WHEN Putrajaya releases the full and final report on the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines (MAS) flight MH370 today, all eyes will be on the questions no one has answered in the last four years since the plane went missing.

Already, the next-of-kin of a missing passenger has questioned whether any agency is guilty of misconduct and why eight days were spent searching in the wrong area.

If no answers are forthcoming as to where the plane and their loved ones are now, victims’ families at the very least want to know who will be held accountable for the delays and confusion just after the plane lost contact with control towers and disappeared from radar.

Families are also against the government’s decision to end the search for the plane.

Here is a recap of what is known so far:

How MH370 went missing 

MH370 took off from Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) for Beijing at 0.41am on March 8, 2014 with 239 people on board.

The last communication between the pilots and Kuala Lumpur air traffic control took place at 1.19am with these words from the cockpit: “Good night, Malaysian three seven zero”.  

After that, the plane headed towards its destination but made a turn-back south of Vietnam, about 38 minutes after take-off. It crossed the peninsula and was detected by military radar over the small island of Pulau Perak in the Strait of Malacca.

During this turn-back, Vietnamese air traffic control failed to inform Kuala Lumpur counterparts early about MH370’s whereabouts after the plane did not communicate with Ho Chi Minh. Meanwhile, a MAS controller mistakenly reported what was the plane’s projected flight track over Cambodia as the actual flight path.

After the turn-back, the plane headed to north of Sumatra near the Andaman Islands and was last detected here by military radar at 2.22am.

The plane’s other communications had also stopped working – its last automatic ACARS (aircraft communications addressing and reporting system) transmission was at 1.07am and its transponder stopped communication at 1.21am.

According to an interim report on the tragedy in 2015, it was two hours more before the rescue coordination centre was informed and another hour before an actual distress signal was issued.

Only at 2.40am did Malaysian air traffic controllers inform MAS that MH370 had gone missing.

The last traces of the plane were a series of satellite “pings”, by which time it was believed to be over the southern Indian Ocean.

Who was on board

Of the 239 people on the Boeing 777-200, 12 were crew members and two were infants. 

The majority of the passengers were Chinese (153), followed by Malaysians (38), Indonesians (7), Australians (6), Indians (5), French (4), Americans (3), two each from New Zealand, Ukraine and Canada, one each from Russia, Taiwan, Netherlands. 

The remaining two passengers, one confirmed as an Iranian, were travelling under stolen Italian and Austrian passports. This led to initial speculation of a terrorist attack or hijacking.

The plane was piloted by veteran pilot Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah, 53. His co-pilot was first officer Fariq Abdul Hamid, 27.

The search

In the initial search, Malaysia deployed 15 air force aircraft, six navy ships and three coast guard vessels to the waters between southern Vietnam and Malaysia, with help from two Australian maritime surveillance aircraft.

Eight days were spent searching this area even though it was known the plane had turned back and was last seen on radar north of Sumatra.

With the high number of Chinese nationals on board and the search area shifted down to the southern Indian Ocean waters off the Western Australia coast, the governments of Malaysia, China and Australia signed a tripartite agreement to search for the plane.

Malaysia held the overall responsibility for the search while Australia took the lead through the Australian Maritime Safety Authority (Amsa) sea surface and air search. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) was also involved in the underwater search to scan the sea floor.

The 120,000sq km search lasted 1,046 days, making it the largest and longest search in aviation history, and was called off in January 2017. The RM610 million search was paid for by the three governments.

In January 2018, the former Barisan Nasional government struck a deal with US exploration firm Ocean Infinity to restart the search, on the condition that it would be paid US$70 million (RM279 million) – only if the Boeing 777 or its black boxes were found.

The privately funded search came to a close on May 29 this year after its deep-sea vessel surveyed 112,000 sq km of the southern Indian Ocean over 90 days. This included a 25,000 sq km area that had not been searched before.

Since the disappearance of MH370 on March 8, 2014, Malaysia has spent approximately RM500 million.

Several pieces of debris have been found, with some confirmed as fragments of MH370, including a 2m wing part known as a “flaperon”, found on July 29, 2015.

The pieces were found on western Indian Ocean shores, leading to more theories and new search areas based on “drift analyses” of ocean currents.

What’s next for families

Families don’t want the search to stop but the authorities have said any new search would only be done if there were credible evidence that pinpoints a specific location of the plane.

Some families have sought legal redress. 

The first suit was filed by a Malaysian family on October 31, 2014. The family of passenger Jee Jing Hang sued the Malaysian government, MAS, civil aviation authorities, the Immigration Department and the air force for negligence.

Other suits have been filed in the Malaysian, Australian, Chinese and American courts before a two-year deadline for legal action over air accidents expired. 

In June 2014, Malaysia Airlines began making initial compensation payments of US$50,000 (RM163,325) to the families of passengers. Full payment was to be made only be when the plane is officially declared lost. 

MH370 was officially declared lost on January 29, 2015. 

But a recent report by Radio New Zealand quoted Ganesan Nethi, a lawyer for several relatives of missing passengers, saying his clients have yet to receive compensation.

Life Insurance Association of Malaysia (LIAM), meanwhile, said on January 30, 2015, a total of RM16.8 million in life insurance claims have been settled to the next-of-kin of passengers and crew members of the ill-fated plane. 

On July 24, 2018, five family members of MH370 victims filed a judicial review to challenge Putrajaya’s decision to place all documents relating to the missing flight under the Official Secrets Act 1972 (OSA).

They are seeking the declassification of recordings and transcripts of communication with the aircraft; the airspace procedural letter of agreement between Singapore, Thailand and Indonesia; the minutes of meetings held with the relevant agencies; internal memos and the search-and-rescue (SAR) report; the SAR operational incident report; and post-mortem reports. – July 30, 2018.