Missing Malaysia plane: Who were the passengers?

Malaysia Airlines logo

Details are emerging about some of 227 passengers and 12 crew on board Malaysia Airlines' Flight MH370 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing that has been missing since early Saturday.

There were at least 14 different nationalities on the Boeing 777-200ER that mysteriously vanished south of Vietnam without sending a distress call.

The majority - 153 people - were Chinese citizens, according to the passenger manifest published by Malaysia Airlines.

Among them was a 19-member group of prominent artists, who were returning home after an exhibition in the Malaysian capital.

Everyone in the group, led by Hou Bo, was "very famous in China", exhibition organiser Daniel Liau was quoted as saying by the Star newspaper.

Some were the country's leading calligraphy artists, he added.

Another Chinese passenger has been identified as Dr Yuchen Li, a recent doctoral engineering graduate from Cambridge University in England.

The university confirmed that he had recently begun working in a "high-flying geotechnical position" in Beijing.

"Yuchen was a hugely talented and likeable person with a brilliant career ahead of him," a Cambridge spokesman said.

A further eight Chinese nationals as well as 12 Malaysians were employees of America's Freescale Semiconductor company.

Malaysian police handout photographs of 19-year-old Iranian Pouria Nour Mohammad Mehrdad (L) and an unidentified man (R) who both boarded missing Malaysia Airlines MH370 flight using stolen passports.
Police released pictures of Pouria Nour Mohammad Mehrdad, left, and another unidentified man

"Our thoughts and prayers are with those affected by this tragic event," the Texas-based company's chief Gregg Lowe said in a statement.

Meanwhile Chinese national Ding Lijun, who had moved to Malaysia about a year ago to work on construction sites, was making his first trip home to Beijing, a relative told US media.

Malaysian-born passenger Mohd Sofuan Ibrahim was reportedly heading to Beijing to report for duty at Malaysia's Ministry of International Trade and Industry branch office there.

It is also known that two teenagers, both French, and five younger children, three Chinese and two Americans aged two to four, were on board the plane.

This undated photo provided by the Wood family shows Philip Wood, an IBM executive who was aboard the Malaysia Airlines flight that went missing over the South China Sea on 8 March 2014
American Philip Wood, an IBM employee, was also on the Malaysia Airlines flight

The third American was identified as Philip Wood - a 51-year-old IBM employee from Texas.

"I know in my heart that Philip's with God," his mother Sandra Wood was quoted as saying by USA Today.

The oldest person on board the plane was 79.

The pilot, who led the 12-member crew, was named by Malaysia Airlines as Zaharie Ahmad Shah.

The 53-year-old joined the carrier in 1981 and had 18,365 hours of flight experience.

Malaysia's police chief, Inspector General Khalid Abu Bakar (C), addresses a news conference on the two passengers who had travelled on board the missing Malaysia Airlines MH370 plane on stolen passports in Kuala Lumpur International Airport, 11 March 2014
Malaysian officials are continuing investigations on the identity of a second man who used a stolen passport

Soon after the plane went missing, questions were raised over the true identities of two people registered as Austria's Christian Kozel and Luigi Maraldi of Italy.

The foreign ministries in Vienna and Rome said the two men were not in fact on the plane. Both were reported as having had their passports stolen in Thailand in recent years.

On Tuesday Malaysian authorities identified one of the men who travelled as a young Iranian, Pouria Nour Mohammad Mehrdad.

They said the 19-year-old was not believed to have terror links and was probably migrating to Germany.

Investigations are continuing into the identity of a second man who appears to have been travelling with Pouria Nour Mohammad Mehrdad also using a false passport.

A young Iranian in Kuala Lumpur told the BBC that both men had stayed with him before taking the Malaysia Airlines flight, and that they had hoped to settle in Europe.

BBC Map