A leading Australian aviation expert said on Thursday that it is "highly likely" that plane debris found near Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean is from the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370.
Talking to Melbourne radio station 3AW on Thursday, aviation journalist Geoffrey Thomas said the debris, thought to be from an airliner's wing, was consistent with that of a large jetliner such as a Boeing 777, Xinhua news agency reported.
He said he was cautiously optimistic the wing belonged to MH370 because in that part of the Indian Ocean there were westward currents which would take any flotsam from the likely crash site towards the east coast of Africa.
"I think it is actually highly likely that it is connected to MH370," he said.
"Although it's at Reunion Island which is on the other side of the Indian Ocean, the current in the Indian Ocean is anti-clockwise."
"So you can draw a perfect circle basically from the current search area, which is about 1,800 km south-west of Perth, all the way around to Reunion Island," he added.
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MH370 was a scheduled Malaysia Airlines flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, which disappeared in March last year.
It was carrying 239 passengers, most of those Chinese, though six Australians were also on board.