re: Official Thread: Missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370

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A Malaysian official denied a report Saturday that the co-pilot of the doomed Malaysia Airlines flight made a “desperate” cellphone call before its demise, further complicating the confusion-shrouded investigation.

Malaysia’s New Straits Times, citing unidentified investigators, said they discovered co-pilot Fariq Abdul Hamid had placed a call when the plane was flying about 200 nautical miles northwest of Penang. Its low altitude allowed for a telecommunications tower to pick up the signal, according to the report.

NBC News has not been able to independently confirm the report, and a Malaysian official said Saturday he “doesn’t think this is true.”

The latest knocked-down report comes as an earlier New Straights Times report last month claimed the plane was flying at a low altitude to avoid being detected by radar. But Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, head of a new Joint Agency Coordination Center, later said, “We don't know what altitude the aircraft was travelling at.”

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