Airline News
MH370 search intensifies, Indonesia on the lookout for debris
November 4th 2014
The search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 has been accelerated in the past week as a third vessel arrived in the search zone to join two other vessels already engaged in performing a bathymetric survey of an area along an arc that the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) determined was the most likely termination site for the B777-200ER. Read More »
Now that the area covering about 58,000 square miles of seafloor has been almost completely mapped out and surveyed, the underwater search using sonar installed in deep-tow vehicles can continue.
“The ATSB has utilized the data from the bathymetric survey work to prepare the initial plan for the underwater search, to be followed and referred to by all parties involved,” ATSB said. “The plan includes search timings, methods, procedures, safety precautions and search areas. The initial search areas have been allocated to the different vessels with the aim of positively identifying and mapping the debris field of MH370.” The search vessels are being funded jointly by Australia and Malaysia, ATSB said.
"While it is impossible to determine with certainty where the aircraft may have entered the water, the available data and analysis indicate that the most likely location lies close to a long but narrow arc in the southern Indian Ocean (where the aircraft last communicated with a ground station through a satellite),” ATSB noted. “This is where the aircraft is assessed to have run out of fuel.”
Meanwhile, the ATSB has asked their Indonesian counterparts to be on the lookout for debris for ill-fated MH370 claiming the lives of 239 passengers and crew, as it was “far more likely” that any floating remains have travelled west away from Australia, possibly to the coastline of Indonesia.
