The Malaysian Government is tipped to announce the resumption of the search for MH370 as early as this week

Malaysia could announce as early as this week that it is resuming the search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370.
The Malaysian government has been looking closely at search offers from private companies and an announcement is expected soon, according to sources linked to Kuala Lumpur.
A “no-find, no-fee” offer by US company Ocean Infinity is understood to be the winning candidate although Dutch company Fugro, which was involved in the original sweep, is believed to have countered with a low-fee proposal.
Ocean Infinity champions a system that uses six HUGIN autonomous underwater vehicles capable of operating at depths of up to 6000m to collect high-resolution data at what it says are “record-breaking speeds’’.

https://www.airlineratings.com/news/mh3 ... arch-deal/

Let's hope the wreckage is found this time

I think before another day is spent on the water the raw data from the satellites including the ground station in Perth is put on Kaggle or similar as a public dataset and open it up as a competition to locate the best possible search area.

Get some intelligent people to have a fresh look at the problem.

Good luck on that. Amazing with all our technology we can't find every piece of metal in the ocean bigger than 3 by 3 meters.

Our oceanographic salvage experts wouldn’t have an idea of how to find something that small made out of aluminum unless you told them the exact position, even then it is hit and miss. This requires smart people, with specific techniques for the task. They want to be looking for the high density components like the engines and landing gear.

I do believe one day we will be able to find the remains of this flight. We will not ever be able to piece together why it happened, of course, but perhaps we will be able to understand what happened. May all the families find/have found some sort of peace.

synanthropic wrote:

I do believe one day we will be able to find the remains of this flight. We will not ever be able to piece together why it happened, of course, but perhaps we will be able to understand what happened.

Just curious - if we can find out what happened, why the certainty that we'll never know why? Or are you already "certain" that the pilot did it?

Having read through all the MH370 threads over the years I hesitate to post here. However, I am glad to hear that a search may resume. Surely Boeing must also have a big interest in seeing the search re-started, I would think that they want to know as a company once and for all what caused this. Does Boeing still have a team or office investigating this, and have they contributed financially to the searches?

Good, we have to find out what in the world happen to that flight and I too also agree we need some fresh eyes to take a look at all the information gathered so far.

enilria wrote:

Good luck on that. Amazing with all our technology we can't find every piece of metal in the ocean bigger than 3 by 3 meters.

Well, it is a big ocean, and the plane is in a remote part of it.

Do they have any new leads?

SonOfABeech wrote:

enilria wrote:

Good luck on that. Amazing with all our technology we can't find every piece of metal in the ocean bigger than 3 by 3 meters.

Well, it is a big ocean, and the plane is in a remote part of it.

Do they have any new leads?

Well they know where it certainly isn't.

This is a true needle in a haystack.

I really hope they find it.

Maybe this sounds stupid and reckless, but why not get something the size and weight of say an engine the same as MH370, put a tracking device in it and drop it in the ocean where they believe it probably crashed.

The reason behind the madness is that it will give a live data feed on the underwater currents that may lead them to finding the actual missing wreckage. Just an idea

They know what the currents are. That's one way they know they're looking in the right place.

Most experts think the plane is *just* outside one of the areas that's been searched. All they really need to do is incrementally expand the search area until it's found.

I've also seen it suggested that they literally missed it in an area that's already been searched. That's actually the worst case scenario. They're probably not going to go back over areas they've already searched.

But as of now, they've searched the most likely areas where it could be, but not all possible areas. So it's probably sitting relatively close to an area that's been searched, and hopefully will be found in this new search. I'm pretty confident that it will be found eventually, one way or another. The question is just whether it'll happen fast enough for any useful data to be gleaned.

SomebodyInTLS wrote:

synanthropic wrote:

I do believe one day we will be able to find the remains of this flight. We will not ever be able to piece together why it happened, of course, but perhaps we will be able to understand what happened.

Just curious - if we can find out what happened, why the certainty that we'll never know why? Or are you already "certain" that the pilot did it?

No, I simply mean that, even if we may find everything (e.g., the what), we may never know with certainty the reasons for how things occurred or the sequence of events (e.g., the why). I don't mean to argue for one theory or another, just that, even finding the pieces we may not be able to see the puzzle as it truly unfolded. I don't know how or why this plane was lost, nor do I subscribe to any theory; it's truly a grey area for me (and for many other people, I suspect). I do think what happened was less malicious than what some other people believe, though. Either way, I hope that makes better sense, please excuse my English!

Well they haven't looked where it landed in Pakistan have they? #sarcasm

I'm surprised more bits of it haven't washed up on some remote beaches in the southern hemisphere.

Hope they will find it this time around. It is a very big ocean for a relatively small piece of aircraft. They first need to find the haystack.

Dutchy wrote:

Hope they will find it this time around. It is a very big ocean for a relatively small piece of aircraft. They first need to find the haystack.

I think you mean the needle.

ikolkyo wrote:

FoxtrotSierra wrote:

Dutchy wrote:

Hope they will find it this time around. It is a very big ocean for a relatively small piece of aircraft. They first need to find the haystack.

I think you mean the needle.

I think what he means is first find the general area then go in for “needle” aka the aircraft.

Bingo, that's exactly what I meant. It is a very big ocean and endless sea of nothingness.

FoxtrotSierra wrote:

Dutchy wrote:

Hope they will find it this time around. It is a very big ocean for a relatively small piece of aircraft. They first need to find the haystack.

I think you mean the needle.

I think what he means is first find the general area then go in for “needle” aka the aircraft.

enilria wrote:

Good luck on that. Amazing with all our technology we can't find every piece of metal in the ocean bigger than 3 by 3 meters.

Oh, we can find that size of metal. The only question is to have an idea where to look for it. It also cost a lot of money to search every square kilometer of ocean floor for pieces of metal that size; so much so that only a limited amount of search equipment exists and it would take hundreds of years to search the entire worlds ocean floors (and who is going to pay for that?).

In this case no one had any real idea of where the aircraft went down. The potential radius was huge beyond what most people understand. The initial search areas were based on at best educated guesses...

Now, several years later; we have had several pieces of wreckage wash up on certain islands... and wave and current patterns are such that there is an actual "likely" to least likely areas for the aircraft to have gone down at; which have not been searched. In fact, much of the areas actually searched are not in a likely or even possible location based on the location of the washed up wreckage.

Perhaps the lesson learned from this case is if you don't have good location data; perhaps its best to wait for actual wreckage that can be positively tied to the aircraft before you start the search.

Also, keep in mind that I it took almost 2 years to find AF 447 crash... and we had a relatively good location on the crash; and lots of actual wreckage and debris recovered within a 5 days.

Have a great day,

TC957 wrote:

I'm surprised more bits of it haven't washed up on some remote beaches in the southern hemisphere.

Sometimes I wonder if there have been more bits washing up on beaches. The problem is, it could be some remote beach where nobody lives, or someone could find a piece of the aircraft and ignore it, thinking it's just trash or something unimportant.

The most recent comments about satellite images and debris is hopeful. I think the wreckage will be located some day. But it will be next to impossible to find the black boxes in my opinion. Every puzzle has a solution.

buzzard302 wrote:

The most recent comments about satellite images and debris is hopeful. I think the wreckage will be located some day. But it will be next to impossible to find the black boxes in my opinion. Every puzzle has a solution.

Why? If they find the wreckage the black boxes should be relatively easy to locate, then they should know where to look, scanning a few NM around the wreckage is dueable.

lowbank wrote:

SonOfABeech wrote:

enilria wrote:

Good luck on that. Amazing with all our technology we can't find every piece of metal in the ocean bigger than 3 by 3 meters.

Well, it is a big ocean, and the plane is in a remote part of it.

Do they have any new leads?

Well they know where it certainly isn't.

I don't think it's entirely out of the question that it could actually be in the area already searched, just very unlikely. The ocean is so big compared to the range of the tools used for searching the seafloor, that my understanding is they've been following a search pattern with gaps between each search track chosen based on the expected size of the debris field, and an estimated low probability of missing all recognizable debris.

Interestingly though, they reportedly found 4 shipwrecks in the process.

As to SonOfABeach's question, there are no major new leads, but they've continued to analyze the available evidence and refine their estimates of where the plane likely came down. In December of last year, the ATSB released a report concluding the most likely final position was within 25 nm of the last arc the satellite data suggested. Furthermore, debris, some of which wasn't found until 2 years after the flight, and drift modelling suggested a range of about 3 degrees latitude. This defined a roughly 25,000 sq. km. area, smaller than the 120,000 sq. km. that had been searched so far. Even better, once the search area was further refined, existing satellite imagery was re-analyzed in greater detail, and the French Defense Ministry found a couple potential matches near that area early this year - not confirmed, and not even certain to be man-made, but probably man-made.

This refined estimate really frustrated a lot of people because it was completed about the same time as the current search efforts concluded. Many felt like it was a case of, "now we know where it is, but we don't care anymore," when the reality was almost 3 years of searching had expended the budgets available for searching.

jnev3289 wrote:

Well they haven't looked where it landed in Pakistan have they? #sarcasm

I sort of got sucked in briefly to the notion of it following in the radar shadow of another plane. At least I wasn't stupid enough to fall for it going into orbit. lol

As to SonOfABeach's question, there are no major new leads, but they've continued to analyze the available evidence and refine their estimates of where the plane likely came down. In December of last year, the ATSB released a report concluding the most likely final position was within 25 nm of the last arc the satellite data suggested.

Well, there's this: http://mh370.radiantphysics.com/2017/10 ... /#comments

It turns out they found fragments of flight simulation flights dating from February 2, 2014 on a disconnected hard drive belonging to the PIC. It depicts an apparent simulation of MH150 (Kuala Lumpur to Jedda), that was diverted to the South Indian Ocean and ran to fuel exhaustion, apparently headed for McMurdo station in Antarctica. It turns out the PIC was PIC of MH150 on February 4. This would seem to indicate a certain amount of planning, and opens the possibility of control inputs at the very end of the flight, entailing that the wreckage could be up to two full degrees of latitude below the final BTO line-of-position....

I think they will eventually find it. The pressure and the questions will never end until they find it. I remember the whole search for the South African Heldeberg along with AF447 of course. Eventually technology had to catch up and the resources allocated until the wreck is found.
Of course I believe something sinister happened.

PlanesNTrains wrote:

jnev3289 wrote:

Well they haven't looked where it landed in Pakistan have they? #sarcasm

I sort of got sucked in briefly to the notion of it following in the radar shadow of another plane. At least I wasn't stupid enough to fall for it going into orbit. lol

Of all the crazy theories out there it is one of the more believable ones, I'll give you that. This always reminds me of some funny guy posting on some Malaysian version of craigslist a "Lightly used 777" for sale

Just a few months before it happened, I had constant thoughts of Malaysia Airlines to Kazakstan, Iran, Israel (so bizarre a place for MH to serve) and Xinjiang running in my head, interesting these places were mentioned even suspected for some reason or another related to the event later on.

From the thread that has been locked:

CBRboy wrote:

It apears that the Malaysian Government has agreed to fund a US seabed exploration company to resume the search for 9M-MRO. Media reporting indicates that Malaysia has notified families of the 239 passengers and crew from MH370 that it is negotiating the terms for the search with US company Ocean Infinity, which has offered to look for the aircraft on a no-find, no-fee basis.

The earlier joint Malaysian, Australian and Chinese search was suspended in January 2017.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-10-19/m ... ch/9067660

What kind of technology will they use?

They use Kongsberg Hugin UAV's with the usual array of Bathy and side scan sonars (and sub bottom profiller, but not much use here!). The clever thing is they pair them up with some UK built USV's (unmanned surface vessels) - these communicate with both the mother ship and the UAV's, and presumably provide SBL positioning to the UAV so they're not relying on dead reckoning and doppler effect with the inevitable drift. This enables them to have a load of them (6 I think) going at once so they cover a whole lot more ground. I assume they view this as a chance to showcase their capability.

Glad to hear a search might resume. If a company is offering a 'no find no fee' proposal then they must be somewhat confident with the new information / updated search zone, otherwise it might cost them a lot of their own $$$ for nothing...

More good money will be thrown down the drain. If it gets located quickly then fine, but if it drags on as badly as the last search then it is an incredible waste of taxpayer money (especially per taxpayer) from first Australia, China, Malaysia and now just Malaysia. 200 million and counting, and far more than most of the victims would have generated in a lifetime with tax contributions.

aerorobnz wrote:

More good money will be thrown down the drain. If it gets located quickly then fine, but if it drags on as badly as the last search then it is an incredible waste of taxpayer money (especially per taxpayer) from first Australia, China, Malaysia and now just Malaysia. 200 million and counting, and far more than most of the victims would have generated in a lifetime with tax contributions.

Well, I am an expat taxpayer in Malaysia and I am glad that a few dozen ringgit of my money are spent for this technologic endeavour. Anyway, the local Prime Minister and his gang in Putrajaya are way more expensive, as are all those useless F35 purchased all over the world. At least here there is a possible positive outcome.

Glad to see the investigation continuing. It seems logical to give the contract to Ocean Infinity based on the "no find-no fee" basis. But it would also seem logical to also include schedule milestones including a "find by no later than" date in that contract. Otherwise the costs would be enormous for say finding the aircraft 10 years after commencement of activities. Just my opinion.

Apologies if covered in previous discussions, but how long can a black box physically survive in a deep ocean environment, both in a sense of it retaining useful data and before literally disintegrating ? Is this scenario tested in certification protocols ?

JannEejit wrote:

Apologies if covered in previous discussions, but how long can a black box physically survive in a deep ocean environment, both in a sense of it retaining useful data and before literally disintegrating ? Is this scenario tested in certification protocols ?

I'm wondering the same thing. After years, surely there will be salt water penetration into the flight recorders. Plus all the pressure on top of it. Will the data even be usable..

I have always felt that "if" the PIC was the guilty party and was smart enough to turn off the transponder he would have also turned off the data recorders. I am told..perhaps erroneously ... that that can be done from the cockpit so I don't think the recorders will yield anything. Even if not disabled, the voice recorder would overwrite after two hours.

Jim

cat3appr50 wrote:

Glad to see the investigation continuing. It seems logical to give the contract to Ocean Infinity based on the "no find-no fee" basis. But it would also seem logical to also include schedule milestones including a "find by no later than" date in that contract. Otherwise the costs would be enormous for say finding the aircraft 10 years after commencement of activities. Just my opinion.

That's only assuming the final fee will be time-related... If it's more of a fixed or goal-related contract then the motivation is there for Ocean Infinity to not waste time.

danman132x wrote:

JannEejit wrote:

Apologies if covered in previous discussions, but how long can a black box physically survive in a deep ocean environment, both in a sense of it retaining useful data and before literally disintegrating ? Is this scenario tested in certification protocols ?

I'm wondering the same thing. After years, surely there will be salt water penetration into the flight recorders. Plus all the pressure on top of it. Will the data even be usable..

The memory units of the recorders are solid state and I believe are literally packed solid. Of course they test these things under high pressure salt water conditions as part of their qualification so I would not expect this to be an issue.

I echo what many on here say; I really hope they finally find the wreckage...

IIRC, the recorders are in the tail section of the aircraft which would likely be one of the larger pieces that would possibly be found along with the wings, wing box, engines and possibly the nose/cockpit section. The ability of recovering the recorders or significant parts of the aircraft would hopefully answer our big questions of why and how, but also allow a certain level of closure to the family and friends of the victims.

MH370 search has resumed

http://www.news.com.au/travel/travel-up ... 11189b6111

https://www.airlineratings.com/news/mh3 ... arch-area/

Good to hear, I wish them immense success!

enilria wrote:

Good luck on that. Amazing with all our technology we can't find every piece of metal in the ocean bigger than 3 by 3 meters.

Well considering the US navy's all singing and dancing P8 couldn't find the Argentine sub, finding MH370 when nobody has a clue where it went down is going to be next to impossible. It's a massive waste of money looking for this aircraft.

The day they find this thing will be one of the most important moments in the history of modern commercial aviation...

Great news! I'm really hoping they locate something and I have a feeling they will. A company that has secured a deal like that will do anything to find it.

Hmmmm my personal opinion is that It cannot be found. It disintergrated on impact similar to how there was little left from the germanwings crash.

LoganTheBogan wrote:

Great news! I'm really hoping they locate something and I have a feeling they will. A company that has secured a deal like that will do anything to find it.

Absolutely, if they are offering a "no find, no fee" deal they must be pretty confident of finding it

LoganTheBogan wrote:

Great news! I'm really hoping they locate something and I have a feeling they will. A company that has secured a deal like that will do anything to find it.

Nothing on this earth can remain hidden forever. It may take decades to find the remains or some underwater submersible may accidentally stumble across it 7 months from today. Who knows? But one thing is certain, it will be found. There is a finite amount of space on this earth and only so many places it could be. There is a certain point where everything given enough time will be accomplished. It has been several years, and I don't think it will be more than 6 or 7 months before someone realizes they've found the wreckage.