BREAKING NEWS: Malaysian passenger plane carrying 295 people 'shot down.

A Malaysian Airlines passenger plane has
reportedly been shot down on the Russian-
Ukraine border, apparently killing all 295 people
on board.
Flight MH17, which was carrying 280
passengers and 15 crew, was flying between
Amsterdam and Kuala Lumpar after taking off
leaving at lunchtime today.
The Interfax news agency reported that the
aircraft went missing near Donetsk, where pro-
Russian rebels have been fighting Ukrainian
government forces for several weeks.
TV pictures from the scene showed a pall of
smoke billowing into the sky apparently from
the stricken aircraft.
It is believed the plane was struck by BUK
surface-to-air missile at 33,000ft around 20
miles before entering Russian airspace.
A Malaysian Airlines passenger jet is thought to
have been shot down over the Ukraine /
Russian border
Malaysian passenger plane crashes on
Russia/Ukraine border
The shoulder-launched Russian-made BUK
surface-to-air missile can be packed into a golf
bag and assembled and fired very rapidly by
one person with minimal training.
Defence experts have expressed fears in the
past they could be used to target at civil
aircraft.
A similar launcher was seen by Associated
Press journalists near the eastern Ukrainian
town of Snizhne earlier today.
Malaysian Airlines said they have no
information about any survivors.
In a tweet, the airline said: 'Malaysia Airlines
has lost contact of MH17 from Amsterdam. The
last known position was over Ukrainian
airspace. More details to follow.'
The crash comes three months after the
mysterious disappearance of Malaysian Airlines
flight MH370 which is though to have crashed
into the Indian Occean.
Two weeks ago, investigators say what little
evidence they have to work with suggests the
plane was deliberately diverted thousands of
kilometres from its scheduled route before
eventually plunging into the Indian Ocean.
The search was narrowed in April after a series
of acoustic pings thought to be from the plane's
black box recorders were heard along a final arc
where analysis of satellite data put its last
location.
But a month later, officials conceded the
wreckage was not in that concentrated area,
some 1,000 miles off the northwest coast of
Australia, and the search area would have to be
expanded.
The next phase of the search is expected to
start in August and take a year, covering some
60,000 sq km at a cost of AU$60 million ($56
million) or more. The search is already the
most expensive in aviation history.
The new priority search area is around 2,000km
west of Perth, a stretch of isolated ocean
frequently lashed by storm force winds and
massive swells.