- Earthbound witnesses say they saw Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 flying low or even crashing
- But none of the claims is substantiated by authorities
- Fishermen in Malaysia and Indonesia allege they saw the plane
- A New Zealand man on an oil rig off Vietnam claims he saw a plane burning
(CNN) -- How could a commercial airliner disappear without a sign, you ask?
In fact, several people on the ground or at sea claimed they saw Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 before it went missing after its post-midnight takeoff from Kuala Lumpur on March 8.
The purported eyewitnesses include fishermen, an oil rig worker and islanders in an atoll. Some even alleged they saw it crash.
A distraught relative of a passenger on the missing Malaysia Airlines jet breaks down while talking to reporters at Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Sepang, Malaysia, on Wednesday, March 19. The Boeing 777-200ER disappeared during a March 8 flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Searchers from 26 countries are trying to pinpoint Flight 370's location somewhere along two vast arcs, one stretching deep into the Asian landmass, the other far out into the Indian Ocean. 
A relative of Chinese passengers aboard the missing plane waits for a news briefing by officials in Beijing on Tuesday, March 18. 
A relative of a Chinese passenger aboard Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 tells reporters in Beijing on March 18 about a hunger strike to protest authorities' handling of information about the missing jet. 
A member of Indonesia's National Search and Rescue Agency joins in a search for the missing plane in the Andaman Sea area around the northern tip of Indonesia's Sumatra on Monday, March 17. 
Relatives of passengers aboard Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 watch a news program about the missing plane as they await information at a hotel ballroom in Beijing on March 17. 
Malaysian Transportation Minister Hishamuddin Hussein, center, shows maps of the search area March 17 at a hotel in Sepang, Malaysia, next to the Kuala Lumpur International Airport. 
U.S. Navy crew members assist in search-and-rescue operations Sunday, March 16, in the Indian Ocean. 
Indonesian personnel watch over high seas during a search operation in the Andaman Sea on Saturday, March 15. 
A foam plane, which has personalized messages for the missing flight's passengers, is seen at a viewing gallery March 15 at Kuala Lumpur International Airport. 
A member of the Malaysian navy makes a call as his ship approaches a Chinese Coast Guard ship in the South China Sea on March 15. 
A Indonesian ship heads to the Andaman Sea during a search operation near the tip of Sumatra, Indonesia, on March 15. 
Elementary school students pray for the missing passengers during class in Medan, Indonesia, on March 15. 
Col. Vu Duc Long of the Vietnam air force fields reporters' questions at an air base in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, after a search operation on Friday, March 14. 
Members of the Chinese navy continue search operations on Thursday, March 13. The search area for Flight 370 has grown wider. After starting in the sea between Malaysia and Vietnam, the plane's last confirmed location, efforts are expanding west into the Indian Ocean. 
A Vietnamese military official looks out an aircraft window during search operations March 13. 
Malaysian air force members look for debris on March 13 near Kuala Lumpur. 
A relative of a missing passenger watches TV at a Beijing hotel as she waits for the latest news March 13. 
A member of the Indonesian National Search and Rescue Agency scans the horizon in the Strait of Malacca on Wednesday, March 12. 
Relatives of missing passengers wait for the latest news at a hotel in Beijing on March 12. 
Journalists raise their hands to ask questions during a news conference in Sepang on March 12. 
Indonesian air force officers in Medan, Indonesia, examine a map of the Strait of Malacca on March 12. 
A member of the Vietnamese air force checks a map while searching for the missing plane on Tuesday, March 11. 
Iranians Pouri Nourmohammadi, second left, and Delavar Seyed Mohammad Reza, far right, were identified by Interpol as the two men who used stolen passports to board the flight. But there's no evidence to suggest either was connected to any terrorist organizations, according to Malaysian investigators. Malaysian police believe Nourmohammadi was trying to emigrate to Germany using the stolen Austrian passport. 
An Indonesian navy crew member scans an area of the South China Sea bordering Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand on Monday, March 10. 
Vietnam air force Col. Le Huu Hanh is reflected on the navigation control panel of a plane that is part of the search operation over the South China Sea on March 10. 
Relatives of the missing flight's passengers wait in a Beijing hotel room on March 10. 
A U.S. Navy Seahawk helicopter lands aboard the USS Pinckney to change crews before returning to search for the missing plane Sunday, March 9, in the Gulf of Thailand. 
Members of the Fo Guang Shan rescue team offer a special prayer March 9 at Kuala Lumpur International Airport. 
A handout picture provided by the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency shows personnel checking a radar screen during search-and-rescue operations March 9. 
Italian tourist Luigi Maraldi, who reported his passport stolen in August, shows his current passport during a news conference at a police station in Phuket island, Thailand, on March 9. Two passengers on the missing Malaysia Airlines flight were reportedly traveling on stolen passports belonging to Maraldi and an Austrian citizen whose papers were stolen two years ago. 
Hugh Dunleavy, commercial director of Malaysia Airlines, speaks to journalists March 9 at a Beijing hotel where relatives and friends of the missing flight's passengers are staying. 
Vietnamese air force crew stand in front of a plane at Tan Son Nhat airport in Ho Chi Minh City on March 9 before heading out to the area between Vietnam and Malaysia where the airliner vanished. 
Buddhist monks at Kuala Lumpur International Airport offer a special prayer for the missing passengers on March 9. 
The Chinese navy warship Jinggangshan prepares to leave Zhanjiang Port early on March 9 to assist in search-and-rescue operations for the missing Malaysia Airlines flight. The Jinggangshan, an amphibious landing ship, is loaded with lifesaving equipment, underwater detection devices and supplies of oil, water and food. 
Members of a Chinese emergency response team board a rescue vessel at the port of Sanya in China's Hainan province on March 9. The vessel is carrying 12 divers and will rendezvous with another rescue vessel on its way to the area where contact was lost with Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. 
The rescue vessel sets out from Sanya in the South China Sea. 
A family member of missing passengers is mobbed by journalists at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on Saturday, March 8. 
A Vietnamese air force plane found traces of oil that authorities had suspected to be from the missing Malaysia Airlines plane, the Vietnamese government online newspaper reported March 8. However, a sample from the slick showed it was bunker oil, typically used to power large cargo ships, Malaysia's state news agency, Bernama, reported on March 10. 
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, center, arrives to meet family members of missing passengers at the reception center at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on March 8. 
Malaysia Airlines official Joshua Law Kok Hwa, center, speaks to reporters in Beijing on March 8. 
A relative of two missing passengers reacts at their home in Kuala Lumpur on March 8. 
Wang Yue, director of marketing of Malaysia Airlines in China, reads a company statement during a news conference at the Metro Park Lido Hotel in Beijing on March 8. 
Chinese police at the Beijing airport stand beside the arrival board showing delayed Flight 370 in red on March 8. 
A woman asks a staff member at the Beijing airport for more information on the missing flight. 
A Malaysian man who says he has relatives on board the missing plane talks to journalists at the Beijing airport on March 8. 
Passengers walk past a Malaysia Airlines sign on March 8 at Kuala Lumpur International Airport. 
Malaysia Airlines Group CEO Ahmad Juahari Yahya, front, speaks during a news conference on March 8 at a hotel in Sepang. "We deeply regret that we have lost all contacts" with the jet, he said. The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370
The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370
The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370
The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370
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The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370
The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370
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The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370
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Photos: The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 
The plane that will find Flight 370? 
Grieving mom: Tell the truth While none of their claims have been substantiated, their assertions add to the ongoing mystery of the missing Boeing 777 and the 239 people aboard.
Sighting claim: Kota Bharu, Malaysia
In the middle of the night, two fishermen near the Malaysia-Thailand border saw a plane flying low over the South China Sea -- at the same time that air traffic controllers lost contact with Flight 370 over the same body of water, at 1:30 a.m. or almost 50 minutes after takeoff.
Fisherman Azid Ibrahim and a friend had taken people fishing that night off the coast of Kota Bharu.
"I was fishing when I saw the plane -- it looked strange. Flying low. I told my friend that's not normal. Normally, it flies at 35,000 feet. But that night it touched the clouds. I thought the pilot must be crazy," Ibrahim said.
"It was really low. I saw the lights they looked like the size of a coconut," he said.
Their fishing grounds lay under a flight path, but the predawn plane was unusual to see because of its low altitude, they said.
The fishermen filed a police report about their sighting, but Malaysian officials haven't commented.
Sighting claim: Oil rig off Vietnam
A New Zealand man working on an oil rig off Vietnam claimed he saw a burning object in the sky Saturday morning, hours after the plane had taken off.
Mike McKay of New Zealand was stationed on the Sona-Mercur oil rig on seas about 186 miles southeast of Vung Tau, a coastal Vietnamese town outside Ho Chi Minh City, according to CNN affiliate Radio New Zealand.
McKay wrote of his sighting in an e-mail, the news outlet said.
"Gentlemen. I believe I saw the Malaysian Airlines flight come down. The timing is right. I tried to contact Malaysian and Vietnamese officials several days ago. But I do not know if the message has been received," he wrote last week. "I observed the plane burning at high altitude at a compass bearing of 265 to 275 degrees from our surface location.
"While I observed (the plane) it appeared to be in one piece. From when I first saw the burning (plane?) until the flames went out (at high altitude) was 10-15 seconds. There was no lateral movement so it was either coming toward our position stationary (falling) or going away from our location. The general position of the observation was perpendicular/south-west of the normal flight path and at a lower altitude than the normal flight paths," he wrote.
In fact, Vietnamese authorities dispatched aircraft last week to search for the plane, in response to McKay's report, the affiliate reported.
When the Vietnamese navy sent a plane to conduct a search, it found nothing, ABC News reported. Vietnamese naval officer Le Minh Thanh told that network that the plane investigated the area cited by McKay, but the search came up empty.
Sighting claim: Maldives atoll
On a remote island in the Maldives, residents claimed they saw a "low flying jumbo jet" the same morning that the Malaysia plane disappeared, according to the website of the Maldivian news outlet Haveeru.
Residents on the isle of Kuda Huvadhoo in the Dhaalu Atoll gave a description that matched the commercial airliners: white with red stripes, according to the news outlet.
"I've never seen a jet flying so low over our island before. We've seen seaplanes, but I'm sure that this was not one of those. I could even make out the doors on the plane clearly," an unidentified eyewitness said, according to Haveeru. "It's not just me either, several other residents have reported seeing the exact same thing. Some people got out of their houses to see what was causing the tremendous noise too."
These claims, published in a story Tuesday, were dismissed by Malaysian officials.
The Maldives coast guard told CNN it had no reports of such sightings and had not even been requested to conduct a search.
The acting Malaysian transport minister also declared the reports false.
"I can confirm that the Malaysian Chief of the Defense Force has contacted his counterpart in the Maldives, who has confirmed that these reports are not true," Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said at a press conference.
The Maldives Ministry of Defense and National Security also confirmed that their radar systems and surveillance mechanisms show no indication of the missing plane.
Sighting claim: Off Indonesia coast
Indonesian fishermen claim they saw an airplane crash around the Strait of Malacca on the morning of March 9 -- more than a full day after the Malaysian plane took off -- the Indonesian state news agency Antara reported late Monday.
The strait lies between Indonesia and Malaysia. The Indonesia fishermen, based in the North Sumatra provincial subdistrict of Pangkalan Susu, went to sea for a week of fishing on March 9, a Sunday.
At 11 a.m., they saw a plane crash, Antara reported.
"We saw an airplane crash around the Malacca Straits," a fisherman identified as Hendra said, according to Antara.
The fishermen saw a white plane crossing and circling, Antara reported. Smoke came from the plane's right rear portion when it circled for a second round and tilted to the left, the agency said.
Flying lower, the plane then fell from sight.
"We suspect the plane crashed into the sea," Hendra said, according to Antara. "We could not go to the location where the aircraft was lost due to large waves, and the boat did not have enough fuel."
The aircraft is believed to have crashed in waters off the Aceh provincial district of East Aceh.
But there are two problems with these fishermen's account.
They spotted the plane more than 24 hours after it took off from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
And Indonesian military officials said their radar didn't spot Flight 370.
The Jakarta Post reported that Indonesian air force spokesman Air Commodore Hadi Tjahjanto said the Air Force's radar in Lhokseumawe, Aceh, didn't detect the missing flight in the area that the Malaysian military suggested was the plane's last detected position, around Penang waters.
"Our radar information has been shared with our Malaysian counterparts," the air force spokesman added, according to the Jakarta Post.
CNN's Saima Mohsin and Mitra Mobasherat in Malaysia and Sarita Harilela in Hong Kong contributed to this report. Michael Martinez reported and wrote from Los Angeles.
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