http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/10/world/europe/oxygen-mask-disclosure-in-malaysia-airlines-crash-inquiry-angers-victims-families-.html 2014-10-09 23:19:53 Oxygen Mask Disclosure in Malaysia Airlines Crash Inquiry Angers Victims’ Families A Dutch official’s comments on a television program led some to wonder whether important information in the July crash in Ukraine was being withheld. === PARIS — A senior Dutch government official’s disclosure that one victim of the “People are shocked when they hear this and wonder what other information there is but isn’t shared,” Veeru Mewa, a lawyer representing the families of several Dutch passengers who died aboard the plane, told Dutch television. Frans Timmermans, the foreign minister, mentioned the discovery of the oxygen mask late Wednesday during an appearance on a popular Dutch television talk show, where an interviewer brought up the July 17 crash of Wim de Bruin, a spokesman for the Dutch national prosecutor’s office, expressed dismay about the disclosure on Thursday. He confirmed that forensics experts had found a yellow plastic oxygen mask dangling around the neck of a male victim among the dozens of bodies that arrived at Eindhoven Air Base a week after the crash. Several news organizations reported that the victim was an Australian, but Mr. de Bruin declined to confirm this. Once the victim was identified, Mr. de Bruin said, investigators immediately informed his next of kin, but withheld the information about the mask from the public while they sought further evidence that might help explain the discovery. “We did not make it public because we are still investigating the circumstances and its significance,” Mr. de Bruin said. The mask was tested for DNA, he said, but that analysis did not yield any useful clues. “Until now, we only have questions, but no answers.” Mr. Timmermans quickly apologized to victims’ families for the disclosure in a government statement. “The last thing I want is to add to their suffering in any way,” he said. But by then, the remarks had already resulted in waves of angry comments as well as intense speculation on Dutch social media about what, if anything, the presence of the oxygen mask might indicate about the circumstances of the crash. The plane, a Boeing 777-200, was headed from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and because the majority of those on board were Dutch, the Netherlands is handling the investigation. A The most widely held view, at least in the West, is that pro-Russian rebels fighting the Ukrainian government in eastern Ukraine shot down the jet with a surface-to-air missile, mistaking it for a Ukrainian military plane. But the precise kind of projectile that hit the plane remains under investigation by the safety board, which expects to publish a final report on the crash next summer and declined to comment Thursday on the significance of the oxygen mask. Air crash experts said they were puzzled by the discovery. George Bibel, a forensics expert and professor of mechanical engineering at the University of North Dakota, said that normally, in the case of a rapid decompression of the aircraft cabin, the plane’s oxygen masks would deploy automatically. “I can imagine a mask remaining around the neck as described,” Professor Bibel said. “The plane ripped apart, some of the oxygen masks deployed, somebody managed to put one on.” But he also acknowledged the possibility that the mask was placed on the victim’s body after the crash. Debris from the accident was scattered over several miles of farmland controlled by the rebels, and much of the site was left unguarded for days, accessible to journalists, mourners and the curious. Evidence tampering, Professor Bibel said, “could also be an explanation.”