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expressed certainty that the plane had crashed into the Indian Ocean, killing all aboard. Bajc, 48, said she was trying to process the news even as she grieved over it. Full closure won’t come until the wreckage is found, she said in an e-mail, but at least she and Wood’s family can begin mourning the loss. “I STILL feel his presence,” she wrote, but she added that “perhaps it was his soul all along.” Wood, 50, of Texas, was one of three Americans aboard Flight 370. He and families continued on A9 BY WILLIAM WAN IN BEIJING For 16 long days, Sarah Bajc was the face of determined hope. The American teacher launched a Facebook page and Twitter account de- voted to finding her partner, Philip Wood, and the Malaysia Airlines jet he had been aboard when it seemingly vanished into thin air on March 8. On little sleep and in clear pain, she said in numerous inter- views that she had a gut feeling that Wood was still alive, awaiting rescue. But that hope and optimism finally cracked Monday night as investigators ABCDE TUESDAY, MARCH 25, 2014 washingtonpost.com • $1.25Light snow 39/27 • Tomorrow: Mostly sunny 42/28 • details, B8 Prices may vary in areas outside metropolitan Washington. MD DC VA SU V1 V2 V3 V4 Rescuers are pulled back New landslide risks hampered efforts to find survivors as the death toll rose to 14 in Washington state. A2 Obama to limit NSA The administration is preparing a bill to end the agency’s widespread collection of U.S. phone data. A3 HEALTH & SCIENCE 1 A hospital bed across the pond An injury in England leads to surprises, some of them pleasant. E1 STYLE The drone rangers Users are high on remote possibilities. C1 IN THE NEWS THENATION The Supreme Court will hear a high-profile challenge to the Afford- able Care Act on Tues- day, but a lower-court case may prove a graver threat to the law. A4 THEENVIRONMENT BP’s Gulf of Mexico oil spill put tuna and amberjack populations at risk by causing heart defects in young fish that will hamper their ability to survive, a study found. A2 Cleanup continued on the Gulf Coast and the Coast Guard was working to reopen the Houston Ship Channel two days after a barge oil spill. A2 THEECONOMY Federal agents tipped off 3,000 companies last year about cyber- attacks, White House officials have told indus- try executives. A10 The Federal Reserve hasn’t significantly changed its intentions for raising interest rates despite a faster-than- expected drop in unem- ployment, a key Fed of- ficial said. A11 THEWORLD An Egyptian court or- dered capital punish- ment for 529 alleged backers of ousted Islam- ist president Mohamed Morsi. A9 China demanded a “clear explanation” from the United States about reports the NSA infil- trated the networks of a Chinese tech firm. A7 THEREGION A judge ordered the District to immediately stop housing homeless families on cots in gym- nasiums on freezing nights. B1 AD.C. judge assigned a medical guardian to the city’s most frequent 911 user. B1 More than 100 stu- dents and staff mem- bers at Watkins Mill High School in Mont- gomery County are ex- pected to undergo test- ing for tuberculosis. B2 D.C. police posted a $25,000 reward and re- leased new photos of a missing 8-year-old girl and the man police think she is with. B4 The District is failing to ensure that its low- performing schools make federally mandat- ed changes, the U.S. Education Department saidin a report. B2 SPORTS Redskins owner Dan Snyder announced that he will start a founda- tion to benefit Native Americans. D1 INSIDE BUSINESS NEWS........................A10 CLASSIFIEDS...............................D8 COMICS.......................................C6 LOTTERIES...................................B3 OBITUARIES.................................B5 OPINION PAGES.........................A14 TELEVISION.................................C4 Printed using recycled fiber 7 8 5 7 CONTENT © 2014 The Washington Post / Year 137, No. 110 TED S. WARREN/ASSOCIATED PRESS BY JIA LYNN YANG, WILLIAM WAN AND ASHLEY HALSEY III kuala lumpur, malaysia — Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak confirmed Monday that the plane that has been miss- ing for 16 days went down in a remote corneroftheIndianOcean,endinghopefor survivors among the 239 people on board. The conclusion was based on satellite data rather than the discovery of any wreckage inthemassivesearcharea, locat- edmore than1,500mileswestofAustralia. Najib said new information on the fate of the aircraft came from Britain’s Air Acci- dents Investigation Branch and the British Inmarsat satellite communications com- pany, which previously had provided data indicating that Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 took either a northern or southern route after diverting from its flight path. The Malaysian leader said that after making further calculations and “using a type of analysis never before used in an investigation of this sort,” Inmarsat had essentially eliminated the northern route and “concluded that Flight 370 flew along the southern corridor.” “It is, therefore, with deep sadness and regret that Imust informyouthat, accord- ing to this new data, Flight MH370 ended in the southern Indian Ocean,” Najib said. His announcement touched off grief and anger among passengers’ families gathered in Kuala Lumpur and in Beijing, where the plane was headed March 8. China,whichhad150passengersonthe flight, demanded that Malaysia “provide all data and information that points to this conclusion.” “China’s search will continue,” said Hong Lei, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry. “We hope the Malaysian side and other countries will continue to search.” search continued on A9 BY SCOTT WILSON AND CAROL MORELLO the hague — The world’s major indus- trial nations on Monday effectively sus- pended Russia indefinitely from the Group of Eight and warned that they would impose stronger economic sanc- tions against Moscow if President Vladi- mir Putin expands his military interven- tion in Ukraine. The decision followed a push by Presi- dent Obama for a united stand by wealthy nations against what he has called Rus- sia’s violation of international law with the annexation of Crimea this month. Obama and the leaders of six allied na- tions — Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Britain — agreed Monday to boycott a planned G-8 summit meeting in Sochi,Russia, inJune, effectively isolating Putin. Instead, they said they would con- vene as the Group of Seven in Brussels during the same time frame. “As long as it is flagrantly violating international law and the order the G-7 has helped build since the end of the Cold War, there is no reason to engage with Russia,” saidBenRhodes, Obama’sdeputy national security adviser for strategic communications. “What Russia has done has been a violation of that entire interna- tional order built up over many decades.” But Russia dismissed the move as un- important. Russian Foreign Minister Ser- ukraine continued on A8 BY LENNY BERNSTEIN When the drugs and the doctors and the physical therapists failed her, Katie Pumphrey had one choice left: She could run from pain or confront it, curtail her lifestyle or push it as far as pain would allow. Pumphrey, a 26-year-old swim coach and painter who has been in chronic pain for nearly two decades, had discov- ered along the way that intense, ex- hausting exercise brought some relief from the strange symptoms of her fibro- myalgia, a controversial neuromuscular disease with no known cure. And so she decided to go for broke. The Baltimore woman is now prepar- ing to swim the English Channel, a physical and logistical undertaking so enormous that pain will just have to get in line with the other challenges she has decided to take on: hypothermia, tides, oil tankers, wind, waves, saltwater, jelly- fish, injuries, the financial cost and many more. “Controlling [pain] is such a strange power trip,” Pumphrey said. “It’s also being proud of yourself. In the past year, I’ve just surprised myself.” Fewer people (1,429) have crossed the channel solo than have climbed Mount Everest (more than 4,000), and only 446 of the swimmers have been women. Eight people have died trying since Matthew Webb first accomplished the feat, in 1875 — though the success rate, which was tiny in the early 1900s, has risen sharply in recent years. If all goes well, Pumphrey will enter the water in Dover, England, on Aug. 8 swim continued on A12 U.S., key allies move to isolate Putin Nations effectively suspend Russia from G-8, warn of more sanctions over Ukraine Flight ‘ended’ in Indian Ocean MALAYSIAN PREMIER CONFIRMS CRASH Satellite data analysis provided breakthrough GOH CHAI HIN/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE VIA GETTY IMAGES Relatives of those aboardMalaysia Airlines Flight 370 grieve in Beijing after being told that the jet crashed in the Indian Ocean. THEFAMILIES A vigil of loving hope gives way to grief COURTESY OF SARAH BAJC Sarah Bajc, whose partner, Philip Wood, was on Flight 370, chronicled her emotional journey on social media. BY ROBERT COSTA Every week, Eric Cantor huddles in a Capitol Hill basement meeting room with House conservatives, seeking their input on legislation. As House majority leader, he has been a trusted liaison be- tween those activists and the Republican leadership. Yet in recent days, Cantor (Va.) has begun laying out a far more centrist agenda than the one espoused by the core conservatives who have long formed his power base. Putting aside his past em- phasis on broad cuts to federal pro- grams, he has become an advocate for research on pediatric cancer, passing legislation that would increase funding for the National Institutes of Health. Cantor has begun talking about urban poverty, visiting charter schools to ex- plore education reform, and has sought alliances with African American law- makers, traveling to Mississippi to ap- pear at a civil rights event and honor Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.). And he has maneuvered behind the scenes to push House Republicans toward an eventual floor vote on a plan to legalize certain illegal immigrants who were brought to the United States as children. The shift, which has rankled some House conservatives, under- scores the political challenge confronting Cantor in the lead-up to this year’s mid- term elections. Even as he strives to repair the GOP’s battered image with voters and hold together a fractious conference, Cantor, 50, is try- ing to remain the heir appar- ent to Speaker John A. Boeh- ner (R-Ohio). Each move and gesture seems de- signed to nudge conservatives toward a more even-tempered message, but Can- tor resists challenging his party’s ideol- ogy or platform, knowing he can go only cantor continued on A4 Pushing her limits to find relief Baltimore woman trains for English Channel swim as a way to fend off her chronic pain JONATHAN NEWTON/THE WASHINGTON POST Katie Pumphrey, 26, has dealt with chronic pain since around age 9. She is an artist in residence at the Creative Alliance at the Patterson in Baltimore. Cantor attempts to rebrand the House GOP, and himself Leader faces quandary as he pushes softer pitch, positions self as next speaker Rep. Eric Cantor A possible next target A sliver of land outside the law, Transnistria savors its Russian heritage. A8 Kiev struggles to find its way Beyond Crimea, Ukraine’s new government faces a host of difficult problems. A8 washingtonpost.com 6 See photos, video and an interactive graphic on what happened to Flight 370 at washingtonpost.com/world. (DETAILS, B2) DAILY CODE A2 Politics & The Nation EZ SU KLMNO TUESDAY, MARCH 25, 2014 The Washington Post is committed to correcting errors that appear in the newspaper. Those interested in contacting the paper for that purpose can: E-mail: corrections@washpost.com. Call: 202-334-6000, and ask to be connected to the desk involved — National, Foreign, Metro, Style, Sports, Business or any of the weekly sections. Comments can be directed to The Post’s reader advocate, who can be reached at 202-334-7582 or readers@washpost.com.  A Reliable Source item in the March 24 Style section, about an upcoming memoir by former congressman Patrick J. Kennedy, misspelled the last name of Washington Post jour- nalist Steven Levingston, who reported the announcement of the book.  A photo caption with the continuation of a March 23 Page One article about George Washington University’s ad- missions process misstated Jim Rogers’s title. He is the university’s associate director of admissions, not the assis- tant director of admissions.  The On Love feature in the March 23 Sunday Style section, about Tyler Jeffrey and Adam Tarosky, referred to Tarosky as “Andrew” in one instance. CORRECTIONS All day President Obama is in the Netherlands to participate in a Nuclear Security Summit and to meet with various world leaders. Visit washingtonpost.com/world for developments. 10 a.m. New-home sales for February are estimated at a 440,000 annual rate, down from an estimate of 486,000 a month earlier. Examine the data at postbusiness.com. 11 a.m. Members of Iowa’s congressional delegation attend the official unveiling of a statue of Nobel Peace Prize winner Norman Borlaug in the National Statuary Hall Collection. The biologist and Iowa native died in 2009. Visit postpolitics.com for details. 7 p.m. The Los Angeles Kings meet theWashington Capitals at Verizon Center. Follow the game at postsports.com. Happening today A guide to the major events expected to shape the news. For the latest updates all day, visit washingtonpost.com. BY DARRYL FEARS The BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill struck at the very heart of fish, a new study says. Exposed to mil- lionsofgallonsofcrude,youngtuna and amberjack, some of the speedi- est predators in the ocean, devel- oped heart defects that are likely to limit their ability to catch food. The findings of the study, led by the National Oceanic and Atmos- pheric Administration, have grim implications for the future of yel- lowfin and bluefin tuna, as well as amberjack, that were embryos, lar- vae or juveniles when the spill oc- curred during tuna-spawning sea- son in the northern Gulf of Mexico in April 2010. Embryos are highly sensitive, so fragile that it is possible to see through them. When scientists re- createdtheconditionsof thespill in a lab, exposing tunaandamberjack in thedevelopmental stage toanoil slick, they observed “a slowing of their heartbeats,” said Barbara Block, a biology professor at Stan- ford University who co-authored the study. “They’re not going to be able to survive” as they develop into adult fish, said Nat Scholz, leader of the ecotoxicology program at NOAA’s Northwest Fisheries Science Cen- ter in Seattle. “You’re going to be losing those fish from the adult spawning population.” The study — “Deepwater Hori- zon crude oil impacts the develop- ing hearts of large predatory pelag- ic fish” — was published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on the 25th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska’s Prince William Sound. Researchconductedonfishafter the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill had similar findings, but the exposed population then was smaller be- causethe11-million-gallonspill col- lected closer to the shore, killing an estimated 250,000 birds. NOAA’s study comes as BP has regained the ability to bid on feder- al oil and gas leases; the Environ- mental Protection Agency recently liftedabanonthecompany.Theoil giant fileda lawsuit inaTexascourt in August, arguing that it had been sufficiently punished for the spill. The study is part of the Deep- water Horizon Natural Resource Damage Assessment, which seeks to determine the impact of the dis- aster and assess the price of restor- ing the gulf after the largest acci- dental marine oil spill in history. The other authors were John In- cardona, a research toxicologist at NOAA’s Northwest Fisheries Sci- ence Center, and Martin Grosell, a biology professor at the University ofMiami’sRosenstielSchoolofMa- rine and Atmospheric Science. The northern gulf is a critical spawning area for a wide variety of warm-water pelagic fish, including mahi-mahi,swordfish,bluemarlin, sailfish, cobia, and king and Span- ish mackerel. Pelagic fish are those that swim at mid-depth, neither at thesurfacenorattheoceanbottom. Pelagic fishproducesmall, buoy- ant embryos that develop quickly but are extremely delicate. During the study, they were exposed to two oil samples collected from surface- skimming operations in the open Gulf of Mexico and from the source pipe attached to the damaged Deepwater Horizon wellhead. In the three species studied, ab- normalities were clear. Heart con- tractions were observed and asym- metry was apparent. The deformi- ties continued after the eggs hatched. “Morphological abnormalities included . . . reduction in the out- growth of the finfolds or finfold blisters, a dorsal or upward curva- ture of the body axis, and marked reduction in the growth of the eye,” the study said. Four years after an estimated 4millionbarrelsofoilburstintothe gulf, biologists still do not know how many fish were killed or mor- tally damaged. Tuna take eight years to mature, the point at which they can be com- mercially caught. Only four years have passed since the spill, so fish that were embryos, larvae or juve- nilesat thetimeof thespillhavenot reached adulthood and cannot be caught. Because the fish at this stage are rarely seen, their mortal- ity cannot be reflected by fishing totals or other surveys. But the study is important be- cause it demonstrates oil’s impact on the hearts of fish and could help explain a future die-off of tuna. “Nowyou’vegot twostudies:one that shows how . . . chemicals in petroleum affect cells and an or- ganismstudywhereyoucanseethe slowing of the heart,” said Block, whoco-foundedtheTunaResearch and Conservation Center at the Monterey Bay Aquarium in North- ern California. Environmental groups wel- comed the study. “This study, and others like it, helps us to see what can’t be seen with the naked eye,” said Jacqueline Savitz, vice presi- dentforU.S.oceansatthenonprofit group Oceana. “Not only is oil toxic to fish, its effects are not limited to small fish. In fact, they extend to the largest and most commercially valuable fishweknow: tuna,” shesaid. “Fora species like bluefin tuna, whose populations have crashed due to overfishing and are fighting to re- build their former abundance, BP’s oil was a shot to the heart.” darryl.fears@washpost.com Gulf spill still imperils tuna, other species BY MARK BERMAN Nearly three days after a mas- sive landslide tore through a stretch of Washington state, kill- ing at least 14 people and leaving scores unaccounted for, the pain- ful uncertainty left in its wake was joined by fears of fresh dangers. Snohomish County warned Mon- day that because of worries about “additional slide activity” in the vicinity, some ground rescue crews were pulled back from the area, while flooding still re- mained a grave concern. The landslide occurred Satur- day morning, blocking a stretch of Route 530 near Oso, about an hour north of Seattle. It appears to have been caused by ground satu- ration due to heavy rainfall in the area, officials said. At least 14 people were con- firmed dead by Monday evening, a number that could rise — there were 176 names on the list of people reported missing or unac- counted for after the landslide, John Pennington, director of emergency management for Sno- homish County, said in a news conference. That number was a substantial increase from the 18 said to be unaccounted for on Sunday. But Pennington cautioned that the number was expected to decrease, noting that it comprised only names that have been reported to various agencies rather than peo- ple confirmed to be missing. The details ranged fromthe fullnames of people who definitely live in the area to reports as vague as “Fran