SEATTLE (AP) – That an American adventurer could be the one to help crack one of aviation’s greatest mysteries came as no shock to his friends, who say they aren’t surprised Blaine Gibson’s passion for mysteries, travel and meeting people would bring him to the Mozambique coast in search of clues about the missing Malaysia Airlines flight.
The lawyer from Seattle may have discovered what could be a piece of tail section from Flight MH370 that disappeared March 8, 2014 with 239 people aboard. The airliner is believed to have crashed somewhere in a remote stretch of the southern Indian Ocean.
According to New York Magazine, Gibson has also spent much of the past year searching for traces of the missing airliner. Gibson has traveled to the Maldives Islands to investigate reports of a plane flying low at the time of the disappearance, Reunion Island to interview a man who found another section of the plane and met with former Australian Transport Minister Warren Truss to discuss Australia’s seabed search for the plane.
“I’m not surprised that he pursued this mysterious disappearance of the plane,” said Vladimir Gololobov, who described his friend as eccentric, bright and kind. He met Gibson nearly two decades ago while the American was in Siberia on business trips.
“He is interested in things that are very mysterious and makes you wonder what happened,” Gololobov said.