Sunderland Uni Graduate Among Those Onboard Missing Flight

21 March 2014, 10:43 | Updated: 30 March 2016, 13:50

It's emerged one of the people on the missing Malaysia Airlines flight is a Sunderland Uni graduate.

Huan Peen Chan, who's known as Jesse, studied engineering and computing on Wearside for 4 years between 1992 and 1995.

The 46 year old was working as an engineer in Malaysia and was with 20 of his colleagues on missing flight MH370.

According to his LinkedIn profile, Jesse worked for Freescale Semiconductor Holdings - a company which has offices in the Far East and Texas in the States.

The company have told Capital:
"Freescale Semiconductor has confirmed that 20 of its employees were confirmed passengers on Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

Twelve are from Malaysia and eight are from China.

The entire Freescale Semiconductor community is deeply saddened by this news.

The company is continuing to monitor the situation and will provide more information as it becomes available."

Gregg Lowe, president and CEO of Freescale said:
"At present, we are solely focused on our employees and their families.  

Our thoughts and prayers are with those affected by this tragic event."

The company has assembled counselors and other professionals through Freescale's Employee Assistance Program, with around-the-clock support for those impacted by this tragedy.

Searches for the plane have been continuing, after it was last heard from almost two weeks ago.

In a statement, The University of Sunderland told Capital:
"We are deeply concerned to hear reports that one of our graduates, Huan Peen Chan, who studied at the University of Sunderland between 1992 and 1995, may be one of the passengers on board the missing Malaysia Airlines plane.

Although we are not able to confirm these reports at this time, we wish to pass on our thoughts to the family at this difficult time.”