 4 stolen passports that were used?

[purple_haize]

and 5 people that were booked on the plane decided not to go and had to get their luggange taken off the plane

[cherry*135]

No, the two persons presenting the stolen passports didn't look like the person they were stolen from. The two travellers were Asian.. The passports were stolen from an Italian national and an Austran national
In Thailand.
Not all countries check for stolen passports at immigration/security or if they do, they may just check random ones.

[cherry*135]

Didnt they say 4 stolen passports originally and changed it to two now?

[cherry*135]

The plane lost contact fairly early in its flight. If it was maintenance issues would the pilot/co pilot not notice and have time to put out put out a distress call?

[purple_haize]

http://http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2577185/Alive-Helicopters-scrambled-possible-sighting...

This is about the 5 that didnt get on the plane

[freakiness]

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@am*3 wrote:
Didnt they say 4 stolen passports originally and changed it to two now?

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I've also read reports that it's not uncommon for people to travel on stolen passports and that one plane that overshot a runway in recent years had 10 passengers on board with stolen passports.

There are also reports about this particular plane being involved in an accident 2 years ago, obviously a minor crash.

It's a matter of wait and see what happened.  None of the circumstances talked about might have had any bearing.

[cherry*135]

They seem to think the plane will never be found 😞

Update: they may have found a door from the plane.

[cherry*135]

( malaysian Transport Minister) Hussein declined to give further details, saying it may jeopardize the investigation. Hussein said only two passengers had used stolen passports, and that earlier reports that the identities of two others were under investigation were not true.