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The Australia-led search has so far been fruitless. Photo: AFP
The Australian government is inviting search and salvage specialists to take on the task of finding the missing Malaysia Airlines plane.
Documents released yesterday show the private sector has effectively been handed control of search operations in an effort to speed up the hunt for flight MH370.
Starting in August, successful bidders will have 300 days to explore 60,000 square kilometres of seabed in the southern Indian Ocean. It's a vast expanse, the size of Sri Lanka, with depths of up to 6,000 metres.
Joining the winning bid will be a consortium of companies including Malaysian oil giant Petronas, which said last night it would fund a deep towed side-scan sonar for the operation. Malaysia last week asked the US to renew a lease on a number of remotely operated underwater vehicles.
Flight MH370 disappeared on March 8 while en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. The aircraft, a Boeing 777, carried 239 people, including 154 Chinese nationals.
The challenging conditions and depths in the Indian Ocean have proved tricky for the Australia-led search mission in the area to date.
The ocean proved too deep for a robotic submarine that went beyond its maximum operating depth of 4,500 metres.
Bidders interested in taking on the contract will need robust equipment capable of navigating "holes, trenches, ridges, steep gradients" and sea floor comprised of "silt, sand, rock and possibly manganese" minerals, the tender says.
The search will be funded from a A$50 million (HK$360 million) pot set aside by Australia.
It will be some weeks until satellite data that led search teams to the Indian Ocean is reappraised to define the 60,000 square kilometres to be searched.
Meanwhile, researchers from Curtin University in Western Australia released underwater data recordings that detected a "dull roar" indicating a high-impact crash in the Indian Ocean, around the time the Boeing 777 was said to have run out of fuel.
"We are cautious whether these acoustic events are related to MH370 … but there is still a small possibility of something to do with it," oceanographer Alec Duncan of the university said.
Analysis of sound data put it within one hour of the last known satellite contact with flight MH370, Duncan said.
Professor Cheng En, who studies underwater sound wave communication at the school of information science and engineering at Xiamen University, said the Australian discovery was possible, because low frequency sound waves could indeed travel thousands of kilometres in water.
Terms of MH370 search contract
Private contractor has 300 days to carry out a seafloor search of 60,000 sq km in the southern Indian Ocean.
Failure to search at least 5,000 sq km every 25 days will result in payment being withheld.
Machinery must be capable of operating at depths between 1,000 and 6,000 metres for up to a year in all ocean currents and sea states.
Must be able to identify, map and photograph wreckage field to determine recovery of human remains, flight and cockpit recorders plus aircraft components or cargo linked to the fate of MH370.
Winning bidder must assemble global team and equipment, ready to search within one month of signing the contract.
The search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 will focus on the "7th arc" in the Indian Ocean, based on new data and analysis, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) says.
The ATSB says the area off the Western Australian coast is where the plane is believed to have exhausted its fuel supply and been descending.
It is also the area where the last satellite contact occurred with the aircraft.
"As a result, the aircraft is unlikely to be any more than 20 nautical miles (38 kilometres) west or 30 nautical miles (55km) east of the arc," the ATSB said.
The total extent of the arc is from latitude 20 degrees south to 39 degrees south.
The ATSB says the underwater search area is likely to be reduced in coming weeks to 60,000 square kilometres.
MH370 went missing in March with 239 people on board, including six Australians, while en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
Earlier this month it was revealed that acoustic pings thought to be from the plane's black boxes were not related to the aircraft.
The pings prompted a multinational search that covered 4.64 million square kilometres of ocean but there was no sign of wreckage from the missing plane.
It is now thought the pings probably originated from one of the search ships.
The Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC) on June 1 said the next underwater search would "begin in August and take up to 12 months".
The Federal Government has set aside $60 million to pay a private contractor to carry out that search.
Meanwhile, Curtin University researchers say they still do not know if a signal picked up by offshore sound recorders was caused by the aircraft crashing into the Indian Ocean.
Curtin University's Centre for Marine Science and Technology monitors a number of undersea sound recorders with hydrophones around the Australian coast.
When satellite data showed the missing Malaysian Airlines plane had tracked south into the Indian Ocean, the researchers retrieved an acoustic recorder that sits 400 metres underwater in the Perth canyon, 40 kilometres west of Rottnest Island.
The centre's Alec Duncan said the recorder had picked up a signal on March 8 that could have been caused by MH370.
Crew deploy the US Navy’s Bluefin-21 in the southern Indian Ocean to look for the missing Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 Photo: Reuters
Several families of those aboard Flight MH370 on Sunday launched a drive to raise $5 million (HK$38.8 million) to reward any insider who comes forward and resolves the mystery of the plane’s disappearance exactly three months ago.
The “Reward MH370” campaign launches on fundraising website Indiegogo and aims to raise at least $5 million “to encourage a whistleblower to come forward with information”, the families said in a press release.
The Malaysia Airlines jet lost contact on March 8 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people aboard -- about two-thirds of them Chinese.
The Boeing 777 is believed to have crashed in the southern Indian Ocean, but an extensive search has turned up no sign of wreckage so far, leaving frustrated and anguished families of those aboard suspecting a cover-up.
“We are convinced that somewhere, someone knows something, and we hope this reward will entice him or her to come forward,” said Ethan Hunt, a technology company chief who is heading the “Reward MH370” project.
Sarah Bajc, partner of American passenger Philip Wood, said a handful of families were behind the campaign to look at the unprecedented aviation mystery with “a fresh set of eyes”.
“Governments and agencies have given it their best shot but have failed to turn up a single shred of evidence, either because of a faulty approach or due to intentional misdirection by one or more individuals,” she said in the release.
Malaysia and Australia, which is leading the search far off its western coast, have promised that the hunt for the plane will continue.
An international team is now determining an expanded search zone of up to 60,000 square kilometres based on where the aircraft last communicated with an Inmarsat satellite.
Australia has also released a request for tenders for a company to be engaged as a prime contractor and provide the expertise, equipment and vessels needed to carry out the deep-sea search from August.
Malaysia -- ruled by the same coalition since 1957 with a history of sweeping scandals aside -- has taken the brunt of criticism from upset relatives.
The Southeast Asian country has insisted it is doing all it can and working closely with Australia, China and other countries to find the jet.
A New Zealand man who reported seeing missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 shortly after it disappeared said his email has cost him his job.
Mike McKay made international headlines when he said he saw what he believed what the missing jet on fire while he was working on an oil rig off the Vietnamese coast.
But now the email he sent out has cost him his job, a newspaper in New Zealand reported.
At the time, he wrote to his employers in an email: "'I believe I saw the Malaysian Airlines plane come down. The timing is right."
McKay said the plane, which he believed was about 50-70km from where he was, burned for 10-15 seconds until the flames went out.
The plane was southwest of and at a lower altitude than the normal flight paths, he said.
The email was leaked to the media, and identified the worker's name, place of work, his employer and rig owner Songa Offshore, and the rig operator Idemitsu.
The companies became so inundated with inquiries after the email was leaked that their communications became blocked.
"This became intolerable for them and I was removed from the rig and not invited back," he told the newspaper.
McKay had been interviewed by investigators as the search for the jet turned to the South China Sea, but the search was called off two days later.
At the time, authorities believed the plane had possibly crashed somewhere in the Indian Ocean.
Searchers are looking along the "7th" arc, a route calculated based on pings sent by the missing jet as it continued to fly south after veering off course on March 9.
Families raise funds for reward
Several families of those aboard Flight MH370 launched a drive to raise $5 million to reward any insider who comes forward and resolves the mystery of the plane's disappearance exactly three months ago.
The "Reward MH370" campaign launches on fundraising website Indiegogo and aims to raise at least $5 million "to encourage a whistleblower to come forward with information", the families said in a press release.
The Malaysia Airlines jet lost contact on March 8 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people aboard -- about two-thirds of them Chinese.
The Boeing 777 is believed to have crashed in the southern Indian Ocean, but an extensive search has turned up no sign of wreckage so far, leaving frustrated and anguished families of those aboard suspecting a cover-up.
"We are convinced that somewhere, someone knows something, and we hope this reward will entice him or her to come forward," said Ethan Hunt, a technology company chief who is heading the "Reward MH370" project.
Searchers have been so far unsuccessful in locating missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370. Photo: Getty Images
Sarah Bajc, partner of American passenger Philip Wood, said a handful of families were behind the campaign to look at the unprecedented aviation mystery with "a fresh set of eyes".
"Governments and agencies have given it their best shot but have failed to turn up a single shred of evidence, either because of a faulty approach or due to intentional misdirection by one or more individuals," she said in the release.
Malaysia and Australia, which is leading the search far off its western coast, have promised that the hunt for the plane will continue.
An international team is now determining an expanded search zone of up to 60,000 square kilometres (24,000 square miles) based on where the aircraft last communicated with an Inmarsat satellite.
Australia has also released a request for tenders for a company to be engaged as a prime contractor and provide the expertise, equipment and vessels needed to carry out the deep-sea search from August.
Malaysia -- ruled by the same coalition since 1957 with a history of sweeping scandals aside -- has taken the brunt of criticism from upset relatives.
The Southeast Asian country has insisted it is doing all it can and working closely with Australia, China and other countries to find the jet.
Danica Weeks is waiting to hear news of Flight MH370. Picture: Sharon Smith/The West Australian
The wife of one of the passengers aboard ill-fated Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 is "disgusted" by a novel based on the plane's disappearance.
Three months after the plane vanished on a flight to Beijing with 239 people on board, New Zealand author Scott Maka has released the thriller novella MH370, an e-book.
According to the website stuff.co.nz Danica Weeks, the wife of missing New Zealander Paul Weeks, said releasing a book so soon after the tragedy and without information on what happened made her angry.
She said it was hurtful to the families of the people on board the flight
"I'd rather they'd put their efforts to helping them find the truth, to be honest," she said.
"We're going to be spending the rest of our lives doing that."
Ms Weeks said people wanting to write books and make movies about the mystery should wait until they had all the information.
The author, with the pen name Scott Maka, said he never intended for the relatives of the missing families to be the book's audience or even find out about it.
Mr Maka, who is based in Malaysia, said he wanted to apologise to Ms Weeks.
"I'm saddened to hear that she's reacted like that, I'm upset that she's upset."
Stuff.co.nz reported that the author acknowledged the book's publication came amid controversy sparked by US and Indian studios working on MH370 films.
He said he decided to write the novella after a "hair-raising" Air Asia flight between Malaysia and Vietnam just a week after the aircraft's disappearance.
"I was damn scared. Flying doesn't usually bother me, but knowing that another aircraft had just vanished on the same flight-path made me very, very jittery."
During his flight the communications consultant and former journalist turned his thoughts to possible causes for the MH370 disappearance, he said. Before his flight landed he came up with a "fascinating scenario", which he decided to turn into a book, which was released today.
The 45-year-old described the novella as "a twist-type thriller" focusing on a female passenger's involvement in international intrigue.
Missing: Paul Weeks. Picture: Facebook
According to stuff.co.nz Ms Weeks is also supporting a crowd-funding campaign to pay for private investigators and reward whistleblower information about the disappearance of MH370 with more than $5 million cash.
Ms Weeks said the families of the missing passengers had received little information from Malaysian Authorities and they were sick of waiting on the official investigation.
"We've lost trust so we've thought outside the box."
Ms Weeks said she hoped someone came forward with a positive lead on what happened to the plane. Finding the plane and finding out what happened would give families the closure they needed, she said.
Australia, Malaysia still to decide MH370 search costs
AFP
June 10, 2014, 10:15 pm
Sydney (AFP) - Australia on Tuesday said it had chosen a Dutch firm to help it map the Indian Ocean floor as the search for missing flight MH370 heads deeper under water.
Netherlands-based Fugro Survey will help a Chinese military vessel survey the ocean bed as part of the next stage of the quest for the Malaysia Airlines plane which vanished three months ago, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC), said.
The announcement came after Australian and Malaysian officials met in Canberra to discuss funding and assets for the unprecedented mission, after a huge air and sea search failed to find any sign of the aircraft.
The Australian Transport Safety Bureau is now planning to comb a 60,000 square-kilometre (24,000 square-mile) search zone based on the plane's last satellite communication.
"The bathymetric (ocean floor) survey will provide a map of the underwater search zone, charting the contours, depths and composition of the seafloor in water depths up to 6,000 metres," JACC, which was set up to head the search, said.
"The survey will provide crucial information to help plan the deep water search for MH370 which is scheduled to commence in August."
Fugro's state-of-the-art vessel MV Fugro Equator, which is equipped with a deep water multibeam echo sounder system, will work with Chinese PLA-Navy ship Zhu Kezhen on the bathymetric survey of the area.
The two vessels are expected to take about three months to complete the mapping ahead of the underwater search by an as-yet undetermined contractor, JACC said.
Fugro said in a statement that it expected its vessel to start mapping in mid-June.
MH370 went missing on March 8 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing carrying 239 people and is thought to have crashed in the southern Indian Ocean.
- Costly search -
Malaysia's costs for the search mission have so far been about one-tenth of the US$84 million Australia expects to spend on the search for the plane.
"The government has allocated Aus$89.9 million (US$84 million). I think about Aus$25 million of that is to go the defence force for the visual search they conducted," retired Air Chief Marshall Angus Houston, who is running the search, told the ABC.
The remaining Aus$60 million has been allocated to the underwater operation in the southern Indian Ocean where the plane is believed to have crashed in Australia's search and rescue zone.
"That money has been allocated but we're still to crunch ... or still to negotiate the burden-sharing with, for example, Malaysia," he added.
Malaysia's Deputy Defence Minister Abdul Rahim Bakri, who will meet with Australian officials, told journalists on Monday that the "costs will be shared 50-50 between Malaysia and Australia".
Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein had earlier told parliament that Malaysia had spent 27.6 million ringgit (US$8.6 million) on fuel and food for equipment and personnel in the search.
"The cost that we had to bear is relatively small compared to the other assets given by other countries used in the search," he said.
"I am proud that many of our friends have come forward to help in the search, and they bear their own expenses and have not made any claims from us."
Australia has said it would welcome other nations contributing to the cost of the underwater probe, but Treasurer Joe Hockey said Canberra would not shirk its responsibility to help find answers to the plane's disappearance.
"We accept responsibility and will pay for it," he told reporters on Tuesday. "We're not a country that begs others for money to do our job."
Months of searching has failed to turn up any trace of MH370, which disappeared on March 8 carrying 239 people after taking off from Kuala Lumpur bound for Beijing. Photo: AP
Australia has chosen a Dutch firm to help it map the Indian Ocean floor as the search for missing flight MH370 heads deeper under water.
Netherlands-based Fugro Survey will help a Chinese military vessel survey the ocean bed as part of the next stage of the quest to find the Malaysia Airlines plane that vanished three months ago.
The announcement came after Australian and Malaysian officials met in Canberra to discuss funding and assets for the unprecedented mission, after a huge air and sea search failed to find any sign of the aircraft.
Months of searching has failed to turn up any trace of the Boeing 777, which disappeared on March 8 carrying 239 people after taking off from Kuala Lumpur bound for Beijing.
The next phase of the search, which will be handed over from the military to the private sector, is expected to start in August and take up to a year, covering 60,000 sq km of ocean at a cost of at least A$60 million (HK$435 million).
The search is already the most expensive in aviation history.
"The bathymetric survey will provide a map of the underwater search zone, charting the contours, depths and composition of the sea floor in water depths up to 6,000 metres," the Joint Agency Coordination Centre said.
Fugro's state-of-the-art vessel MV Fugro Equator, which is equipped with a deep water multibeam echo sounder system, will work with Chinese PLA Navy ship Zhu Kezhen.
The two vessels are expected to take about three months to complete the mapping ahead of the underwater search by an as-yet undetermined contractor.
Malaysia's costs for the search mission have so far been about one-tenth of the US$84 million Australia expects to spend on the search for the plane.
"The government has allocated A$89.9 million. I think about A$25 million of that is to go to the defence force for the visual search they conducted," retired air chief marshal Angus Houston, who is head of the Joint Agency Coordination Centre , said.
The remaining A$60 million has been allocated to the underwater operation in the southern Indian Ocean where the plane is believed to have crashed.
Malaysian Deputy Defence Minister Abdul Rahim Bakri said the "costs will be shared 50-50 between Malaysia and Australia".
Months of searching has failed to turn up any trace of MH370, which disappeared on March 8 carrying 239 people after taking off from Kuala Lumpur bound for Beijing. Photo: AP
Australia has chosen a Dutch firm to help it map the Indian Ocean floor as the search for missing flight MH370 heads deeper under water.
Netherlands-based Fugro Survey will help a Chinese military vessel survey the ocean bed as part of the next stage of the quest to find the Malaysia Airlines plane that vanished three months ago.
The announcement came after Australian and Malaysian officials met in Canberra to discuss funding and assets for the unprecedented mission, after a huge air and sea search failed to find any sign of the aircraft.
Months of searching has failed to turn up any trace of the Boeing 777, which disappeared on March 8 carrying 239 people after taking off from Kuala Lumpur bound for Beijing.
The next phase of the search, which will be handed over from the military to the private sector, is expected to start in August and take up to a year, covering 60,000 sq km of ocean at a cost of at least A$60 million (HK$435 million).
The search is already the most expensive in aviation history.
"The bathymetric survey will provide a map of the underwater search zone, charting the contours, depths and composition of the sea floor in water depths up to 6,000 metres," the Joint Agency Coordination Centre said.
Fugro's state-of-the-art vessel MV Fugro Equator, which is equipped with a deep water multibeam echo sounder system, will work with Chinese PLA Navy ship Zhu Kezhen.
The two vessels are expected to take about three months to complete the mapping ahead of the underwater search by an as-yet undetermined contractor.
Malaysia's costs for the search mission have so far been about one-tenth of the US$84 million Australia expects to spend on the search for the plane.
"The government has allocated A$89.9 million. I think about A$25 million of that is to go to the defence force for the visual search they conducted," retired air chief marshal Angus Houston, who is head of the Joint Agency Coordination Centre , said.
The remaining A$60 million has been allocated to the underwater operation in the southern Indian Ocean where the plane is believed to have crashed.
Malaysian Deputy Defence Minister Abdul Rahim Bakri said the "costs will be shared 50-50 between Malaysia and Australia".
MH370 searchers not looking in crash 'hotspot': Inmarsat
AFP
June 17, 2014, 2:53 pm
London (AFP) - The search for Malaysian Airlines Flight MH370 is yet to target the most likely crash site after being distracted by what are now believed to be bogus signals, British company Inmarsat claimed Tuesday.
Inmarsat's scientists told the BBC's Horizon programme that they had calculated the plane's most likely flight path and a "hotspot" in the southern Indian Ocean in which it most likely came down.
The flight lost contact on March 8 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with total of 239 passengers and crew on board.
Hourly pings sent by the plane were received by Inmarsat's spacecraft, leading scientists to calculate its likely path.
Australian naval vessel Ocean Shield was dispatched to investigate, but before reaching the likely site it began to detect a signal that it believed was coming from the plane's black box, Inmarsat said.
Two months were spent searching 850 square kilometres (330 square miles) of sea bed northwest of Perth, but the source of the "pings" was not found and a submersible robot found no evidence of the airliner.
"It was by no means an unrealistic location but it was further to the northeast than our area of highest probability," Chris Ashton at Inmarsat told Horizon.
Experts from the satellite firm modelled the most likely flight path using the hourly pings and assuming a speed and heading consistent with the plane being flown by autopilot.
"We can identify a path that matches exactly with all those frequency measurements and with the timing measurements and lands on the final arc at a particular location, which then gives us a sort of a hotspot area on the final arc where we believe the most likely area is," explained Ashton.
Australia's Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC), established to manage the search, said the four acoustic "pings" picked up by the black box detector attached to Ocean Shield had to be pursued at the time.
"The four signals taken together constituted the most promising lead in the search for MH370 and it was a lead that needed to be pursued until completion so the search team could either discount or confirm the area as the final resting place of MH370," JACC said in a statement to AFP.
- 'This is complex work' -
Australian officials agree that a linear arc produced using the satellite messages, or "handshakes", leading to the southern Indian Ocean likely represents the plane's flight path.
But the Australian Transport Safety Bureau said experts were still working to define the area to be scoured in the next phase of the search, which will plunge ocean depths of up to 6,000 feet.
"The search strategy group is continuing its analysis of satellite and aircraft performance data, along with a range of other information, to determine the area that offers the highest probability of finding the aircraft," a spokesman said.
"This is highly complex work that requires significant collaborative effort with international specialists. The revised search zone is expected to be available in the coming weeks."
Malaysia's civil aviation authority and Inmarsat last month released the raw satellite data after coming under criticism from relatives over the fruitless search.
However, its complexity has led to few independent conclusions being drawn about the likely crash site.
Malaysian Selamat Umar, whose son Mohamad Khairul Amri was on the ill-fated jetliner, questioned the motives behind the data release.
"I am not convinced at all by the data," he said. Why are they releasing it now? Before when we asked for it, they did not want to release it. What can we do with it now?" he said.
Australian marine ships deployed on a search of the missing flight. The new search zone for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 will be announced by the end of the month. Photo: AFP
Australian officials said on Wednesday they will announce the new search zone for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 by month’s end, as mapping of the Indian Ocean seabed resumed.
The jet went missing on March 8 flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing and despite a massive aerial and sea search no sign of the aircraft which was carrying 239 people has been found.
An underwater probe of the Indian Ocean seabed where acoustic signals, thought at the time to have come from the jet’s black box recorders, were heard also proved fruitless.
Australia’s Joint Agency Coordination Centre said analysis of satellite and other data to determine the search area for the next underwater phase would be concluded soon.
An underwater probe of the Indian Ocean seabed where acoustic signals, thought at the time to have come from the jet’s black box recorders, were heard also proved fruitless. Photo: Reuters
“The search area will be confirmed before the end of June, after completion of extensive collaborative analysis by a range of specialists,” it said in a statement.
“It is already clear from the provisional results of that analysis that the search zone will move, but still be on the seventh arc (where the aircraft last communicated with satellite).”
The search has been frustrated by a lack of information, with experts modelling the plane’s most likely flight path based on signals between it and an Inmarsat satellite.
The seventh arc, or “handshake”, is the final signal from the plane and thought to be when the jet ran out of fuel.
Scientists from the British firm have suggested that searchers are yet to target the most likely Indian Ocean crash site because they became distracted by the acoustic signals detected in April.
“It was by no means an unrealistic location but it was further to the northeast than our area of highest probability,” Chris Ashton at Inmarsat told the BBC’s Horizon programme on Tuesday.
But JACC said the area in which the Australian vessel Ocean Shield used a mini-sub to scour the ocean floor was “based on the best information and analysis available at that time”, including from Inmarsat.
“The location was identified by the satellite communications sub-group, which included accident investigation agencies from the USA and the UK along with their technical advisors, including from the aircraft manufacturer, the satellite manufacturer and Inmarsat as operator of the satellite,” JACC said Wednesday.
“Based on analysis at the time, it represented the most likely location of the aircraft.”
Australia, which is leading the hunt given the plane is likely to have crashed in its search and rescue zone, said the vessel Fugro Equator, which it contracted, had begun its work in mapping the ocean floor.
It will be joined by Chinese PLA-Navy ship Zhu Kezhen in conducting the bathymetric survey crucial to carrying out the deep water search for the plane which is set to begin in August.
“So far, the Zhu Kezhen has surveyed 4,088 square kilometres of the ocean floor,” before it was forced back to port for repairs, JACC said.
The survey of a 60,000 square kilometre search zone was expected to take three months.
Experts say MH370 flew on autopilot then ran out of fuel as search shifts south
Autopilot theory would explain plane's 'orderly path' says Australian transport minister
Australian Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss shows the new search area in the Indian Ocean for missing Malaysia Airlines aircraft MH370. Photo: EPA
The missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 flew on autopilot until it ran out of fuel above the southern Indian Ocean, with its crew likely "unresponsive", experts believe.
The latest theory on the fate of the plane - which disappeared more than three months ago - came as Australia announced that the underwater search for the jet would shift further south.
Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss said yesterday that an expert review had found it was "highly, highly likely that the aircraft was on autopilot" when it crashed. "Otherwise it could not have followed the orderly path that has been identified through the satellite sightings," he said.
The jet, with 239 people - mostly Chinese - on board, disappeared on March 8 on its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
An extensive Australian-led search has so far failed to find any trace of the jet. New search efforts will now concentrate on an area 2,000 kilometres off Australia's west coast near where the original search began in late March.
The new search area, covering up to 60,000 square kilometres, is along the so-called seventh arc, one of several possible routes projected by investigators. Starting in August, the seabed search at depths of up to 5,000 metres will last up to a year.
"We are now shifting our attention to an area further south ... broadly in the area where our first search efforts were focused," Truss said.
Australian Transport Safety Bureau chief commissioner Martin Dolan said the plane's journey over the Indian Ocean was largely guided automatically, giving rise to the likelihood that the crew had been rendered unconscious.
Theories on the plane's fate have included hijacking, a rogue pilot and mechanical failures.
But the ATSB report released yesterday said the most likely scenario was the crew suffering from hypoxia, or lack of oxygen, possibly from the plane losing air pressure at high altitude.
The report said "the hypoxia event type appeared to best fit the available evidence for the final period of MH370's flight".
Graham Edkins, a former ATSB safety investigator, said the time and distance for which the Boeing 777's autopilot function was used was not considered "unusual".
He supported the idea that the crew was "incapacitated", adding that it did not necessarily "indicate there was some kind of terrorist activity".
Malaysia last week denied claims that experienced Boeing 777 captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah was a prime suspect in investigations surrounding the flight's disappearance.
Hishammuddin Hussein attends the opening of the MH370 Tribute Photo Exhibition organised by the Foreign Correspondents Club of Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur. Photo: AP
Malaysia will send more equipment to the southern Indian Ocean to join the search for flight MH370 which went missing four months ago.
Defence Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said yesterday that a Malaysian navy ship equipped with a multi-beam echo sounder - a device to map the ocean floor - would set sail on August 4 for the deep-sea search zone far off western Australia.
State energy firm Petronas, together with Deftech and Phoenix International, would deploy a towed device called a synthetic aperture sonar to scan the ocean floor, he said.
Shipbuilder Boustead Heavy Industries, together with iXBlue Australia, would send a deep towed side scan sonar with a remotely operated vehicle.
"Instructions for immediate mobilisation have been given and the assets are expected to reach the search area in mid- August," Hishammuddin said.
Another Malaysian vessel which was deployed in April would stay in the search area,.
The Malaysia Airlines flight lost contact on March 8 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people aboard. It is believed to have veered off course and - based on satellite data analysis - crashed in the southern Indian Ocean, but an extensive Australian-led search has so far found no sign of wreckage.
Australian officials announced last month that the search would shift further south based on a review of the satellite data. They also said the Boeing 777 was almost certainly on autopilot when it ran out of fuel and crashed.
The most likely scenario, the officials said, was that the pilots and crew suffered from hypoxia, or lack of oxygen, and became "unresponsive", which can occur when a plane loses air pressure at high altitude.
The underwater search will start in the new area, covering up to 60,000 square kilometres in the southern Indian Ocean, next month and take up to a year.
Relatives of Chinese MH370 passengers say police detained and beat them
Families members say Malaysia Airlines has refused repeated requests for them to see official video footage of passengers boarding flight that disappeared on March 8
Relatives of passengers on missing flight MH370 are still waiting for news about what has happened to the Malaysia Airlines aircraft. Photo: AP
Chinese relatives of passengers on missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 claim they were detained by Beijing police for nearly 24 hours after demanding to see the carrier’s official video footage of people boarding the doomed flight.
Two other female relatives allege they were punched and beaten by about six policemen after asking for the release of two relatives – a father and daughter – who were detained on a separate occasion.
Today more than 20 relatives told the South China Morning Post that since July 14 they have asked almost daily for the airline’s liaison staff in Beijing to show them the footage – but always without success.
They claimed 16 relatives – nine men, five women and two boys, aged six and four – were detained by police on July 14.
A photograph showing one of the female relatives, allegedly beaten by police, with bruises on her knees in a hospital bed. Photo: Screenshot via Weibo
The relatives said they had gone to the airline’s office, in Shunyi district, in the northern suburb of Beijing, after learning that Malaysian relatives had already seen the footage.
Police arrived at nearly midnight and detained the 16 relatives, who were preparing to stay overnight and ask for more information in the morning.
The relatives told the Post they were held at five different police stations in Shunyi for almost 24 hours, before being released just before midnight on July 15.
“The police accused us of being an organised group, and said that we had an agenda,” a relative said. “All we wanted is to find our loved ones – people with whom we share the same blood.”
One parent added: “We asked what we were being charged with – especially the children. They said we could file a legal complaint if we had a problem.”
They said police had not shown them any official warrants, or legal documents, when they were detained. Police had told the group of relatives they had been called because they were “disturbing the social order”, they added.
However, it is possible they were detained because many of the relatives not from Beijing had made plans to stay overnight inside the office.
The two women claimed they were dragged and punched by six local policemen in a police station on May 19 after asking for the release of two family members held on an earlier occasion.
The women alleged the violent conduct of police had left then with numerous serious bruises on their bodies. The elder of the two said she was kept in hospital for three days.
Both women said they had asked Shunyi district and the Beijing municipal police officials to investigate their allegations of police violence. So far they have had no response, they said.
The relatives said they had posted photographs of the two, allegedly beaten women on a WeChat public account, which was closed recently.
They also claimed they had also posted comments on Sina Weibo social media about the alleged detention of the 16 people, only for these comments to be removed.
The relatives said they may have experienced pressure from officials because they had been acting as a group, which mostly involved exchanging information and communicating with other groups of relatives in China and Malaysia.
One relative said: “We were also warned that more than 10 people gathering together is illegal.”
They said they had also been pressured to stop call themselves the “Relative Council” or “Aid Group”.
Flight MH370 disappeared on March 8, while carrying 239 passengers and crew on a scheduled flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Most of those on board – 153 people – were Chinese.
No trace has been found of the aircraft, which is believed to have crashed somewhere in the Indian Ocean, west of Australia.
Shunyi police told the Post they would need more time to investigate the claims over the detention of the relatives and alleged police violence.
The Beijing liaison office of Malaysia Airlines could not be reached today.
Relatives of the MH370 passengers holding placards and banners, with chinese characters to express their good wishes to their loved ones on the plane and requesting the truth from Malaysia government, at the Malaysia Embassy in Beijing. Photo: Simon Song
More than HK$270,000 has been mysteriously withdrawn from the bank accounts of four passengers on missing Malaysian Airlines flight 370. A relative of one of the missing branded it "an evil crime".
"Do they realise some of those missing passengers are the sole breadwinners of their families and that they need that money?" said Lokman Mustafa, whose sister was on MH370. "I am angry to hear this news."
According to Malaysian police, the money was taken in early July, four months after MH370 went missing with 239 people on board while travelling from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
"A total of 111,000 ringgit (HK$270,840) was withdrawn from the accounts of four MH370 passengers. This occurred in one bank," said Kuala Lumpur Commercial Crime Investigation Department chief assistant commissioner Izany Abdul Ghany.
He declined to name the bank, which reported the incident to the police on August 2.
"The money was taken via ATM and internet bank transfer to a third party. We are investigating this case," Izany said.
He said the police were working closely with the bank and surveying its CCTV footage.
"Whoever did this is taking advantage of the situation and adding to the suffering of the victims' families," Izany added.
On March 24, the Malaysian government announced that flight MH370 crashed in the southern Indian Ocean.
Lokman's 30-year-old sister, industrial engineer Hajah Suhaili Mustafa, was on the flight as part of an assignment to Beijing to help build a semiconductor plant there.
"People are still suffering. Some are still hoping for the plane to be found. They have not gotten over the tragedy," Lokman said. "People should leave them alone to pick up the pieces and carry on with their lives."
Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai is scheduled to visit Australia on Tuesday to hold talks with Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss, as well as with agencies and search teams, on the search for and recovery of MH370.
Australia last week signed a contract worth US$55 million with Dutch company Fugro to scour the ocean floor for the wreckage of the missing Malaysia Airlines plane.
Chinese hackers targeted MH370 investigation a day after jet went missing: report
Malware disguised as a news report that the missing Boeing 777 had been found was emailed to Malaysian officials on March 9, according to report
An Malaysia Airlines plane taxis on the tarmac at Kuala Lumpur International Airport. Photo: Reuters
Chinese hackers have targeted Malaysian government departments involved in the search for Malaysia Airlines flight 370, a Malaysian newspaper said on Wednesday.
Malware disguised as a news report that the missing jet had been found was emailed to Malaysian officials on March 9, a day after the airliner disappeared in mid-air, The Star said, citing CyberSecurity Malaysia chief executive Amirudin Abdul Wahab.
CyberSecurity Malaysia is a government agency under the Science, Technology and Innovation Ministry.
In a statement to the South China Morning Post, a spokesman said the agency's digital forensics team provided technical assistance to targeted departments. However, the agency declined to say which departments had been targeted and how.
The Star report said affected agencies included Malaysia’s Civil Aviation Department, the National Security Council and Malaysia Airlines, which is majority owned by the Malaysian government.
Malaysian police were investigating the attack, the newspaper said. The information office of Malaysia's Ministry of Home Affairs, which overseas the Royal Malaysia Police could not be reached for comment on Wednesday.
Once the hackers gained access to the networks, the government departments registered a flood of outgoing e-mails, the report said. The outgoing e-mails included classified documents, the report said.
By the time the transmissions were blocked and the affected computers shut down, an unspecified amount of information had already been sent from Malaysian government computers to China, it said.
Such a hacking attack is not technically difficult, but requires preparation, said Dhillon Andrew Kannabhiran, founder and CEO of Kuala Lumpur-based Hack In The Box, which organises IT security conferences.
The timing of the attack, one day after the plane went missing, meant that the attackers had the PDF malware ready to use to infect the Malaysian government computers, he said.
Kannabhiran said investigators could only trace the stolen documents to where they had been sent to, but that might not provide definitive clues to who hacked into the computers.
Stolen documents are often sent to "some other compromised machine belonging to an innocent victim not connected with the attacker”, he said.
Flight MH370 went missing more than an hour after it took off from the Malaysian capital Kuala Lumpur in the early hours of March 8 bound for Beijing, sparking an international search for the plane.
China participated in the multinational search effort in the Indian Ocean, which has so far been futile. Acoustic signals suspected to have come from the missing plane’s black boxes indicated that the airliner left its route to China, turned southwest and crashed in the southern Indian Ocean.
Australia is leading the search effort assisted by the PLA navy ship Zhu Kezhen and private contractors, scouring the vast ocean floor off Australia’s western shore with sonar equipment.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said on Wednesday that a new underwater hunt for the missing Boeing 777 had a “reasonable chance” of finding the plane, adding that searchers would not give up easily.
Experts have used technical data to finalise the most likely resting place of the plane deep on the ocean seabed and are preparing for a more intense underwater search to find it.
“They are now going to search the entire probable impact zone which is, from memory, something like 60,000 sq km of the ocean floor, off the coast of Western Australia,” Abbott told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
Abbott has repeatedly said Australia will do its utmost to find the plane and help determine what went wrong with the Boeing 777 to provide closure to the families of those onboard and the flying public generally.
“We’re determined to do the right thing by the Australian families who lost their loved ones in this plane, we’re determined to do the right thing by all of the bereaved families,” he said.
“And we’ve got a long way to go before we’re going to give this one up.”
Among the 227 passengers on board, 152 were Chinese and six were Australians.
India in March rejected a Chinese request to enter territorial waters in the Andaman Sea in an effort to search for the missing jet, before search efforts switched to the area off the coast of Western Australia, over concerns that the request might be an excuse for military snooping.
Two charged in Malaysia with stealing from MH370 victims
AFP
August 20, 2014, 8:59 pm
Kuala Lumpur (AFP) - A Malaysian bank officer and her husband were charged Wednesday with forgery, theft and other offences after allegedly stealing more than $30,000 from the accounts of four people who were aboard missing flight MH370.
Nur Shila Kanan, who has worked for the Malaysian operations of British banking giant HSBC for 10 years, and her mechanic husband Basheer Ahmad Maula Sahul Hameed pleaded not guilty in a Kuala Lumpur court to a total of 16 charges, their lawyer Hakeem Aiman Affandi said.
The couple, who have three children and are both aged 33, are alleged to have withdrawn a total of 110,643 ringgit ($34,850) from the accounts of two Malaysians and two Chinese nationals who were on the Malaysia Airlines flight.
The withdrawals were allegedly made via ATMs and electronic transfers between May 14 and July 8, Hakeem added.
Each could face several years in prison if convicted.
The charges include illegally transferring money electronically, which alone carries up to 10 years in prison.
Police are still looking for another suspect, a Pakistani, who is believed to have had some of the money deposited into his bank account through an online transfer.
The case has provoked outrage in Malaysia, which has seen an outpouring of sympathy for MH370 victims and their families.
The flight with 239 people aboard disappeared on March 8 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
It is believed to have veered mysteriously off course and gone down far to the south in the Indian Ocean, but no trace has been found despite a massive international search for the Boeing 777.
Sarah Bajc wants to know what happened to her partner. Photo: AFP
Chinese physics student Jimmy Wang had no interest in aviation until March 8, when Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 went missing with his 58-year-old father, Wang Lijun, aboard.
But Wang, 31, now spends evenings in central China combing through aviation blogs for Boeing 777 technical specs, exchanging what he finds with fellow MH370 next-of-kin.
He is one of hundreds of relatives who - desperate to learn the fate of their loved ones - are channeling their grief in a cross-border, social-media-enabled, but so far frustrating citizen campaign to solve what is now aviation's greatest mystery.
"Malaysia Airlines and others are not doing their jobs so we have to organise," Wang, who abandoned graduate studies in Sweden to be with his mother, said via Skype from his home in Anyang . "I cannot live the rest of my life in questions."
Through Chinese micro-blogging site weibo - 153 Chinese were aboard MH370 - a closed Facebook group and Skype "meetings" of up to dozens of people, participants exchange findings, discuss the latest theories and proposals for their taking group action.
The group, calling itself Voice370 with some 300 members, receives and debates advice from aviation, legal and other experts, while similar groups formed after previous disasters such as the 2009 Air France crash offer support.
While some face-to-face meetings have been held, most exchanges are conducted via webcam or extensive email strings, with members voting on strategies for pushing Malaysia Airlines and governments involved in a still-fruitless search for more information.
In doing so, they juggle time zones and language barriers - "meetings" are held mainly in English, with bilingual Chinese translating for their countrymen.
"It's really quite a community," said Sarah Bajc, an American whose partner, Philip Wood, was on the flight.
"I feel compelled to do everything in my power to find Philip. We owe it to them."
Flight MH370 disappeared with 239 people en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
No trace has been found despite an extensive, Australian-led search in the southern Indian Ocean. Some next of kin have sharply accused the airline and Malaysian authorities of a bungled response - its military tracked MH370 on radar after it mysteriously diverted, but did nothing - and withholding data from the public.
Yet despite their efforts, families have seen only modest success. In an open letter to authorities in Malaysia, Australia and China in May, a sceptical Voice370 demanded to see satellite and other data that Malaysia says indicates MH370 went down in the Indian Ocean.
The information was eventually released but shed little light on what happened.
In June, several families, including Bajc, launched a drive to raise US$5 million for any whistle-blower with information on the jet's fate. Only US$100,500 has been raised.
K.S. Narendran, spouse of passenger.
"You get tired, and part of you wants to put it behind and say, 'That's where it all ends', and part of you says, 'You can't rest until you figure things out,'" said K.S. Narendran, 50, a soft-spoken Indian business consultant, whose wife, Chandrika Sharma, was on MH370. Families denied AFP's request to sit in on meetings.
The airline and Malaysian government deny charges of a cover-up and insist they will leave no stone unturned.
The government is yet to announce any findings of its investigations into MH370.
Its attention is now diverted by the July 17 downing of another Malaysia Airlines passenger jet, MH17, over war-torn eastern Ukraine, a tragedy that also ripped open emotional wounds for many MH370 next-of-kin.
Bajc said MH17 underlines the importance of Voice370, particularly the need to highlight "critical flaws" in global aviation and police "incompetent" airlines and authorities that endanger passengers.
But she and others admit resignation is setting in.
Bajc no longer joins the video meetings, as she and others look increasingly for other ways to pressure authorities.
No significant lawsuits have been filed yet.
"It's my father. I'm his only son. No matter what happened, we need to bring them back," Wang said.
The search area for the missing MH370 in the southern Indian Ocean has been refined based on the latest analysis. Photo: EPA
The search area for the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 in the southern Indian Ocean has been refined based on the latest analysis, officials said yesterday. They said the investigation into how the plane came to crash cannot proceed until the wreckage and black boxes are recovered.
Australian Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss said analysis of a failed attempted satellite phone call from the airline to the flight, which disappeared March 8, "suggests to us that the aircraft might have turned south a little earlier than we had previously expected".
However, Truss said the overall search area of Australia's west coast remained unchanged. He did not elaborate on how that analysis was achieved.
Truss and Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in the search for the missing Boeing 777 as it progresses to the expensive next phase. The agreement shares the ongoing cost between the two countries.
China's deputy transport minister He Jianzhong, who also attended the Canberra meeting, said the ministers had all agreed that the search would not be interrupted or given up. Most of the plane's passengers, 153, were Chinese.
The airliner disappeared with 239 people aboard after flying far off course while on a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
Liow said investigators had advised that success of the undersea search for wreckage and the aircraft's black boxes with cockpit voice recordings and flight data was crucial to solving the mystery of the disaster.
"The investigation cannot continue without the search result," he said. "We need to find the plane, we need to find the black box in the plane so that we can have a conclusion in the investigation."
Malaysia, as the country where the Boeing 777 was flagged, has overall responsibility for the investigation. But Australia has search and rescue responsibility for the area of the Indian Ocean where the plane is thought to have crashed 1,800km off Australia's west coast.
Dutch contractor Fugro Survey will conduct the underwater search, starting next month. Three vessels towing underwater vehicles equipped with side-scan sonar, multi-beam echo sounders and video equipment would search for the plane, Truss said.
The search could take up to a year to scour 60,000 square kilometres of seabed and cost A$52 million (HK$376 million).
Before the underwater search starts, two survey ships are mapping the entire search area.
