In this day and age, any one who would accidentally stumble on anything that looks like coming from an airplane, would quickly think of the fatal Malaysian Airlines Flight.
However, Dr. Schalk Luckhoff, a retired physician, posted a photograph of the engine cowling which he first found in Mossel Bay sometime in December, but which he left on the beach.
The image showed the engine cowling with a Rolls-Royce logo that was covered in barnacles, which were, in fact, the marine life that the theorists were looking for in the discovered debris.
Luckhoff told an African newspaper that he had not realized that it could be from the Flight MH370 when he first found it in December.
He also did not bother picking it up because the barnacles smelled so bad.
He also said that when he returned to the same spot later in the day, the whole object had been washed away.
It was only during its official discovery in March by archaeologist Neels Kruger when Luckhoff finally realized that what he saw in December was actually the engine cowling of the Flight MH370.
By the time it was found by Kruger, the barnacles on the engine cowling appeared to have been washed off.
Authorities came out to say eventually that the new image presented by Dr. Luckhoff make a compelling case that the barnacle-encrusted debris could be thoroughly cleaned by wave, sand, and sun after coming ashore.
