Anger as MH370 report offers no new clues to aviation's greatest mystery

Yahoo – AFP, M. Jegathesan, 30 July 2018

Sarah Nor, the mother of a passenger on MH370, weeps as she arrives for
the final investigation report

Investigators said Monday they still do not know why Malaysia's Flight MH370 vanished four years ago in aviation's greatest mystery, sparking anger and disappointment among relatives of those on board.

In a long-awaited report the official investigation team pointed to failings by air traffic controllers, said the course of the Malaysia Airlines plane was changed manually, and refused to rule out that someone other than the pilots had diverted the jet.

But after years of fruitless searching for the Boeing 777 that disappeared in March 2014 with 239 people aboard, the report offered nothing concrete to grieving relatives of passengers and crew hoping for some sort of closure.

"The team is unable to determine the real cause for the disappearance of MH370," concluded the largely technical 400-page report, noting that investigators were hindered in their probe as neither the plane's wreckage nor its black boxes had been found.

Investigators said the plane was airworthy and the pilots were in a fit state to fly, and dismissed the theory that the plane had been taken over remotely to foil a hijacking.

Relatives who were briefed at the transport ministry in the administrative capital Putrajaya before the report's public release expressed anger that there was nothing new in the document, with some storming out of the briefing as frustration boiled over.

"It is so disappointing," said Intan Maizura Othman, whose husband was a steward on MH370, which had been flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing carrying mostly mainland Chinese passengers when it vanished.

"I am frustrated. There is nothing new in the report."

She said the meeting between relatives and officials descended into a "shouting match" as anger mounted.

G. Subramaniam, who lost a son on the flight, added that "unsatisfactory responses left many angry".

Largest hunt in history

The disappearance of MH370 triggered the largest hunt in aviation history. But no sign of it was found in a 120,000-square kilometre (46,000-square mile) Indian Ocean search zone and the Australian-led hunt was suspended in January last year.

Copies of the MH370 safety investigations report are seen on the floor 

during a media briefing

US exploration firm Ocean Infinity resumed the search in a different location at the start of this year on a "no find, no fee" basis, using high-tech drones to scour the seabed. But that search was also called off after failing to find anything.

Only three confirmed fragments of MH370 have been found, all of them on western Indian Ocean shores, including a two-metre wing part known as a flaperon.

Malaysia's new government, which took power in May, has said the hunt could be resumed but only if new evidence comes to light.

Transport Minister Anthony Loke insisted Monday that "the aspiration to locate MH370 has not been abandoned and we remain ever-hopeful that we will be able to find the answers we seek when the credible evidence becomes available".

One area that came in for criticism in the report by the 19-member team, which included foreign investigators, was air traffic control.

It said both Malaysian air traffic control and their Vietnamese counterparts failed to act properly when the Boeing jet passed from Malaysian to Vietnamese airspace and disappeared from radars.

Air traffic controllers did not initiate emergency procedures in a timely fashion, delaying the start of the search and rescue operation, it said.

However it played down concerns about the pilot and first officer, saying neither appeared to have suffered difficulties in their personal lives that could have affected their ability to fly.

"We did not find any change to their behaviour, everything was normal," Kok Soo Chon, head of the investigation team, told a press conference.

The report also said the plane was airworthy and did not have major technical issues, with Kok saying it had been diverted from its intended flight path manually.

Intervention by a third party could not be ruled out, the report said, but also added there was no evidence to suggest the plane was flown by anyone other than the pilots.

Graphic on the debris so far discovered from Malaysia Airlines MH370 that went missing in 2014 with 239 people on board pic.twitter.com/7Y0IgMl6c8

— AFP news agency (@AFP) July 30, 2018

Ryanair warns Dutch passengers to claim compensation directly

DutchNews, July 24, 2018

Photo: Ryanair.com

Budget airline Ryanair has written to a Dutch organisation which helps passengers claim compensation for delays saying it is disturbing ‘the good relationship with passengers,’ according to broadcaster NOS. 

The letter calls on EUclaim to stop putting in claims on behalf of passengers who face delays or whose flights have been cancelled. Some 700 Dutch nationals submitted claims via the bureau last week after their flights were cancelled or delayed following strikes by Ryanair staff, NOS said. 

In the letter, Ryanair asks the organisation to advise passengers to get in touch with the airline directly. If it does not, the airline says it will ‘take all necessary measures’ to protect the contractual relationship with its passengers. 

Ryanair has a claim formula on its website and states that all claims will be dealt with within 10 days. 

However, EUclaim, which charges 29% of any payout plus a 26 admin fee per person, says passengers tend to turn to it for help after being turned down by Ryanair. 

A spokesman for the Dutch consumers organisation Consumentenbond, which according to NOS works together with EUclaim, says the Ryanair letter is ‘shocking’. ‘We know that it is often very difficult for consumers to get justice,’ a spokesman told the broadcaster. 

Under EU law, airline passengers are entitled to compensation if their flight has been delayed for more than three hours, ‘if the airline cannot prove that the delay was caused by extraordinary circumstances which could not have been avoided by reasonable measures.’

Women pilots fly against cockpit prejudices

Yahoo – AFP, Sonia WOLF, 19 July 2018

EasyJet wants 20 percent of its new cadet pilots to be women by 2020

When a stricken Southwest Airlines jet was expertly landed after an emergency descent in April, saving 148 lives, it was a surprise to some that a woman was at the controls.

Role models remain few and far between for women wanting to enter the cockpit, rather than serve the onboard drinks, despite a huge shortage of pilots worldwide.

"So often we're shown men as pilots, and women as cabin crew. This could be sending a message to young girls that if they want to work in aviation, it can't be as a pilot," according to the British Airline Pilots' Association.

But things are finally starting to change and a few airlines are trying to redress the gender imbalance.

Europe's biggest budget carrier easyJet, under an initiative named after pioneer aviator Amy Johnson, wants 20 percent of its new cadet pilots to be women by 2020.

Today, just three percent of professional pilots worldwide are women, according to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

The UN agency estimates that passenger numbers will double over the next 20 years, and that airlines will need to recruit 620,000 pilots to keep up with the demand.

Tammie Jo Shults is one of those few women.

Shults, one of the first female fighter pilots for the US Navy, performed heroics in safely bringing down her Southwest Boeing 737 after an engine blowout.

One passenger died in the incident.

'Top Gun' machismo

According to retired captain Kathy McCullough, "having someone in the spotlight who's a lady who does a great job just points out that it can happen and does happen and isn't really that much of a surprise".

Just over 5 percent of the global total of pilots are women

Nevertheless, McCullough said after Shults hit the headlines that her generation of female pilots were still waiting to pass the baton to another.

"Until we reach a tipping point, which is supposedly 20 percent, I don't think we'll see much in the way of a change," she told National Public Radio.

The "Top Gun" machismo attached to aviation runs deep.

Neither does commercial flying lend itself to a work-family balance, giving organisations such as the ICAO and the International Society of Women Airline Pilots an uphill challenge to entice more women into the profession.

The society says just over 7,400 pilots flying for commercial airlines are female, or 5.2 percent of the global total.

United ranks best with 7.4 percent. Ironically Southwest, Shults's employer, has just 3.6 percent.

It is not just employment practices that the International Society of Women Airline Pilots has to confront but passenger prejudices as well, according to former chairwoman Liz Jennings Clark.

Mistaken for cabin crew

A captain with Dutch low-cost carrier Transavia, 55-year-old Clark likes when possible to come out of the cockpit and say goodbye to her passengers at the end of a flight.

But she said that many still hand their litter to her, mistaking her for cabin crew.

Girls who want to grow up as pilots still lack role models, agreed Sophie Coppin, diversity officer at the French Civil Aviation University in Toulouse.

A few airlines are trying to redress the gender imbalance as more women become pilots

Among both students and their parents, "there is a conscious or unconscious suppression" of the idea of women as aviators, she said.

About 15 percent of the student pilots at the French university are women. Double that figure are training as air traffic controllers, another sector suffering an acute shortage of entrants.

There has, at least, been some progress since 1979 when Shults, 56, was at high school and attended a careers lecture on aviation by a retired colonel.

The Southwest pilot said she was the only girl in the class, and he started by asking her if she was lost.

"I mustered up the courage to assure him I was not and that I was interested in flying," she wrote in a book about female military aviators.

"He allowed me to stay, but assured me there were no professional women pilots."

EasyJet wants 20 percent of its new cadet pilots to be women by 2020

Just over 5 percent of the global total of pilots are women

A few airlines are trying to redress the gender imbalance as more women become pilots.

Champagne as historic commercial flight links Ethiopia and Eritrea

Yahoo – AFP, Chris STEIN, July 18, 2018

Passengers pose for a selfie aboard the Ethiopian Airlines plane -- the first flight from
Addis Ababa to Eritrea in a generation (AFP Photo/Maheder HAILESELASSIE TADESE)

Asmara (Eritrea) (AFP) - Ethiopia and Eritrea on Wednesday resumed commercial airline flights for the first time in two decades, with emotions spilling over into the aisles and onto the tarmac as families were reunited.

Two flights left Addis Ababa within minutes of each other and an hour and a half later touched down in the Eritrean capital Asmara, in the latest phase of a whirlwind peace process between the former foes that began just six weeks ago.

An AFP journalist on one of the flights reported passengers singing and dancing in the aisles, overwhelming flight attendants, before falling into the arms of long-lost family members upon their arrival.

"I'm super excited. You have no idea," said Izana Abraham, an Eritrean who was born in Addis Ababa -- a fact that saw him deported from his home country during a bloody war between 1998 and 2000. "This is history in the making."

Izana, 33, was going to visit his father. The two had been separated ever since his deportation until finally meeting in Dubai last year.

The airline wrote on Twitter shortly after take-off that "the bird of peace has just flown to Asmara."

"This day marks a unique event in the history of Ethiopia and Eritrea," the airline's chief executive Tewolde GebreMariam said at a ceremony inaugurating the historic flight.

"The fact that we are taking two flights at a time shows the eagerness of the people," said Tewolde.

Champagne was served to passengers in all classes, who toasted each other and posed for selfies during the flight.

Smiling flight attendants also handed out roses to passengers.

Ethiopian Airlines, one of Africa's fastest-growing carriers, has said it would initially operate a daily return flight between Addis Ababa and Asmara.

Map of Ethiopia and Eritrea (AFP Photo/Kun TIAN)

"With the demand we are witnessing, I think we're going to increase the frequency to twice a day, thrice a day and even more," said Tewolde.

He added the opening of Eritrean airspace to Ethiopian Airlines would also mean more efficient routes to the Middle East.

When the planes landed, passengers poured onto the tarmac where they danced together with a cheering crowd who welcomed them, waving the flags of the two nations.

Family members torn apart by the war sobbed as they were reunited.

"I am very excited. I can't explain my feelings," said Fasika Moges, who lived in Addis and met her sister Lula at the airport.

The pair had been separated since the war but, unlike many, Lula was able to afford a slow, indirect flight to Addis Ababa last year to visit.

Among the passengers on the first flight was former prime minister Hailemariam Desalegn, whose shock resignation in February was the first step in a series of seismic shifts in the politics of Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa.

"I knew one day it would happen," Hailemariam said of the peace with Eritrea.

'A man in a hurry'

Hailemariam was succeeded in April by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, a 42-year-old former army officer and cabinet minister described by analysts as a "man in an extreme hurry".

After announcing the liberalisation of parts of the Ethiopian economy and releasing jailed dissidents, Abiy last month declared his intention to make peace with Eritrea after two decades of frozen relations.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (L) and President Isaias Afwerki of Eritrea 

celebrated the reopening of Asmara's embassy in Addis Ababa on Monday (AFP 

Photo/MICHAEL TEWELDE)

Eritrea was once part of Ethiopia and comprised its entire coastline on the Red Sea until it voted for independence in 1993 after decades of bloody conflict.

A row over the demarcation of the shared border triggered a brutal conflict that lasted between 1998 and 2000, leaving 80,000 people dead before evolving into a bitter cold war.

Abiy stunned observers with his announcement that he would finally accept a 2002 United Nations-backed border demarcation. However he has yet to announce a pull-out of troops.

He then paid a historic visit to Eritrea, during which he and President Isaias Afwerki declared an official end to the war. Afwerki reciprocated with a state visit to Ethiopia just days later.

The emotional reunion has been welcomed by Ethiopians who share strong cultural ties with Eritreans and have been cut-off from friends and family on the other side during the long years of enmity.

On Monday Afwerki reopened Eritrea's embassy in Addis Ababa.

The rapprochement is expected to provide an economic boost to both nations, offering booming Ethiopia -- which currently channels its trade through Djiboutian ports -- access to Eritrea's coast.

Amnesty International has said the new peace should be a catalyst for change in Eritrea, one of the world's most isolated nations.

Since the end of the war, Isaias has used the threat of Ethiopian aggression to justify repressive policies, including an indefinite national service programme the UN has likened to slavery.

Maverick entrepreneur's space rocket fails at blast off

Yahoo – AFP, June 30, 2018

The launch was supposed to send the rocket carrying observational equipment 

to an altitude of over 100 kilometres (62 miles) (AFP Photo/JIJI PRESS)

Tokyo (AFP) - A rocket developed by a maverick Japanese entrepreneur and convicted fraudster exploded shortly after liftoff Saturday, in a major blow to his bid to send Japan's first privately backed rocket into space.

Interstellar Technologies, founded by popular internet service provider Livedoor's creator Takafumi Horie, launched the unmanned rocket, MOMO-2, at around 5:30 am (2030 GMT Friday) from a test site in Taiki, southern Hokkaido.

But television footage showed the 10-metre (33-foot) rocket crashing back down to the launch pad seconds after liftoff and bursting into flames.

No injuries were reported in the spectacular explosion.

The launch was supposed to send the rocket carrying observational equipment to an altitude of over 100 kilometres (62 miles).

The failure follows a previous setback in July last year, when engineers lost contact with a rocket about a minute after it launched.

Interstellar Technologies said it would continue its rocket development programme after analysing the latest failure.

The outlandish, Ferrari-driving Horie -- who helped drive Japan's shift to an information-based economy in the late 1990s and the early 2000s but later spent nearly two years in jail for accounting fraud -- founded Interstellar in 2013.

However, privately backed efforts to explore space from Japan have so far failed to compete with the government-run Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.