Kuala Lumpur, March 18- The last words spoken from the cockpit of the Malaysian passenger jet that went missing 10 days ago were believed to have been spoken by the co-pilot, First Officer Fariq Abdul Hamid, 27, the airline’s top executive said Monday.
“Initial investigations indicate it was the co-pilot who basically spoke,” Malaysia Airlines CEO Ahmad Jauhari Yahya (photo) told a news briefing.
The last message from the cockpit — “All right, good night” — came after one of the plane’s crucial signalling systems had been manually disable.
Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah and Fariq have become a primary focus of the investigation into the fate of Flight 370, with one of the key questions being who was controlling the aircraft when the communications systems were disabled.
The last signal from the Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS) was received 12 minutes before the co-pilot’s seemingly nonchalant final words.
ACARS transmits key information on a plane’s condition to the ground.
The plane’s transponder — which relays radar information on the plane’s location — was switched off just two minutes after the voice message.
Ahmad Jauhari said the last transmission from ACARS was at 1.07am. And DCA director general Azharuddin Abdul Rahman confirmed that Fariq’s communication to the air traffic control took place at 1.19am.
“The ACARS could be switched off anytime between 1.07am and 1.37am,” Azharuddin affirmed.
Ahmad Jauhari also said that neither Zaharie nor Fariq had requested to fly together in this flight. He said that their names appeared together for this flight in the flight roster.
-Freemalaysiatoday
