The day started with an innocuous call from Reunion. Debris had been found on the beach which resembled that of the wing of a plane. A few photos later, nothing is certain but that it is a piece of a plane (asymmetry above/below).
Too round, not deep enough, the piece does not resemble the wing of a modern airliner, nor a tourist plane.
An AvGeek team therefore launched an investigation. It comes in a closed forum in which pilots, passionate about and specialised in aviation, exchange ideas far from view, to allow them to air all the hypotheses, gathering ideas and highlighting the most probable - a panel from the flap of an airliner.
What's left to distinguish is from what plane, and we launched a comparison of hundreds of photos of airliners. The missing element comes from a pilot friend, LustuCrew, who sent me the diagram of the flaps of the Boeing 777.
The similarity is unbelievable: "We see well the slot for the outboard actuator, the joint."
Have we found the first debris from MH370, the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 that disappeared in March 2014 off Australia without leaving a trace? The debris does not seem to be so degraded and the officials at the site think that it could have been submerged for about a year.
There is also a reference indicated on the debris: BB670. The code does not correspond to either the registration of a plane, nor a serial number. However, if this flap is really part of MH370, it is clear that this reference will allow its quick identification. In a matter of days we will have a definitive response.
Following numerous messages on Twitter: the fact that we have found debris in Reunion does not signify that it [MH370] has travelled this far. In crashing off Australia, this debris could simply have been carried by the current and run aground in this place after a year.
The original blog post, in French, can be found here: http://blog-peuravion.fr/2015/07/a-t-on-retrouve-les-premiers-debris-du-...
