MH370 search: Families scour beach find photos for clues

Some 20 personal effects recently found on Riake beach by Blaine Gibson include this 'Angry bird' bag  (Image: )

Campaigners for families of those on board missing flight MH370 have released photographs of personal items that washed up on a Madagascar beach, hoping to identify them.

Some 20 items found include purses, backpacks and part of a laptop case.

There are no labels identifying them as belonging to the 239 people on board the jet that vanished two years ago.

"They may have just fallen off a ship," Mr Gibson told the BBC.

"Still, I found them on the same 18km (11-mile) stretch of beach where I found suspected aircraft parts [of the Malaysia Airlines jet] so it is important that they are investigated properly."

MH370 was flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing in March 2014 and is presumed to have crashed into the southern Indian Ocean after veering off course.

The personal items found include a white, black and red "Angry Bird" purse, a tartan handbag and part of a black laptop case inscribed with the letters "MENSA".

Mr Gibson, who has has funded his own search for MH370 debris in east Africa, found them earlier in June on Riake beach, on the island of Nosy Boraha in north-east Madagascar.

The personal items were found on Riake beach, on the island of Nosy Boraha in north-east Madagascar   (Image: BLAINE GIBSON)

Part of a black laptop case was among the items to wash up on the Madagascar beach in June(Image: BLAINE GIBSON)

As well as the personal items, he also found two pieces of debris that may be from the aircraft itself.

He recently found three pieces of debris in that area, having already found another piece of debris in Mozambique in March, which Australian investigators believe is almost certainly part of the missing plane.

Campaigners have released the images on the Aircrash Support Group Australia website to ascertain whether they may have belonged to MH370 passengers.

'What choice do families have?'

Relatives of those on board the plane have expressed frustration at the official investigation into MH370's disappearance.

KS Narendran said that while none of the personal items found belonged to his wife, MH370 passenger Chandrika Sharma, investigators' lack of urgency was disconcerting.

"We don't sense any sense of urgency at any level," he told the BBC from his home in Chennai.

"So what choice do families have but to pull together and help whoever they can?"

He said the current search does not include the only areas of the world where pieces of the aircraft have actually been washed up - beaches on the Indian ocean, thousands of miles from the official underwater sea search.

Australia, Malaysia and China have nearly completed a search of 120,000 sq km (46,000 sq miles) of the Indian Ocean, using underwater drones and sonar equipment deployed from specialist ships.

All the debris is being examined in Australia by the Australian Transport Safety Bureau and other experts.

But the countries involved have agreed the sea search will end in the next couple of months unless "credible new information" is found.