Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 - Missing Plane

Relatives of the passengers of the Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, disappeared over the Indian Ocean more than two years ago, will travel to Madagascar on December 3-11 to search for debris on their own, the association of the plane's passengers and crew families Voice370 announced on Monday.

Relatives of Missing MH370 Plane Passengers to Conduct Own Search in Madagascar
https://sputniknews.com/asia/201611211047671178-mh370-crash-relatives-madagascar-trip/

Relatives also plan to meet with local social service organizations, community-based groups and local population to raise awareness about the still missing airplane, establish collection points for debris and encourage people to provide any help and information about the plane, according to the statement.

"All debris collected to date have been found off the East Coast of Africa by the public. Despite these hugely important finds, there has been no systematic, organized search by any responsible party. This leaves the NOKs no other choice except to take it upon ourselves to do something to find answers and closure," Voice370 said on Facebook.

_https://www.facebook.com/gsubathirai/posts/10157725716915697
 
An undersea sonar search for the wreckage of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 has turned up an oil barrel and cable debris -- but no sign of the missing plane.

Sonar Search for Flight MH370 Turns Up Ocean Debris, No Sign of Missing Plane
https://sputniknews.com/asia/201612011048031846-sonar-search-mh370-ocean-debris/

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) announced on Wednesday that their search of the southern Indian Ocean continues, but the efforts over the past week have not yet produced any discoveries.

"The underwater search continues with an AUV searching areas of challenging terrain and an ROV examining a range of sonar contacts which have been previously identified. Over the past week, ROV missions have revealed those contacts to be geological or man-made objects," ATSB said in a statement. "Dive 17 identified a contact cluster as geological comprising basaltic rock outcrops on a slope." The agency hopes to conclude their search by February of next year, if no credible clues are found between now and then — they plan to suspend the search.

Early next month, relatives of those lost on the flight are travelling to Madagascar to conduct their own search effort.

The group “Voice370” consists primarily of the next-of-kin of those who were onboard. They have become increasingly upset about the lack of a coordinated search effort in the western Indian Ocean or along the African coast — despite wreckage determined to have been confirmed or likely to have been from MH370 being found in those regions “Despite these hugely important finds, there has been no systematic, organized search by any responsible party,” the group wrote in a post on Facebook announcing their trip earlier this month. “This leaves the NOKs [next-of-kin] no other choice except to take it upon ourselves to do something to find answers and closure.”
 
Source: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/01/17/mh370-search-comes-up-empty-but-a-secret-hint-reveals-it-s-not-over.html

HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL
MH370 Search Comes Up Empty, But a Secret Hint Reveals It's Not Over

A last-minute switch to a new area indicates preparation for another mission, after 28 months of the most demanding and terrifying underwater search in history.

Clive Irving 01.17.17 1:00 PM ET

The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has come up empty. After 28 months of operations in the southern Indian Ocean, the last remaining search vessel is about to head back to port in Australia having completed its final sweeps.

An announcement from the governments of Malaysia, China, and Australia said, “Despite every effort using the best science available, cutting-edge technology, as well as modeling and advice from highly skilled professionals who are the best in the field, unfortunately the search has not been able to locate the aircraft.”

They said that the search was being “suspended” not terminated—a term they have used for some time.

But behind “suspended” lies a controversy that is only likely to increase: The governments are under intense pressure to renew the effort at a different location that experts believe is far more likely to contain the remains of the Boeing 777.

In fact, as The Daily Beast first revealed, the Dutch-owned search ship Equator was urgently switched to the new location for several sweeps in the last two weeks. And we can now reveal that part of those missions was spent not searching for wreckage, but mapping the ocean floor—something that would be necessary only if a new search is authorized.

In December, a team of Australian scientists said it was very confident that it now knew that the jet had dived into the ocean in a different place—an area north of the one that has been the subject of the most intense underwater search ever undertaken, which began in October 2014. Moreover, this new area is far smaller, 9,600 square miles (the size of Vermont) compared to the original area of 46,000 square miles.

It was this report that gave relatives of the people lost on Flight 370 renewed hope that the airplane’s remains would be found. Now those relatives are expressing despair and distress that the announcement of the suspension of the search gives no indication that a new one is being considered.

“I feel so furious about the suspension, which is only due to a shortage of funding” Jiang Hui, whose mother was one of the passengers, told The Guardian.

The crucial evidence that transformed calculations about the most likely end of the last five hours and 40 minutes of the flight—the period known as “the zombie flight” because nothing was heard from anyone on board—was not produced by the sea search but by the discovery of debris on beaches in the western Indian Ocean.

Australian oceanographers made replicas of the first piece of wreckage discovered, called a flaperon, and carried out tests with them in ocean waters to measure the speed of their drift. They combined this data with the results of an unprecedented international effort to recreate the exact weather and ocean conditions from the time the debris originated as the airplane crashed in March 2014, to when it washed up. By these means they were able to far more accurately assess the most likely point of its origin, the crash site.

The search is funded by the governments of Malaysia, China, and Australia, and has cost $150 million. So far, five specialized vessels have at various times been involved, three operated by the Dutch company Fugro, one by the American company Phoenix International, and one by the Chinese.

Because of weather conditions, the work can be conducted only in the Southern Hemisphere summer, which is now drawing to an end. Even then, the crews have faced some of the most severe sea conditions—storms with waves as high as 50 feet.

Seas were often so rough that crews, working 42-day missions on shifts around the clock, had to sleep on the floor wedged between a table and a bed—lying in bed was impossible. Even for the most hardened crew, sea sickness was a constant curse needing continual treatment. When crew were injured or fell ill, the ships had to return to port because they were out of range of helicopters, 1,700 miles from the nearest Australian port and, in any case, seas would have been too rough for evacuation by helicopter.

Teams of experts aboard the vessels reviewed data as it came up from the depths and it was then streamed live to another team of experts in Australia for more lengthy review. On two occasions, debris was spotted that was thought to be of the Boeing 777 but, after closer examination, turned out to be shipwrecks.

During the last few months, the Equator was assigned to return to more than 30 sites that had previously been scanned and that, after review, were judged to require another look to make sure that wreckage had not been missed. Those sites have now been scanned without result.

The underwater equipment used to search for the airplane’s debris field was often working at the limits of its capabilities—between 16,000 and 20,000 feet. The same would be true if a search in the newly identified area was launched.

Executives of Fugro have emphasized that the deeper the search, the more limited is the equipment able to deal with terrain they describe as the most challenging they have ever faced. That is why mapping of the contours of the sea floor is so essential before a search can begin. Three-dimensional color images are created from a sonar scanner attached to the hull of the ship. (Only 5 percent of the world’s ocean bed is surveyed in any detail.)

Despite the abandonment of the search there is no doubt that it is not only the families of the passengers who are hugely disappointed and will be applying pressure for a new search. The Australian oceanographers whose effort came up with the new projection of where the wreck is likely to be are continuing their work and believe that they will be able to convince officials to fund a new search. But given the scale and cost of the operations involved, the time needed for the three governments to consider the costs of a new search, agree on the time required it is highly unlikely that a decision will be taken soon.

Related info from: http://nltimes.nl/2017/01/17/dutch-firms-ships-recalled-mh370-search-comes-short

Dutch firm's ships recalled as MH370 search comes up short

By Janene Pieters on January 17, 2017 - 10:17

The search in the Indian Ocean for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 has been called off, the three involved countries, China, Malaysia and Australia, announced. The plane has not been found. Ships searching for the missing plane, including those of Dutch company Fugro, are being recalled, AD reports (Dutch only).

The Boeing 777 disappeared in March 2014. The plane had 239 people on board and was en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Most of the passengers were Chinese, with a number of Malaysians and Australians. The flight's disappearance is considered one of the biggest mysteries in aviation.

"Despite every effort using the best science available, cutting-edge technology, as well as modeling and advice from highly skilled professionals who are the best in their field, unfortunately, the search has not been able to locate the aircraft", the Australian, Malaysian and Chinese governments said in a joint statement, according to Australian broadcaster ABC. "Whilst combined scientific studies have continued to refine areas of probability, to date no new information has been discovered to determine the specific location of the aircraft."

A total area of 120 thousand square kilometers was searched, costing over 160 million dollars.

The representatives of the three countries stated that this decision was not made lightly and acknowledged the impact it will have on the families of passengers and crew, who have been missing for almost three years. "We again take this opportunity to honor the memory of those who have lost their lives and acknowledge the enormous loss felt by their loved ones", they said in the statement. "We remain hopeful that new information will come to light and that at some point in the future the aircraft will be located."

Last year the three countries agreed that the search would be suspended once the area in the Indian Ocean was completely searched and if no new evidence of the plane's location was found. Over the past years three pieces of wreckage identified as belonging to MH370 washed ashore on Mauritius, Reunion and an island near Tanzania. Investigation showed that the plane went down due to a lack of fuel.

Relatives of the victims, united under Voice 370, are disappointed by the decision to call off the search. They can't believe that the countries would let the matter go unsolved. The group criticized the countries for not expanding the search, calling it "an inescapable obligation to the passengers". The group recognizes that the governments made a huge effort, but they call on the three countries to reverse their decision.
 
An American company has offered its fleet of underwater drones to the Malaysia government in the search for the Malaysia Airlines jet, MH370. The jet went missing near Australia three years ago with 239 people on board.

Fleet of deepwater drones may hunt for long-missing MH370 jet
https://www.rt.com/usa/399362-deepwater-drones-mh370-search/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

Ocean Infinity’s six autonomous underwater vehicles (AUV), or drones, are capable of operating at 6,000 meters under water to collect high resolution data. The company advertises them as offering “seabed intelligence,” and equipped with sonar equipment and capable of search “huge swathes of the seabed, quickly and with outstanding accuracy.”

"The terms of the offer are confidential, but I can ... confirm that Ocean Infinity have offered to take on the economic risk of a renewed search," the company said in an email to AP.

"We're in a constructive dialogue with the relevant authorities and are hopeful that the offer will be accepted," it added.

The drones are connected to surface vehicles for positioning and communication.
Ocean Infinity’s offer comes after victims’ families have been urging the government to agree to a private sector hunt for the wreckage.

The Malaysia Airlines flight, carrying 239 passengers and crew, mysteriously disappeared on its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, 2014. The subsequent search by Malaysia, Australia and China of a 46,000 square-mile area of remote seabed in the southern Indian Ocean cost about A$200 million ($150 million) and was extended twice with few clues offered. They failed to find any trace of the Boeing 777.

A total of 33 pieces suspected to be from the plane have been found so far, including parts of the wings and tail, in places as far afield as Reunion, Mozambique, South Africa, Mauritius and Tanzania.

"Why hasn't Malaysia accepted this win-win offer?" Voice370 asked in a statement.

An international board of experts concluded the flight most likely crashed in a 9,700-square-mile area of ocean on the northern boundary of the last search zone, far southwest of Australia.

Malaysia, Australia and China agree that the newly identified area is too big to justify resuming the publicly funded search.
 
Why did the Australian Transport Safety Bureau keep silent on this infor and why make it public - now?

Released to the public Wednesday by the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, new satellite photos taken two weeks after missing flight MH370 disappeared from radars may help researchers narrow their search area for the lost plane.

Satellite Images Spot Possible Floating Debris from Missing MH370 Crash (PHOTOS)
https://sputniknews.com/asia/201708161056520224-satellite-images-spot-possible-mh370-debris/

Prepared by Geoscience Australia and the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), officials say the new evidence, which captures 12 "probably man-made" floating objects, provides an "unprecedented precision and certainty" that the plane crashed into the sea northeast of the initial area that was searched for two-and-a-half years.

The new suggested crash site is just north of the former search zone and covers roughly 5,000 square kilometers, the ATSB noted.

According to CSIRO's David Griffin, with the help of drift modelling technology, the photos, first snapped by French satellites, slims down the search area to three specific locations in the southern Indian Ocean.

"We are talking about much smaller distances than we've ever talked about before," Griffin told Al Jazeera. "The three locations that we nominated are of the highest priority."

However, Greg Hood, chief commissioner of the ATSB, said that even though the new report might "be useful in informing any further search effort that may be mounted in the future," investigators and family members of the victims should still be cautious since the objects outlined in the images "have not been definitely identified as MH370 debris."

"The image resolution is not high enough to be certain whether the object originated from MH370 or are other objects that might be found floating in oceans around the world," Hood added.

Coordinated by Malaysia, China and Australia, the tri-nation search was first suspended in early January after the $150 million investigation failed to offer any concrete evidence on what happened.

While Australia hasn't officially ruled out resuming the search for the missing airliner that had 239 passengers on board, the decision would be ultimately left up to Malaysia since the aircraft was registered in that nation.

"We will need to verify the data to see if it's credible before we make any decision," Aziz Kaprawi, Malaysia's deputy transport minister, told the Associated Press.

Recently, Ocean Infinity, an American firm specializing in seabed exploration technology, announced it had submitted an offer to renew the search at their own expense. Malaysia has yet to respond to the company's effort as reports cite the southeast Asian country stalled over unclear "monetary terms" the government deemed unacceptable.

The Boeing 777-200 went missing March 8, 2014, as it traveled from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
 
from https://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21733399-swarm-submarine-drones-will-scour-depths-plane-fantastical-ship

The search for MH370
A fantastical ship has set out to seek Malaysian Airlines flight 370

A swarm of submarine drones will scour the depths for the plane

Jan 2nd 2018 | DURBAN

ON JANUARY 2nd, at 8pm local time, a strange vessel weighed anchor and sailed out of the Port of Durban, in South Africa, heading east. Her hull was orange. Her superstructure bristled with antennas—some long and pointy, some sleek, white and domed. Her stern sported a crane and also a strange gantry, known to her crew as the “stinger”. Her bow looked so huge and ungainly as to be on the point of tipping her, nose first, into the depths. And below deck, invisible to the casual observer, she carried eight autonomous submarines called HUGINs, each six metres long, weighing 1,800kg, and containing a titanium sphere to protect the sensitive electronics therein from the pressure of the ocean’s depths.

The strange ship’s name is Seabed Constructor. She is a Norwegian research vessel, built in 2014 and owned by Swire Seabed, a dredging and surveying firm in Bergen. At the moment, though, she is leased to Ocean Infinity, a company based in Houston, Texas. And the task Ocean Infinity has hired her for is a hard one: to find whatever is left of flight MH370, a Boeing 777-200ER that left Kuala Lumpur on March 8th 2014 with 239 people on board and vanished over the Indian Ocean.

The disappearance of MH370 is one of the great mysteries of modern civil aviation. The aircraft was bound for Beijing, but changed course suddenly over the South China Sea and broke off radio contact. It was last detected by radar near the northern tip of Sumatra, heading west-north-west into the open ocean. Subsequent connections to a communications satellite suggested that it crashed somewhere along an arc 1,500km west of Australia.

The search that followed was the largest in aviation history. It was mounted by Fugro, a Dutch firm, and paid for by the Malaysian, Chinese and Australian governments. Over the course of three years Fugro managed to scan 120,000 square kilometres of seabed. But it found nothing. The plan is for Ocean Infinity’s search to be paid for, on a “no find, no fee” basis, by Malaysia alone. Contracts have yet to be signed, but Oliver Plunkett, Ocean Infinity’s boss, has decided to go ahead anyway, to take advantage of the window of good weather that opens in the southern Indian Ocean in January and February.

Ocean Infinity aims to cover the ground much faster than Fugro did. In prior cruises in the Atlantic, the firm has, according to Josh Broussard, its technical director, managed to scan 890 square kilometres a day using six autonomous submarines. With eight, Mr Broussard thinks that the new mission will be able to manage 1,200 a day—enough to have covered the original search area in just 100 days.

The new search area, 25,000 square kilometres of sea floor chosen by investigators from the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB), is just north of the old one (see map). Fugro could infer MH370’s crash site only from its final, rather shaky, communication signals. Ocean Infinity’s effort has been guided as well by wreckage washed ashore on the coasts of Madagascar, Mozambique and Réunion—hence the more northerly starting point. Seabed Constructor will reach the starting-point of the search, about 35°S off the coast of Western Australia, on or about January 17th, her crew having conducted a few final tests and calibrations of the HUGIN system en route, using remote-controlled robots to place dummy debris on the sea floor in order to see if the subs can find it. If searching the patch of ocean designated by the ATSB reveals nothing, then the ship will head further north, towards the 30th parallel, which some independent experts believe is a better bet.

Rolling in the deep
Fugro’s search used but a single autonomous submarine, and this was unable to dive below 4,000 metres, meaning it was not always close to the seabed. The HUGINs carried by Seabed Constructor can, however, go as deep as 6,000 metres. That permits them to reach most of the sea floor comfortably. And the fact that there are eight of them means different areas can be searched in parallel, and that some submarines will always be at sea.

The HUGINs will be launched by the stinger, which extends out over the ship’s stern. Once underwater, the robot craft will communicate with the ship using an acoustic modem. The ship’s own modem, which will receive these signals, is fixed to the end of a long pole that extends down through her hull into the water.

Each HUGIN comes with a 300kg lithium-polymer battery pack, good for a tour of duty lasting up to 60 hours. A downward-pointing sonar will map the contours of the seabed beneath the craft, but most of the searching will be done by side-mounted sonars scanning the bed on either side of the craft. These send out pings and measure the intensity with which they are reflected. Sand reflects less sound than metal does, meaning metal objects such as aircraft debris are easy to distinguish. And if something apparently metallic is detected, its nature can be confirmed using an on-board magnetometer.

The HUGINs’ search patterns are set by people, but the craft will actually navigate with little reference to their mother ship. Every so often, the ship will send out a corrective ping to keep them on course. Mostly, however, they will employing dead reckoning, based on data from accelerometers, to steer themselves autonomously. They are also capable of picking their way without assistance over sheer underwater cliffs and mountains, past crevices and gullies, using on-board cameras and machine-vision software.

After its tour of duty, a HUGIN will be lifted back on-board ship and the data it has collected (up to two terabytes, recorded on a waterproof hard drive) downloaded into the ship’s data centre and turned into human-readable maps, a process that takes six hours. The HUGIN’s battery will be replaced with a fully charged one, any necessary repairs made, and the craft then sent back out into the ocean.

A team of geologists and hydrographers will then pore over the maps, looking for signs of the missing plane. Surprisingly, for such a high-tech operation, this stage of the search will be entirely manual. Every block of sea floor that the HUGINs map will be examined by three sets of human eyes. Together, this survey team will come up with a list of possible targets, ranked from “E” to “A” (“nothing” to “that’s it”), to present to their bosses. If the data look good, a HUGIN will be sent down for a second, closer look, cameras at the ready.

What happens next, if Ocean Infinity does locate what is left of the missing aircraft, is unclear. Friends and relatives of those aboard it will doubtless find relief from knowing where the flight ended up. But merely finding the wreckage will not explain what happened on board the plane. That will require the discovery of the aircraft’s flight recorder.

That object is therefore Ocean Infinity’s ultimate target. If the firm finds it on this mission, Mr Broussard says they plan to bring it to the surface and then deliver it for analysis to the Australian authorities, who have the technical competence to assess it. A follow-up trip to examine the wreckage, and even bring it to the surface, would require further authorisation from the Malaysian government.

Seabed Constructor is the most advanced civilian survey vessel on the planet today. If its array of technology cannot find MH370, then it is likely that nothing will, and that the mystery of MH370 may never be solved. Either way, though, the advance of technology may mean that it is the last such mystery. As the oceans are watched with ever closer scrutiny, from space and the depths, it is increasingly difficult for anything to get lost in the first place.
 
KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia signed a deal on Wednesday to pay a US seabed exploration firm up to $70 million (SR262.5 million) if it finds the missing Malaysia Airlines aircraft MH370 in a new search area in the Southern Indian ocean.

Malaysia to pay US firm up to $70 million if it finds missing MH370 aircraft Wednesday 10 January 2018
http://www.arabnews.com/node/1222766/world

The disappearance of the aircraft en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing in March 2014 with 239 people aboard ranks among the world’s greatest aviation mysteries.

Australia, China and Malaysia ended a fruitless A$200-million search of an area of 120,000 square kilometers in January last year, despite investigators urging the search be extended to a 25,000-square-km area further to the north. Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai said a Houston-based private firm, Ocean Infinity, would search for MH370 in that 25,000-sq-km priority area on a “no-cure, no-fee” basis, meaning it will only get paid if it finds the plane.

The search is expected to be completed within 90 days, he told a news conference.

“As we speak, the vessel, Seabed Constructor, is on her way to the search area, taking advantage of favorable weather conditions in the South Indian ocean,” Liow said in a statement.

The vessel will have 65 crew, including two government representatives drawn from the Malaysian navy.

The search operation will begin on January 17, said Ocean Infinity Chief Executive Oliver Plunkett, who attended the signing event.

Ocean Infinity will be paid $20 million if the plane is found within 5,000 sq km, $30 million if it is found within 10,000 square km and $50 million if it is found within an area of 25,000 square km. Beyond that area, Ocean Infinity will receive $70 million, Liow said.

Ocean Infinity’s priority is to locate the wreckage or the black box recorders — flight and cockpit recorders — or both, and present credible evidence to confirm their location, Liow added.

Last week, Ocean Infinity said it had moved the vessel closer to a possible search area. The vessel left Durban, South Africa, on January 2 and was headed to Perth, Australia, Reuters shipping data showed.

The MH370 debris could furnish clues to events on board before the aircraft crashed. There have been competing theories that it suffered mechanical failure or was intentionally flown off course.

Investigators believe someone may have deliberately switched off the plane’s transponder before diverting it thousands of miles out over the Indian Ocean.

At least three pieces of aircraft debris collected from sites on Indian Ocean islands and along Africa’s east coast have been confirmed as being from the missing plane.
 
A new search for the remains of missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 has resumed on Monday, the Malaysian civil aviation department said in a statement.

Last Chance: New Search for Missing Flight MH370 Begins 24.01.2018
https://sputniknews.com/world/201801241061014616-mh370-malaysia-search/

The aircraft vanished en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing in March 2014, with 239 people on board. Debris has been collected from Indian Ocean islands and Africa's east coast, with at least three pieces confirmed as coming from the missing plane.

Earlier this month, Texas-based US company Ocean Infinity was contracted by the Malaysian Government to search for the wreckage on a "no find, no fee" basis. The firm will be paid up to $70 million if it finds the plane within 90 days.

One of the world's most advanced undersea search vessels, the Seabed Constructor, set off from Durban, South Africa, on January 3. The search restarted immediately after a US-led team aboard the Seabed Constructor on Sunday reached the remote spot in the Indian Ocean that Australia's scientific agency believes is the plane's resting place.

The team will reportedly be using eight drone-like autonomous underwater vehicles, AUVs, to scour the seabed. Nothing on this scale with this equipment has been attempted before.

"If they don't find anything in the 90 days… I think that would be the end for decades — this is like the final effort, if you like," Charitha Pattiaratchi, professor of coastal oceanography at the University of Western Australia, told Reuters.

Australia, Malaysia and China called off the original two-year search for the plane after finding nothing in a 120,000-sq-km underwater search zone in January last year, despite investigators urging the search be extended to a 25,000 sq km area further to the north.
 
4 years on, Malaysia says search for missing MH370 flight to end in June Saturday 3 March 2018
http://www.arabnews.com/node/1258341/world

A Malaysian official said Saturday that the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 by a US company will likely end in June, as families of passengers marked the fourth anniversary of the plane’s disappearance with renewed hope that the world’s biggest aviation mystery will be solved.

Malaysia inked a “no cure, no fee” deal with Houston, Texas-based Ocean Infinity in January to resume the hunt for the plane, a year after the official search in the southern Indian Ocean by Malaysia, Australia and China was called off.

Ocean Infinity started the search on Jan. 22 and has 90 search days to look for the plane. Malaysia’s civil aviation chief, Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, said the 90-day term will spread over a few months because the search vessel has to refuel in Australia and bad weather could be a factor.

Azharuddin said the search is going smoothly and is expected to end by mid-June.

“The whole world, including the next of kin, have (new) hope to find the plane for closure,” he told reporters at a remembrance event at a shopping mall near Kuala Lumpur. “For the aviation world, we want to know what exactly happened to the plane.”

Officials have said there was an 85 percent chance of finding the debris in a new 25,000-square-kilometer (9,650-square-mile) search area — roughly the size of Vermont — identified by experts.

If the mission is successful within three months, payment will be made based on the size of the area searched. Malaysia says it will pay Ocean Infinity $20 million for 5,000 square kilometers (1,930 square miles) of a successful search, $30 million for 15,000 square kilometers (5,790 square miles), $50 million for 25,000 square kilometers (9,653 square miles) and $70 million if the plane or flight recorders are found beyond the identified area.

The plane vanished March 8, 2014, while flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.

The official search was extremely difficult because no transmissions were received from the aircraft after its first 38 minutes of flight. Systems designed to automatically transmit the flight’s position failed to work after this point, according to a final report issued in January 2017 by the Australian Transport Safety Board.

Family members lit candles on a stage Saturday and observed a moment of silence during the three-hour event. Most are split over whether the search will be fruitful.

“It doesn’t renew (any hope) because I also have to be realistic. It has been four years,” said Intan Maizura Othman, whose husband was a flight attendant on the plane. She was pregnant when the plane disappeared and attended the event with her now 4-year-old son.

Jiang Hui of China, whose mother was on board the plane, said that he was grateful for Ocean Infinity’s courage to mount the search, but that he hopes it will not be the end if the mission fails. He proposed for a public fund to be set up to continue the search.

“Without a search, there will be no truth,” Jiang said.

Hunt for missing Malaysian plane likely to end in June Sunday 4 March 2018
http://www.arabnews.com/node/1258721/world
 
Malaysia says MH370 report to be released after latest search ends Thursday 8 March 2018
http://www.arabnews.com/node/1261671/world

The full investigation report into the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 will be released after the latest search efforts are completed, officials said on Thursday, four years after the aircraft first went missing.

Flight MH370, carrying 239 people onboard, became one of the world’s greatest aviation mysteries when it disappeared on its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, 2014.

Malaysia agreed in January to pay US firm Ocean Infinity up to $70 million if it found the plane during an offshore search effort that is underway and expected to end in June.

The decision to engage the firm came after Australia, China and Malaysia ended a fruitless A$200-million ($159.38 million) search across a 120,000 square-kilometer area in the Indian Ocean last year, despite investigators calling for the target area to be extended 25,000 square kilometers north.

The release of a full report into MH370’s disappearance has been suspended pending the outcome of the new search, as any new evidence uncovered is “likely to significantly affect the investigation,” Malaysian investigators said in their annual interim statement sent to families of those aboard the plane.

“In the event that the aircraft is found, the team will conduct further investigation,” said the statement seen by Reuters and due to be released publicly later on Thursday.

“If the aircraft is not found and a decision is made to discontinue the search, the team will resume the completion of the report and release it in the months ahead.”

Several pieces of aircraft debris have been found on Indian Ocean islands and along Africa’s east coast, and efforts to retrieve more are ongoing.

Three wing fragments were confirmed as coming from the missing plane, while other pieces, including some cabin interior items, were determined to be “almost certain” from MH370, the investigators said.

Malaysian officials are working with Australian authorities on plans to recover the Boeing Co. 777’s wreckage or its flight recorders, in the event the aircraft is found.

Prime Minister Najib Razak reiterated the country’s commitment to finding the plane. “We are pushing the global aviation community to take measures to make our skies safer,” he said on his official Twitter account on Thursday.

The Seabed Constructor vessel has covered 16,000 square kilometers so far but has yet to identify any significant findings, Ocean Infinity said in its weekly search update on Tuesday.
 
https://www.amazon.fr/dp/2081422239/ref=cm_sw_r_fa_dp_U_OqrOAbA82PKN0

Vol MH370 - Une vie détournée Broché – 28 février 2018
de Ghyslain Wattrelos (Auteur),‎ Gaëlle Legenne (Auteur)

Le 8 mars 2014, Ghyslain Wattrelos a perdu Laurence, sa femme, Ambre et Hadrien, leurs enfants de 13 et 17 ans, dans la disparition du vol MH370 de la Malaysia Airlines. Que s est-il passé cette nuit-là à bord du Boeing 777? Aujourd hui, un grand nombre de questions demeurent. Comment un avion avec 239 personnes à bord a-t-il pu se volatiliser?

Pas de zone de crash, pas de corps. Confronté à un deuil impossible, pris dans les fils d une enquête remplie de zones grises, Ghyslain consacre chacune de ses journées à la recherche de la vérité, n hésitant pas à prendre des risques, pointant du doigt les incohérences, les mensonges et les silences. Avec une conviction : des gens savent.

Dans un récit bouleversant mêlant l enquête et l intime, Ghyslain Wattrelos livre ses interrogations, ses doutes, sa colère, mais aussi la douleur d un père qui doit la vérité au seul enfant qu il lui reste.



https://www.amazon.fr/dp/2081422239/ref=cm_sw_r_fa_dp_U_OqrOAbAbA82PKN0

Flight MH370 - A Life Diverted Broché - February 28,2018
by Ghyslain Wattrelos (Author),? Gaëlle Legenne (Author)

On March 8,2014, Ghyslain Wattrelos lost Laurence, his wife, Ambre and Hadrien, their 13- and 17-year-old children, in the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370. What happened that night on the Boeing 777? Today, many questions remain unanswered. How could a plane with 239 people on board vanish?

No crash zone, no bodies. Confronted with an impossible mourning, caught in the threads of a survey filled with grey areas, Ghyslain devotes each of his days to the search for the truth, not hesitating to take risks, pointing the finger at inconsistencies, lies and silences. With a conviction: people know.

Ghyslain Wattrelos, in an overwhelming tale mixing investigation and intimacy, reveals his interrogations, doubts, anger, but also the pain of a father who owes the truth to the only child left to him.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator
 
PERLOU said:
https://www.amazon.fr/dp/2081422239/ref=cm_sw_r_fa_dp_U_OqrOAbA82PKN0

Vol MH370 - Une vie détournée Broché – 28 février 2018
de Ghyslain Wattrelos (Auteur),‎ Gaëlle Legenne (Auteur)

Le 8 mars 2014, Ghyslain Wattrelos a perdu Laurence, sa femme, Ambre et Hadrien, leurs enfants de 13 et 17 ans, dans la disparition du vol MH370 de la Malaysia Airlines. Que s est-il passé cette nuit-là à bord du Boeing 777? Aujourd hui, un grand nombre de questions demeurent. Comment un avion avec 239 personnes à bord a-t-il pu se volatiliser?

Pas de zone de crash, pas de corps. Confronté à un deuil impossible, pris dans les fils d une enquête remplie de zones grises, Ghyslain consacre chacune de ses journées à la recherche de la vérité, n hésitant pas à prendre des risques, pointant du doigt les incohérences, les mensonges et les silences. Avec une conviction : des gens savent.

Dans un récit bouleversant mêlant l enquête et l intime, Ghyslain Wattrelos livre ses interrogations, ses doutes, sa colère, mais aussi la douleur d un père qui doit la vérité au seul enfant qu il lui reste.


https://www.amazon.fr/dp/2081422239/ref=cm_sw_r_fa_dp_U_OqrOAbAbA82PKN0

Flight MH370 - A Life Diverted Broché - February 28,2018
by Ghyslain Wattrelos (Author),? Gaëlle Legenne (Author)

On March 8,2014, Ghyslain Wattrelos lost Laurence, his wife, Ambre and Hadrien, their 13- and 17-year-old children, in the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370. What happened that night on the Boeing 777? Today, many questions remain unanswered. How could a plane with 239 people on board vanish?

No crash zone, no bodies. Confronted with an impossible mourning, caught in the threads of a survey filled with grey areas, Ghyslain devotes each of his days to the search for the truth, not hesitating to take risks, pointing the finger at inconsistencies, lies and silences. With a conviction: people know.

Ghyslain Wattrelos, in an overwhelming tale mixing investigation and intimacy, reveals his interrogations, doubts, anger, but also the pain of a father who owes the truth to the only child left to him.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator

Thanks - so much - for bringing that information to the Forum, PERLOU. Very few articles and book publications have surfaced of what the families have experienced from the disappearance of MH370.

Ghyslain Wattrelos in London on Friday. His wife, daughter and one of his two sons were on Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 when it vanished last March.

Families of Flight 370 Victims Fear Silence as World Moves On (Photo) MARCH 6, 2015
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/07/world/europe/mh370-families-victims-search-for-answers.html

PARIS — Most of the time, Ghyslain Wattrelos believes that his wife and two of his three children are dead.

But that is pretty much all he believes of what the authorities in eight countries have said about the Malaysian plane that carried his family and disappeared a year ago as if swallowed whole by the earth.

A French engineer and senior business executive, Mr. Wattrelos has no physical proof of their deaths, with 236 others on board Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing last March.

No bodies, not even a trace of debris from the plane. He does not know where they died or how: Laurence, his wife of 24 years; his son Hadrien, who would have turned 18 last month; and his daughter, Ambre, barely a teenager, whose last text message to a friend before boarding the plane was “Soon I will see my papa again.”

For a long time, he had held on to those words, willing them to still come true. They could have crash-landed, he hoped, on one of about 16,000 uninhabited islands in Indonesia. They could be hostages somewhere. Nothing seemed more outlandish than a Boeing 777’s simply vanishing in the 21st century.

The tale of Flight 370 is the greatest unsolved mystery in aviation since Amelia Earhart disappeared with her Lockheed Electra in 1937.

Investigators say they have pieced together a flight path that has the jetliner suddenly veering off its China-bound northward trajectory and doubling back over Malaysia before heading south. That presumed path has resulted in a 23,000-square-mile primary search area about 1,000 miles west of Perth, Australia. But even if it were to prove broadly accurate, it would leave open the question of why the plane found itself on such a spectacular diversion.

Like the families of other victims, most of whom were Chinese or Malaysian, Mr. Wattrelos has spent the past year suspended in a limbo of acceptance, grief, anger and hope fanned by a lack of answers. Distressed by the shrillness of the early news media attention, when cameras besieged his home and the faces of his wife, son and daughter would haunt him from television screens and magazine covers, he now speaks of something that to him is far worse: silence.

“The world has moved on,” Mr. Wattrelos said in a recent interview. “But I can’t. Not until I know what happened.”

When the status of Flight 370 changed from “delayed” to “missing” on flight-tracking sites in the early afternoon of March 8, 2014, Mr. Wattrelos was 28,000 feet in the air. He was on a flight from Paris to Beijing to meet his family for the second half of their vacation. They had been living in Beijing for six years and were about to move back to France.

His plane landed nine hours after Flight 370 was scheduled to arrive. When he turned on his cellphone, a text message from a colleague appeared on his screen: “I am so terribly sorry about your family.”

At the gate, a hostess was waiting for him. She took him to a private room with the French consul, an acquaintance from years of working in China. The consul grabbed his shoulders. “The plane is missing,” he said. “Your family has died,” using the French word “disparu.”

It had never occurred to him what an irony it was that in French the word can mean “dead,” though more often “disappeared.” But in those early hours, there was no ambiguity. He had to call his oldest son, who had stayed behind, studying in Paris. “It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” he said.

Hope came later, when no physical evidence of a crash emerged and officials got tangled in contradictory statements.

Mr. Wattrelos remembers them all.

On March 11, the chief of Malaysia’s air force, Gen. Rodzali Daud, was reported as saying that the plane had last been detected way off its route in the Malacca Strait. Later that day, Gen. Rodzali denied he had ever said such a thing. For days, the search focused on the South China Sea, thousands of miles north of today’s primary search area.

On March 15, the Malaysian prime minister, Najib Razak, suggested that someone on board had deliberately turned off the communication systems.

Nine days later, Malaysia Airlines texted the victims’ families, stating “beyond any reasonable doubt that MH370 has been lost and that none of those on board survived.”

At a memorial service that Mr. Wattrelos organized at the French Embassy in Beijing, the school friends of his children spoke about them in the present tense. And when the day came, in May, that he had to pack up the family home and move to France, his son pleaded with him to bring back all his siblings’ toys and clothes.

What will they think if they come back and we have thrown away all their stuff, his son asked.

But Mr. Wattrelos refused. “I did not want to build a shrine,” he said.

Instead he wanted to put up gravestones in the local cemetery, a place to feel close to his family and grieve with his son. But when he called, he was told he could not have a headstone without a death certificate.

He still gets letters and emails from people telling him his family is alive. Some say the plane’s geographic coordinates came to them in a dream. Others, engineers or retired pilots, send dozens of pages of conjecture of what might have happened. Others again have themselves suffered catastrophic grief and simply offer their support. He has been told his wife and children were prisoners in Afghanistan or Diego Garcia, the American military base in the Indian Ocean.

Sometimes, he said, his heart jumps when the phone rings. A small part of him still wants to believe that they are held hostage, “somewhere,” he says.

Officials at the Australian Transport Safety Bureau leading the search say they are confident that the wreckage will be found by May, when the primary search area will have been combed by underwater drones.

To Mr. Wattrelos such pronouncements, after a year of uncertainty, are meaningless, even insulting.

In January, the Malaysian government announced that the plane’s disappearance was officially considered an “accident.” Mr. Wattrelos received an email from the authorities telling him he could now apply for death certificates and compensation.

“How dare they say it was an accident, just like that?” he said.

“They would not be offering us death certificates if they didn’t know that my wife and children are dead,” he said. “That’s the part I believe. But if they know that much, what else do they know? And why aren’t they telling us?”

Together with an American teacher, Sarah Bajc, whose partner was on the plane, and a handful of other family members of victims, Mr. Wattrelos wants to motivate a whistle-blower to speak up. Last year, they made a video and raised just over $100,000, which was quickly spent on private investigators. They want to try again. “If we offer a million, maybe someone will speak up,” he said.

He does not have a single theory of what happened. Was it an attempted terrorist attack? A military exercise that accidentally brought down the plane? Did the Western authorities externally take control of the plane and force it to land in the water because someone or something dangerous was believed to be on board?

Whatever happened, Mr. Wattrelos said, “someone somewhere knows something.”

“It’s too big,” he said. “There are too many countries involved, and I hope someone comes forward.”

When he is not peering over oceanic maps and emailing with Ms. Bajc about the next step in their campaign, Mr. Wattrelos tries to live a normal life, for his son’s sake. Before returning to work last spring, he had called his human resources department and requested that no one talk to him about his loss.

“That was very helpful,” he said.
 
http://rmc.bfmtv.com/emission/vol-mh370-disparu-en-mer-de-chine-je-ne-crois-pas-a-la-version-officielle-1391318.html#


Il a perdu sa femme et ses enfants lors du crash du vol MH370: "Ce que je sais, c'est qu'on me ment et qu'on me cache quelque chose"
08/03/2018 à 14h06

Ghyslain Wattrelos était l'invité des GG ce jeudi. Cet ingénieur a perdu sa femme et deux de ses enfants dans la disparition du vol MH370 de la Malaysia Airlines en mars 2014. Depuis, on sait toujours peu de choses sur la disparition de cet avion.
Quatre ans après la disparition du vol MH370 de la Malaysia Airlines, Ghyslain Wattrelos n'a aucune réponse. Son épouse et deux de leurs enfants se trouvait à bord de l'appareil qui s'est évanoui des écrans radars le 8 mars 2014. "Pas de preuve, pas de crash, pas de corps", écrit dans son livre "Vol MH370, une vie détournée" (Flammarion)

Pourtant, il y a bien une version officielle du drame:

"La version officielle c'est que l'avion a volé pendant une heure, après plus de trace de lui. L'avion partait de Kuala Lumpur et allait vers Pékin. En pleine mer de Chine, on perd sa trace. On nous dit qu'un radar militaire l'a détecté retraversant la Malaisie, après il a encore fait un changement de cap à des milliers de kilomètres au sud. Ce qu'on nous dit, c'est que tous les passagers étaient morts après une dépressurisation. L'avion était en autopilote et quand il n'a plus eu d'essence, il est tombé dans l'eau", a-t-il raconté ce jeudi chez les GG.

Mais Ghyslain Wattrelos est sceptique: "Je ne crois pas à la version officielle. Ce que je sais 4 ans après, c'est qu'on me ment depuis la première semaine et qu'on me cache quelque chose".

"Une opération militaire"?
"C'est invraisemblable. On ne nous explique pas comment ça a pu arriver. Si l'avion a fait ce trajet-là, les contrôleurs civils ne le voient plus mais les militaires devraient toujours le voir. Les militaires de neuf pays auraient dû l'apercevoir. Je n'y crois pas. Un avion qui tombe dans l'eau, on retrouve des débris flottants partout. Ce n'est pas possible, il n'est pas tombé-là. On a retrouvé quelques débris des années plus tard sur une plage très loin", a-t-il aussi argumenté.

Il se défend d'être un complotiste et dit exposer dans son livre des faits troublants: "Mon interprétation, c'est que l'avion est tombé là où on l'a perdu. Que les débris ont été ramassés. C'est une opération militaire parce que quelqu'un, qui était présent dans l'avion, ne devait pas arriver à Pékin".

Le 8 mars 2014, 239 personnes ont disparu après avoir décollé de Kuala Lumpur à bord d'un Boeing en direction de Pékin.

P.B.
A lire aussi
Germanwings, Malaysia Airlines : deux communications de crise après un crash
Avion de Malaysia Airlines disparu: qui sont les passagers suspects?
Malaysia Airlines: le Boeing reste introuvable
Vol MH370: la communication calamiteuse de Malaysia Airlines




He lost his wife and children in the crash of flight MH370:"What I know is that someone's lying and hiding something from me".
08/03/2018 to 14h06

Ghyslain Wattrelos was the guest of the GGs on Thursday. This engineer lost his wife and two children in the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 in March 2014. Since then, little is known about the disappearance of this plane.
Four years after the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, Ghyslain Wattrelos has no response. His wife and two of their children were on board the aircraft, which collapsed from the radar screens on March 8,2014. "No proof, no crash, no body", writes in his book "Vol MH370, une vie détournée" (Flammarion)

Yet there is an official version of the drama:

"The official version is that the plane flew for an hour, after more trace of him. The plane was departing from Kuala Lumpur and heading for Beijing. In the open sea of China, we're losing track of him. We are told that a military radar detected him passing through Malaysia, after which he made another course alteration thousands of kilometres to the south. What we're being told is that all the passengers were dead after a depressurization. The plane was in autopilot and when it ran out of gas, it fell into the water,"he told the GGs on Thursday.

But Ghyslain Wattrelos is skeptical:"I don't believe in the official version. What I know four years later is that someone has been lying to me since the first week and that they have been hiding something from me.


"A military operation"?
"It's unbelievable. They don't explain how this could have happened. If the aircraft made that flight, civilian controllers no longer see it, but the military should always see it. The soldiers of nine countries should have seen it. I don't believe that. A plane falling into the water, floating debris is everywhere. That's not possible, he didn't fall there. We found some debris years later on a very distant beach,"he argued.

He refuses to be a complotist and says in his book he explains disturbing facts:"My interpretation is that the plane fell where it was lost. That the debris was picked up. It is a military operation because someone who was on the plane was not supposed to arrive in Beijing.

On 8 March 2014,239 people disappeared after taking off from Kuala Lumpur on a Boeing to Beijing.

P.B.
Read also
Germanwings, Malaysia Airlines: two crisis communications after a crash
Malaysia Airlines plane missing: who are the suspicious passengers?
Malaysia Airlines: Boeing still untraceable
Flight MH370: Malaysia Airlines' calamitous communication disaster

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator
 
Australian engineer Peter McMahon has claimed that he has determined the location of fragments of Flight MH370, the Malaysian Airlines’ Boeing 777 that went missing on its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

Australian Engineer Claims Malaysian MH370 Boeing 777 Found 19.03.2018
https://sputniknews.com/asia/201803191062673536-mcmahon-mh370-found/

According to the 64-year old Australian, who claims a 25-year record of catastrophe investigations, by thoroughly studying NASA and Google maps he has determined that the plane fragments are located 10 miles from Round Island, not far from the island nation of Mauritius, the Daily Star reports.

The engineer claims that earlier searches for the aircraft did not explore this territory. Some fragments of the plane's front section were found not far from Rodrigues Island.

The Australian says he sent the results of his investigation to the country's Transport Security Bureau (ATSB). The ATSB, he asserts, did not rule out that his find could be fragments of the plane, but, as McMahon claims, US government representatives ordered the Australians to stick to their search region in the Indian Ocean.

"Four Americans were sent to Australia to track [search] results… They have made sure that all information received has been hidden from the public," the engineer told the Daily Star.

As McMahon tells it, authorities "do not want [the plane] found as it's full of bullet holes, finding it will only open another inquiry."

Australian authorities have not commented on McMahon's more far-fetched statements.
 
No sign of MH370 found in new scan of Indian Ocean floor
https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/scan-ocean-floor-found-sign-mh370-54843126
Search for missing flight MH370 continues 4 years later with seafloor drones (Bla Bla Blaaaaaaaaa... :zzz: )

A new scan of the Indian Ocean floor for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has searched nearly 80,000 square kilometers (31,000 square miles) since January without finding any sign of the wreckage. But the company looking for the plane, which has been missing for more than four years, said it is still determined to find it.

This comes despite earlier hopes that a 25,000-square-kilometer (9,650-square-mile) area most likely to contain the missing aircraft had been identified.

Ocean Infinity, the American technology company conducting the latest search, said in an update Monday that it had scanned up to 1,300 square kilometers (500 square miles) per day since launching its mission far off the west coast of Australia in late January. It has searched both inside and outside an area identified by Australian authorities.

"Whilst it's disappointing there has been no sign of MH370 in the Australian Transport Safety Bureau search area and further north, there is still some search time remaining," Ocean Infinity chief executive officer Oliver Plunkett said in a statement.

"Everyone at Ocean Infinity remains absolutely determined for the remainder of the search," he said.

Flight 370 disappeared March 8, 2014, while en route from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Beijing with 239 people aboard. No transmissions were received from the aircraft after its first 38 minutes of flight, but it is believed to have crashed in the far southern Indian Ocean based on the drift patterns of crash debris that washed ashore on distant beaches.

The governments of Malaysia, China and Australia called off the nearly three-year official search in January 2017. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau's final report on the search conceded authorities were no closer to knowing the reasons for the plane's disappearance or its exact location.

In January, the Malaysian government pledged to pay Texas-based Ocean Infinity up to $70 million if it could find the wreckage or black boxes of the aircraft within 90 days. Ocean Infinity uses up to eight autonomous vehicles capable of operating in depths up to 6,000 meters (19,685 feet), and Plunkett had launched the search by saying his company had "a realistic prospect" of finding the aircraft.

He said Monday that its technology had performed "exceptionally well," with "significant amounts of high quality data" collected.

The company's Seabed Constructor research vessel is stopping in the West Australian port of Fremantle for resupply and crew rotation before returning to the search until it's forced to quit in the southern hemisphere's winter.

ABC DSN News Video / 03:49

Flash Backs: :whistle:
Santiago Flight 513 Commercial Airliner Takes Off in Germany in 1954, Lands in Brazil in 1989

erhrh-min.jpg


Flight 214 (Damage Control DSN's) :pinocchio:
 
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