MH370: Military radar showed aircraft deliberately flying towards Andaman Islands - Reuters

The authorities are now suspecting foul play, sabotage or hijack in the flight’s disappearance.

Sources told Reuters that military radar-tracking saw an unidentified aircraft, believed to be the missing MH370, following a route between navigational waypoint – something that only those with aviation training could do.

Sources familiar with the investigations said based on the last plot on the military radar, it is believed that the plane was flying towards the Andaman Islands.

Following the new evidence, search and rescue efforts have been extended to the Andaman Sea and the Indian Ocean.

The sources said Malaysia had also requested raw radar data from Thailand, Indonesia and India which has a naval base in the Andaman Islands.

The sources said the reason for the aircraft to have lost contact with air traffic control and become invisible to civilian radar could be because someone had deliberately turned off its communication systems.

According to the sources, the unidentified aircraft had followed aviation corridors identified as N571 and P628. Pilots flying commercial planes use these routes to get to Middle East or Europe from the Southeast Asia.

“The sources also said that the last confirmed position of the aircraft was at 35,000 feet about 90 miles off the east coast of Malaysia, heading towards Vietnam, near a navigational waypoint called "Igari",” Reuters reported.

The military radar then suggested that the aircraft had turned sharply westwards, heading towards a waypoint called "Vampi", northeast of Indonesia's Aceh province.

“Vampi” is a navigational point used for planes following route N571 to the Middle East.

“From there, the aircraft had flew towards a waypoint called "Gival", south of the Thai island of Phuket, and was last plotted heading northwest towards another waypoint called "Igrex", on route P628 that would take it over the Andaman Islands and which carriers use to fly towards Europe,” the report added.

A senior Malaysian police officer was also quoted as saying that investigation are now focussing on a theory that someone who knows how to fly a plane has purposely diverted the flight from its KL-Beijing route.

The source said authorities are looking at sabotage and hijack as motives behind the aircraft’s disappearance.

Despite the search by navies and military aircrafts from 13 countries, there is still no sign of the aircraft.

All contacts with the aircraft was lost less than an hour after it took off from Kuala Lumpur.