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'Anomalies' in data logs in final MH370 report suggest they were modified: Report

SYDNEY — Independent aviation investigators looking into the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines (MAS) flight MH370 said data logs in the final report on the missing airplane were modified and incomplete, The West Australian newspaper reported on Monday (Sept 3).

A girl looks at a board with messages of support and hope for passengers of the missing Malaysia Airlines MH370. Photo: Reuters

A girl looks at a board with messages of support and hope for passengers of the missing Malaysia Airlines MH370. Photo: Reuters

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SYDNEY — Independent aviation investigators looking into the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines (MAS) flight MH370 said data logs in the final report on the missing airplane were modified and incomplete, The West Australian newspaper reported on Monday (Sept 3).

Members of the Independent Group, which worked with the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) on investigations into the MH370 mystery, claimed to have found "some anomalies in the message logs that were included in factual information released by Malaysia on March 8, 2014, and the Safety Investigation Report released by Malaysia on July 30".

The inconsistencies in these reports "suggest the traffic logs appearing in the reports are not complete and what appears in the reports has been modified", Independent Group member Victor Iannello told the newspaper.

The data logs document communications between the MAS Operations Dispatch Centre (ODS) and service providers that route messages leading to the cockpit.

Mr Iannello said errors in the two reports, such as wrongly recorded timings of messages and exclusion of certain logs, suggested the data were edited in the most recent report.

He said it was important for Malaysian investigators to provide a "complete, unmodified log" of all communications with the missing airplane.

"It is disappointing that more than four years after MH370's disappearance, we are still asking Malaysia to release withheld data," said Mr Iannello.

"The military radar data is another example of a dataset that has never been released in full, despite its significance in providing information about how the aircraft was flown after the diversion from the flight plan."

In July, Malaysia released a largely technical 1,500-page report on MH370, which concludes with the statement that the international investigating team is unable to determine the true cause of the aircraft's disappearance on March 8, 2014.

Two undersea searches — the first led by the ATSB, and the second by Houston-based seabed survey company Ocean Infinity — have failed to find the aircraft.

Another Australian newspaper, The Australian, has quoted aviation experts as saying that factors such as the lack of a distress call and the deliberate flying of the aircraft for at least two hours before it disappeared from radar screens pointed to hijacking by the pilot. THE MALAYSIAN INSIGHT

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