Possible MH370 engine part washes up on Mossel Bay beach in South Africa

“I JUST thought, ‘Oh, my word!’” Debris with the Rolls Royce logo of a Boeing engine has washed up on a beach in South Africa.

A South African archeologist has found what may be a piece of MH370 debris featuring part of the Rolls Royce logo stamped on aircraft engines.

Malaysia said it would send a team to retrieve the object, which was found near Mossel Bay, a town of about 60,000 in Western Cape province on the country’s southern coast.

“Based on early reports, there is a possibility of the piece originating from an inlet cowling of an aircraft engine,” Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai said in a statement.

Neels Kruger was walking along a lagoon when he spotted something that did not seem to suit the natural surroundings.

“Being an archeologist I’m always looking for things with my nose to the ground,” Mr Kruger, 35, told The Associated Press.

“When I flipped it around, I didn’t know immediately what it was but just thought, ‘Oh my word!”’

Mr Kruger’s piece is believed to have come from an inset cowling of an aircraft engine, and appears to match the honeycomb composite of two others parts recently found in Mozambique

The similarities between the debris found by Mr Krugers and the logo on this B777 engine are startling.

The underside of Liam Lotter’s suspect MH370 wing part (pictured) appears to be made from a similar honeycomb composite to Mr Gibson’s piece (below) and now Mr Kruger’s (top).

Mr Gibson’s ‘NO STEP’ piece (pictured) also has a honeycomb composite

He recognised the brown honeycomb structure from photographs of other pieces of debris believed to part of the missing aircraft and also the distinctive black logo of aircraft engine manufacturer Rolls Royce on the other side.

Mr Kruger described the object as being about 70cm by 70cm, “with chunks gone from the side”. The white surface, with the partial logo, has peeled away to reveal a dark metallic grey covering.

EIGHT VITAL MH370 QUESTIONS THAT NEED ANSWERS

Mr Kruger sent photographs he took of the object to a friend who is a pilot, who in turn passed it on to other pilots, who all quickly became convinced that this was part of an aeroplane engine. He then alerted the South African Civil Aviation Authority who told him to sit tight until further instruction.

ARE YOU INADVERTENTLY HOARDING MH370 DEBRIS?

Wondering what to do next, he sent a message via Facebook to Liam Lotter, the South African teenager who also found a piece of possible MH370 debris. Mr Lotter passed on the details of Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) investigators.

“They said it was a very interesting piece and they need it sent to them,” Mr Kruger said, adding that he was instructed to bubble-wrap the piece and keep it safe until aviation authorities could collect it.

If proven to have come from MH370, the location of the Mozambique objects would be consistent with the MH370 drift model, according to the ATSB

Mr Lotter stumbled across a suspected wing tip stamped with the zone reference “676EB” while walking along beach in Mozambique last December during a family holiday.

However, he didn’t come forward until seeing headlines about the “NO STEP” aircraft part found by American lawyer and MH370 sleuth Blaine Gibson early this month. The part is believed to be from the horizontal stabiliser of an aircraft tail.

Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 vanished March 8, 2014, with 239 people on board en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Its fate has become one of the greatest aviation mysteries of all time.

The ATSB’s underwater search in the southern Indian Ocean, where authorities believe the plane crashed after inexplicably diverting from its flight path, has found no trace of it so far.

A flaperon, or wing part, that washed up on La Reunion last July is the only piece of debris confirmed to have come from MH370 so far.

However, the objects found by Mr Lotter and Mr Gibson are considered promising and are currently being examined in Australia by international and Boeing specialists.

Investigators have said the deep sea search will end by early July unless fresh clues are found.