Despite fruitless hunt for MH370, Australia says ‘confident’ searching in right spot

KUALA LUMPUR, April 16 — The search team seeking for signs of the missing Malaysia Airlines (MAS) Flight MH370 is “very confident” that it is looking for the aircraft in the most likely area, Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB)’s chief commissioner Martin Dolan said today.

Dolan was asked if it could be concluded that search teams have been focusing on the wrong area if there is still no trace of the plane in both the current and likely expanded search areas amounting to 120,000 square kilometres.

He replied that it was a “hypothetical question” that may be directed to him in about a years’ time.

“At this stage, we are very confident that the aircraft is likely to be found in that search area and that’s the search area we are focusing on,” he added during a press conference here.

Citing experts’ analysis of satellite data, Dolan explained that the expanded search zone would be in the same area that the search team is scouring as data showed that this was the likely flight path.

“That is the range that covers 95 per cent of possible likely flight paths of MH370,” he said.

A tripartite meeting was held earlier today between Malaysia, China and Australia, where all three nations agreed to double and expand the search area if the aircraft is not found within the current 60,000-square-kilometre search area.

A year-long search in the southern Indian Ocean off the Australian coast since Flight MH370 disappeared in March last year has failed to yield any leads.

The commercial jet disappeared en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, 2014 with 239 people on board.

On January 29 this year, the Malaysian government declared the loss of Flight MH370 as an accident under international aviation regulations.

Yesterday, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC) said in an operational update that more than 60 per cent of the priority search area has been scoured, adding that the current underwater search area may be largely completed around the search deadline of May if there are no delays.

The search is jointly funded by Australia and Malaysia, with both splitting the A$120 million (RM325 million) pledged so far.

Following the tripartite meeting, Transport Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai said the expanded search phase for Flight MH370 will likely cost an additional A$50 million.