Yet another conflicting storyline emerged overnight in the perplexing disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 nearly six days ago.
After search crews failed to find any trace of debris suggested by Chinese satellite photographs, Malaysian officials on Thursday denied a newspaper report that suggested the plane may have kept flying for four hours after its last reported contact.
The officials acknowledged the search for the jetliner, which disappeared early Saturday, is becoming harder and harder.
The report from The Wall Street Journal said U.S. aviation investigators and national security officials were basing their belief that the missing plane kept flying on data automatically transmitted to the ground from the passenger jet's engines.
But Malaysia's acting Transportation Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said at a news conference that the report, citing unidentified people familiar with the matter, was "inaccurate."
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Conspiracy theories surround Flight 370 The news came after Vietnamese and Chinese search crews found nothing where Chinese satellite photographs released Wednesday showed large floating objects in the South China Sea.
The spot is between Malaysia and Vietnam and not far from the plane's expected flight path.
China's State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense described the images as showing "a suspected crash site."
But Chinese authorities later said the release of the satellite images was a mistake and that they didn't show any debris relating to the plane, Hishammuddin said.
Engine data controversy
The Malaysian denial of the Wall Street Journal piece is the latest in a series of conflicting accounts involving crucial details such as the plane's route, when it vanished and other issues.
The Wall Street Journal report said the plane's engines have an onboard monitoring system supplied by their manufacturer, Rolls-Royce PLC. The system "periodically sends bursts of data about engine health, operations and aircraft movements to facilities on the ground," the newspaper said.
Malaysia Airlines sends its engine data live to Rolls-Royce for analysis, the report said, and that data is now being analyzed to figure out the flight path of the missing plane after contact was lost with its transponder, a radio transmitter in the cockpit that communicates with ground radar.
But Malaysia Airlines Chief Executive Ahmad Jauhari Yahya said Thursday that Rolls-Royce and Boeing have reported that they didn't receive transmissions of any kind after 1:07 a.m. Saturday. Air traffic controllers lost contact with the plane shortly afterward, around 1:30 a.m.
Erin Atan, a spokeswoman for Rolls-Royce in Asia, declined to comment on the matter, telling CNN it was "an official air accident investigation."
Malaysian officials said they had consulted with the makers of the plane and its engines, who told them that no transmissions of any kind were received from the plane after air traffic controllers lost contact with it.
A Vietnamese military official looks out an aircraft window on Thursday, March 13, during search operations for the missing Malaysian Airlines jet. Contact with Flight 370 was lost Saturday as the Boeing 777-200ER flew over the South China Sea after leaving Kuala Lumpur for Beijing. It was carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew members. Malaysian air force members look for debris on March 13 near Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. A relative of a missing passenger watches TV as she waits for the latest news in a hotel in Beijing on March 13. A member of the Indonesian National Search and Rescue Agency scans the horizon in the Strait of Malacca off Sumatra island, Indonesia, on Wednesday, March 12. Relatives of missing passengers wait for the latest news in a hotel in Beijing on March 12. Journalists raise their hands to ask questions during a news conference in Sepang, Malaysia, on March 12. Indonesian air force officers in Medan, Indonesia, examine a map of the Strait of Malacca on March 12. A member of the Vietnamese air force checks a map while searching for the missing plane on Tuesday, March 11. Iranians Pouri Nourmohammadi, second left, and Delavar Seyed Mohammad Reza, far right, were identified by Interpol as the two men who used stolen passports to board the flight. But there's no evidence to suggest either was connected to any terrorist organizations, according to Malaysian investigators. Malaysian police believe Nourmohammadi was trying to emigrate to Germany using the stolen Austrian passport. An Indonesian navy crew member scans an area of the South China Sea bordering Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand on Monday, March 10. Vietnam air force Col. Le Huu Hanh is reflected on the navigation control panel of a plane that is part of the search operation over the South China Sea on March 10. Relatives of the missing flight's passengers wait in a Beijing hotel room on March 10. A U.S. Navy Seahawk helicopter lands aboard the USS Pinckney to change crews before returning to search for the missing plane Sunday, March 9, in the Gulf of Thailand. Members of the Fo Guang Shan rescue team offer a special prayer March 9 at Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Sepang, Malaysia. A handout picture provided by the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency shows personnel checking a radar screen during search-and-rescue operations March 9. Italian tourist Luigi Maraldi, who reported his passport stolen in August, shows his current passport during a news conference at a police station in Phuket island, Thailand, on March 9. Two passengers on the missing Malaysia Airlines flight were reportedly traveling on stolen passports belonging to Maraldi and an Austrian citizen whose papers were stolen two years ago. Hugh Dunleavy, commercial director of Malaysia Airlines, speaks to journalists March 9 at a Beijing hotel where relatives and friends of the missing flight's passengers are staying. Vietnamese air force crew stand in front of a plane at Tan Son Nhat airport in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, on March 9 before heading out to the area between Vietnam and Malaysia where the airliner vanished early Saturday. Buddhist monks at Kuala Lumpur International Airport offer a special prayer for the missing passengers on March 9. The Chinese navy warship Jinggangshan prepares to leave Zhanjiang Port early on March 9 to assist in search-and-rescue operations for the missing Malaysia Airlines flight. The Jinggangshan, an amphibious landing ship, is loaded with lifesaving equipment, underwater detection devices and supplies of oil, water and food. Members of a Chinese emergency response team board a rescue vessel at the port of Sanya in China's Hainan province on March 9. The vessel is carrying 12 divers and will rendezvous with another rescue vessel on its way to the area where contact was lost with Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. The rescue vessel sets out from Sanya in the South China Sea. A family member of missing passengers is mobbed by journalists at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on Saturday, March 8. A Vietnamese air force plane found traces of oil that authorities had suspected to be from the missing Malaysia Airlines plane, the Vietnamese government online newspaper reported March 8. However, a sample from the slick showed it was bunker oil, typically used to power large cargo ships, Malaysia's state news agency, Bernama, reported on March 10. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, center, arrives to meet family members of missing passengers at the reception center at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on March 8. Malaysia Airlines official Joshua Law Kok Hwa, center, speaks to reporters in Beijing on March 8. A relative of two missing passengers reacts at their home in Kuala Lumpur on March 8. Wang Yue, director of marketing of Malaysia Airlines in China, reads a company statement during a news conference at the Metro Park Lido Hotel in Beijing on March 8. Chinese police at the Beijing airport stand beside the arrival board showing delayed Flight 370 in red on March 8. A woman asks a staff member at the Beijing airport for more information on the missing flight. A Malaysian man who says he has relatives on board the missing plane talks to journalists at the Beijing airport on March 8. Passengers walk past a Malaysia Airlines sign on March 8 at Kuala Lumpur International Airport. Malaysia Airlines Group CEO Ahmad Juahari Yahya, front, speaks during a news conference on March 8 at a hotel in Sepang. "We deeply regret that we have lost all contacts" with the jet, he said. 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Photos: The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 The report threatened to open the door to a fresh round of theories about what has become of the plane, which vanished while flying over Southeast Asia on its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
Four more hours in the air could have put the plane many hundreds of miles beyond the area currently being searched.
But one aviation industry observer expressed skepticism about the report even before the denials by officials.
"I find this very, very difficult to believe," Tom Ballantyne, chief correspondent for the magazine Orient Aviation, told CNN. "That this aircraft could have flown on for four hours after it disappeared and not have been picked up by someone's radar and not have been seen by anyone, it's almost unbelievable."
Search getting harder
The mystery over the fate of the passenger jet, a Boeing 777-200, and the 239 people it was carrying has so far left government officials and aviation experts flummoxed.
"With every passing day the task becomes more difficult," Hishammuddin said Thursday.
Searchers have already been combing a vast area of sea and land for traces of the plane. But so far, with the search well into its sixth day, their efforts have been fruitless.
Malaysian officials say they are still trying to determine if a radar blip detected heading west soon after the plane lost contact was in fact the missing jet.
If it was, the plane would have been hundreds of miles off its original flight path and headed in the wrong direction. Malaysian officials say they have asked U.S. experts to help them analyze the radar data.
Meanwhile, India is joining the multinational search, dispatching two of its naval ships off the remote Andaman and Nicobar islands, a military spokesman told CNN on Thursday.
Last known words
Also on Thursday, a Malaysian aviation official told CNN that the last known words from the flight crew of the missing plane were "All right, good night."
Malaysian civil aviation officer Zulazri Mohd Ahnuar said he couldn't confirm which member of the flight crew sent the message, which was transmitted from the plane back to Malaysian flight controllers as the aircraft transferred into Vietnamese airspace early Saturday.
For the families of those on board the missing plane, the wait for news is tortuous.
Danica Weeks is trying to keep it together for her two young sons, though the possibility of life without husband Paul, who was on the plane, is sometimes overwhelming. She's clinging to hope even though, as Weeks told CNN's Piers Morgan, it's "not looking good."
"Every day, it just seems like it's an eternity, it's an absolute eternity," Weeks said from Australia. "We can only go minute by minute ... and hope something comes soon."
