Malaysia has confirmed that a piece of aircraft wreckage found on an Indian Ocean island last week is from missing flight MH370, solving the mystery of the plane that disappeared with 239 people on board more than a year ago.
Prime Minister Najib Razak announced, "Today, 515 days since the plane disappeared, it is with a very heavy heart that I must tell you that an international team of experts has conclusively confirmed that the aircraft debris found on Reunion Island is indeed from MH370."
The ill-fated Malaysia Airlines jet was carrying 239 crew and passengers, including five Indians, when it disappeared on a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8 last year. The search operation had found no verified sign of the plane.
Last week a two-metre-long flaperon was found on the French Indian Ocean island of Reunion, near Madagascar. It was examined at an aeronautical test centre in Toulouse, France.
A flaperon is a part of the wing used to manage the lift and control the roll of an aircraft.
Najib announced that the joint France-Malaysia investigations confirmed the aircraft flaperon found on the island was part of the Boeing 777 aircraft.
"We now have physical evidence that, as I announced on March 24 last year, flight MH370 tragically ended in the southern Indian Ocean. MH370's disappearance marked us as a nation. We mourn with you, as a nation," Najib said.
Najib's announcement ended an agonising wait for grieving families who have endured 17 months with no proof that their loved ones were dead or alive. However, it still leaves the baffling question of what caused the plane to veer off course and fly for hours after its communications and tracking systems were shut off, in what remains one of the biggest mysteries in the history of aviation.
Malaysia Airlines said the confirmation that the debris found on an Indian Ocean island came from flight MH370 was a "major breakthrough" in solving the mystery of the flight's disappearance.
"This is indeed a major breakthrough for us in resolving the disappearance of MH370 and we expect and hope that there would be more objects to be found which would be able to help resolve this mystery," said a statement by the airline, quoted by the official Bernama news agency.
"Moving forward, Malaysia Airlines' priority will be to continue providing the latest updates and information to the families and will fully cooperate with the relevant authorities on the investigation and recovery of this tragic accident," the airline statement said.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott expressed confidence that the "baffling mystery" of flight MH370 will be solved soon.
Abbott said the search "must go on" and that the discovery indicated the Boeing 777 had crashed close to the place they had previously thought it had.
"What we have found in the West Indian Ocean does seem to indicate that the plane did come down more or less where we thought it did and it suggests for the first time we might be a little bit closer to solve this baffling mystery," he said.
"I believe it is appropriate because not only were there six Australians on that plane, but millions of Australians -- nearly every Australian -- at some point in time is an air traveller," he said.
"We owe it to the hundreds of millions of people who use our skies to ensure their travel is as safe as it possibly can be, to try to get to the bottom of this terrible mystery," he added.
Foreign Minister Julie Bishop who was in Kuala Lumpur also said Australia is committed to continuing the search for MH370.
"At least it is a piece of evidence and I am sure that more assumptions can come from this and hopefully we will find answers for the families of those who have been waiting for such a long time, to hear something of what happened to MH370."
Tom Ballantyne of Orient Aviation magazine was quoted by CNN as saying that the condition of debris could indicate if the plane met a catastrophic end. Charring, for example, could indicate an explosion, he said.
Investigators would be on the lookout for telltale signs of what caused the crash.
"It's possible to find positive evidence of a criminal act, or, of course they could find the absence of that. If they find characteristic pitting in the wing structure, in the metal or the composite, that indicates there was some sort of explosive device, or if they find residue, which is not likely (after) this long in the ocean," Tom said, adding, "But they'll probably not be able to tell why the plane went down -- only that it did, and the manner in which it did."
Malaysia Airlines has been left reeling by the loss of MH370 and the shooting down over Ukraine last year of flight MH17, which killed 298 people.
A drop in bookings following the disasters compounded years of losses, forcing a government bailout and the slashing of 6,000 jobs.
