Safety Investigation Report 2018:1 Factual Information/1.1/1.1.6
SAFETY INVESTIGATION REPORT MH370 (9M-MRO)
1.1.6 Search for Aircraft
Extensive work done by the MH370 Search Strategy Group, coordinated by the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB), by analysing signals transmitted by the aircraft’s satellite communications terminal to Inmarsat’s Indian Ocean Region satellite indicated that the aircraft continued to fly for several hours after loss of contact. The analysis showed the aircraft changed course shortly after it passed the northern tip of Sumatra (Indonesia) and travelled in a southerly direction until it ran out of fuel in the southern Indian Ocean west of Australia. Details of this work can be found in the ATSB’s report: AE-2014-054 dated 26 June 2014, and in subsequent updates, available at ATSB’s website:
http://www.atsb.gov.au/publications/investigation_reports/2014/aair/ae-2014-054/
On 03 October 2017, the ATSB published a report detailing the history of the search and made conclusions and recommendations relating to the search activities. This is contained in the report titled “The Operational Search for MH370”. The report and relevant attachments are available at ATSB’s website:
https://www.atsb.gov.au/newsroom/news-items/2017/chapter-closes-on-mh370/
The search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 commenced on 8 March 2014 and continued for 1,046 days until 17 January 2017 when it was suspended in accordance with a decision made by the Governments of Malaysia, Australia and the People’s Republic of China. This involved surface searches in the South China Sea, Straits of Malacca and the southern Indian Ocean. The 52 days of the surface search involving aircraft and surface vessels covered an area of several million square kilometres. A sub surface search for the aircraft’s underwater locator beacons was also conducted during the surface search. The underwater search started with a bathymetry survey which mapped a total of 710,000 square kilometres of Indian Ocean seafloor and continued with a high-resolution sonar search which covered an area in excess of 120,000 square kilometres. The last search vessel left the underwater search area on 17 January 2017 without locating the missing aircraft. Although combined scientific studies continued to refine areas of probability, there was no new information at that date to determine the specific location of the aircraft.
On 10 January 2018, the Malaysian Government entered into an agreement with the US company, Ocean Infinity, to conduct a 90-day underwater search in an area that was considered the most likely location for the wreckage. This search which commenced in the identified search area on 22 January 2018 was completed on 29 May 2018 without locating the missing aircraft. The search utilising the most advance underwater search technology currently available covered an area in excess of 112,000 square kilometres.
Details on the whole search effort for the aircraft have been documented elsewhere, in particular in the Australian Transport Safety Bureau report, “The Operational Search for MH370”, in relation to the search in the southern Indian Ocean and the weekly updates provided by the MH370 Response Team in relation to the re-activated search by Ocean Infinity, and are separate and distinct from this Safety Investigation Report.