He screamed at the screen
as a promised video conference with Malaysian authorities became the
latest part of the aftermath of the plane's disappearance to encounter
technical difficulties.
"You're all bloody liars, and you're lying to us again," the Chinese man said, according to a translation.
Families of the
passengers on the missing plane in attendance at the Beijing briefing
Wednesday exploded in anger and stormed out.
"We will request their
team of experts to come to Beijing to conduct face-to-face
communications and fulfill their commitment," said Jing Hui, a spokesman
for some of the families. "What Is the truth? What problem do they want
to cover up?"
The families have 26 questions they want answered now. The queries were posted on the social media site Weibo
by a committee representing some of the passengers' relatives. Some of
the "questions" are requests that evidence be shared with them,
including the flight's logbook and recording of air traffic control on
March 8, the night the plane disappeared with 239 people aboard.
Most of the people on the
plane were Chinese, and their families have become very distrustful of
Malaysian government authorities and officials with the airline.
That was apparent in the
request for MH370's log book. John Goglia, a former member of the U.S.
National Transportation Safety Board, told CNN the log is usually on the
plane and even if it wasn't, investigators wouldn't reveal specific
information from it.
He also said a request for phone numbers of investigators would be denied.
But the other 24 questions and requests?
"These are not state secrets so the families should have access to all of that kind of information," he said.
Many of the 26 questions
focus on technical issues involving emergency locator transmitters, or
ELTs, and "black boxes." With an apparent in-depth understanding of how
these work, the families ask about the specific technology on the
missing plane.
ELTs are designed to
activate after a crash and send a signal to a frequency monitored by air
traffic controllers. "Black boxes," or voice and data recorders, could
shed light on what went on in the plane's cockpit and other crucial
flight information.
The families' final
seven questions involve "protocol," including this: What did Malaysia
Airlines do when the flight went missing?
Bluefin-21 redeployed in plane search
The challenges of salvaging MH370 debris
MH370 partner: They're still alive
Photos: The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370
The families also ask
whether search and rescue teams have final results from searched areas,
and whether the Malaysian government could specify the rights of family
members "to know the facts of cases or the details of an incident."
Malaysia Airlines has said it shares all the information it has with appropriate authorities.
In a video message this
month, Hugh Dunleavy, the airline's commercial director, said the
company shares the same "fundamental requirement" as the families: to
find out what happened.
Malaysian authorities
have come under criticism repeatedly for their handling of the
investigation. But the government has insisted it's doing what it can to
get to the bottom of what happened and support the families.
"We understand that it
has been a difficult time for all the families. And we appreciate that
many families want to see physical evidence before they will accept that
MH370 ended in the southern Indian Ocean," acting Transport Minister
Hishammuddin Hussein said at the end of March. "... The question that
the families principally want answered, is the question we simply do not
have the answer to -- namely, where their loved ones are, and where is
MH370."
A week earlier, Hishammuddin made a pledge to the families: "We will do everything in our power to keep you informed."
Bluefin-21 completes 'full search'
After two previous
setbacks that officials called minor, an underwater vessel searching for
traces of MH370 resurfaced Thursday morning after completing what
search officials called a "full mission."
The Bluefin-21 has now searched a total of 90 square kilometers (34.7 square miles) in its first three trips to the ocean floor.
On its second trip the Bluefin was forced to resurface after 11 hours because it needed to have a technical issue addressed.
Part of the equipment
designed to help the Bluefin-21 move deeper and avoid seepage was low on
oil. Officials replenished the supply and redeployed the vessel.
The Bluefin-21 has its
electronics sealed in bottles so they are protected from saltwater. As
the probe moves deeper and the pressure increases, the operating system
pushes oil into these bottles. The oil counters the pressure and
prevents saltwater from seeping in. If oil fills the container, there's
no space for saltwater.
"In no way should this
suggest that (the AUV) is not 'hardy' enough to be working at this
depth. On the contrary, it is absolutely the best piece of equipment for
the job we are doing," a source close to the operation said, adding
that technical issues are common at great depths.
Data from its second and third mission have been downloaded, the Australian Joint Agency Coordination Centre said.
There were no "significant detections" during the second search.
24-hour mission
Bluefin-21 takes two
hours to get near the ocean floor and another two hours to return to the
surface. It aims to map the ocean floor for 16 hours to retrieve data,
which then take four hours to analyze.
The vessel searches
maximum depths of 4,500 meters (14,764 feet), and before the technical
interruption, it was scheduled to complete its second dive about 10 a.m.
ET, a source said.
The U.S. Navy has determined the seafloor in the search area reaches a maximum depth of 4,600 meters (15,092 feet).
The Bluefin operators
said they can reprogram it to operate at 5,000 meters (16,404 feet),
meaning it can search the originally designated area, which is thought
to have yielded the most promising clues.
It is where a second
audio signal that searchers thought was manmade and the right frequency
to belong to the flight data recorder's emergency beacon.
The quality of the "ping" led authorities to focus the underwater search in the area.
An oil sample taken from
a slick on the surface in that section of the ocean is at a lab being
analyzed to see if it is an aviation or maritime fluid.
'Garbage patch'
"We have known a long
time that especially the recent search area, the new search area they
are looking at now, there's a lot of debris there because it is close to
what we call the garbage patch, and that's where all of the garbage
accumulates," said Erik Van Sebille, a physical oceanographer at
University of New South Wales.
"There are five in each
basin and one in the Indian Ocean. Everything that has been thrown in
the ocean in the last 50 years and still floating is somewhere in this
garbage patch."
Malaysia Airlines Flight
370 vanished on March 8 with 239 people aboard after taking off from
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, bound for Beijing.
With no debris found
after weeks of searches and no possible pings from the plane's "black
boxes" detected in a week, officials said it's time to focus the search
underwater.
While air and sea
surface searches continued Thursday in a zone centered about 2,170
kilometers (1,348 miles) northwest of Perth, those searches are probably
nearing an end.
Still, Thursday's surface search area grew significantly to 40,349 square kilometres (15,578.8 square miles).
READ: A primer on the latest in the search for Flight 370
READ: How phones work in flight
READ: MH370: How do underwater sonar subs work?
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