Malaysia announced on Friday that it had agreed to launch a new search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370which disappeared 10 years ago in one of aviation’s greatest and most enduring mysteries.
The Boeing 777 carried 239 people disappeared from radar screens on March 8, 2014 on the way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
Despite the largest search in aviation history, the plane was never found. Malaysia’s prime minister said 17 days after the plane disappeared that his government did so based on the satellite data concluded that the plane had crashed in a remote corner of the Indian Ocean, and that there were no survivors.
Transport Minister Anthony Loke said Malaysia had agreed to a new search operation by a maritime exploration company Ocean infinitywho also conducted an unsuccessful hunt in 2018.
The company’s initial efforts followed a massive Australian-led search for the aircraft that lasted three years before being called off in January 2017.
Loke said a new 5,800-square-mile area in the southern Indian Ocean would be combed by Ocean Infinity, which is based in the United Kingdom and the United States.
“The new search area proposed by Ocean Infinity is based on the latest information and data analysis conducted by experts and researchers,” Loke said.
“The Ocean Infinity search proposal is sound and deserves consideration,” he told reporters.
The government said on December 13 that it had agreed to Ocean Infinity’s proposal “in principle.” The Ministry of Transport is expected to determine the conditions in early 2025.
The new search will continue “once the contract is finalized and signed by both parties,” Loke said.
“They told us that the ideal time to search in the designated waters is between January and April. We are working to finalize the agreement as quickly as possible,” he added.
“I really hope the loss of MH370 comes to an end. May all questions be answered,” Malaysian Rosila Abu Samah, 60, the stepmother of one of the passengers, told AFP.
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Malaysian Shim Kok Chau, 49, whose wife was a flight attendant on the ill-fated flight, said he had accepted her fate but hoped to learn what happened to the plane, “why it happened and who did it”.
Other victims included a famous group of 24 Chinese calligraphy artists who were returning from an exhibition of their work. Two young Iranian men on the plane, 18-year-old Pouria Nour Mohammad Mehrdad and 29-year-old Delavar Seyed Mohammadreza, were traveling with stolen passports in search of a better life in Europe.
Two of the U.S. citizens on the plane were young children, Nicole Meng, 4, and 2-year-old Yan Zhang.
Philip Wood was the only one American adult on flight. The IBM manager had been living in Beijing and was planning to move to the Malaysian capital with his girlfriend Sarah Bajc.
“No find, no fee”
The new search follows the same “no find, no fee” principle as Ocean Infinity’s previous search, with the government only paying if it finds the plane.
The contract is for 18 months and Malaysia will pay the company $70 million if the plane is found, Loke said.
He said the decision to agree to a new search “reflects the Malaysian government’s commitment to continuing the search operation and bringing closure to the families of the MH370 victims.”
The original search conducted by Australia covered 120,000 square kilometers of the Indian Ocean but found little trace of the plane, only a few pieces of debris.
In July 2015, a plane fragment later confirms that it is a flaperon of MH370 was found washed ashore on the island of Reunion in the western Indian Ocean. It was the first clear evidence that the plane had crashed in the area. More debris was later found washed up on the coast of East Africa.
YANNICK PITOU/AFP/Getty Images
The plane’s disappearance has long been the subject of various theories – including this one Experienced pilot Zaharie Ahmad Shah had gone apostate.
A final report on the tragedy published in 2018 pointed to air traffic control failures and said the plane’s course had been changed manually.
Asked if he was confident the plane would be found in the new search, Loke said: “Nobody can give any guarantees at this point.”
“It has been over 10 years and it would be unfair to expect a concrete commitment. However, according to the terms and conditions, any discovery must be credible. It can’t just be a few fragments; The contract specifies certain criteria.” “
