US official: Debris in Indian Ocean belongs to same type of aircraft as missing Malaysia plane

SYDNEY — A sea-crusted wing part washed up on an island in the western Indian Ocean may be the first trace of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 since it vanished nearly a year and a half ago, and a tragic but finally solid clue to one of aviation's most perplexing and expensive mysteries.

Air safety investigators — one of them a Boeing investigator — have identified the component found on the French island of Reunion as a "flaperon" from the trailing edge of a Boeing 777 wing, the U.S. official said. Flight 370, which disappeared March 8, 2014, with 239 people on board, is the only 777 known to be missing.

http://www.startribune.com/us-official-plane-debris-in-indian-ocean-same-type-as-mh370/319845221/