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MH370 3rd Search Update

Via changingtimes.media :

Malaysia’s transport minister expresses support for Ocean Infinity’s search for MH370, but says contract is still being finalised

By Annete Gartland on February 25, 2025

This article has been updated.

Latest update, March 4: Ocean Infinity’s vessel Armada 78 06 is now docked at the Australian Marine Complex at Henderson, south of Perth, and is refuelling and taking on provisions so as to resume its search for MH370 in the southern Indian Ocean.

Malaysia’s transport minister, Anthony Loke, has expressed support for Ocean Infinity’s new search for MH370, but said Malaysia’s ‘no find, no fee’ contract with the company was still being finalised.

At the weekend Ocean Infinity’s vessel Armada 78 06 arrived in the area of the southern Indian Ocean where MH370 is thought to have crashed.

The vessel is now in an area suggested by independent investigators Victor Iannello and Bobby Ulich that has already been partly searched, but which Iannello and Ulich say needs scouring again, with a widened scope. This area, which is about 2,000 km west of Perth, Australia, is centred on 34.2°S 93.8°E.

Several commentators, including independent investigator Mike Exner and vessel tracker Kevin Rupp, who have been studying Armada 78 06’s movements, say it appears that Ocean Infinity has already deployed at least one AUV in the ocean.

Exner tweeted on Monday that the vessel’s manoeuvring was “consistent with AUV deployment (not verified)”. Some investigators have deduced from vessel tracking that three AUVs have been deployed.

A spokeswoman for Ocean Infinity told Changing Times: “Ocean Infinity has no information to provide at this stage, but, as soon as we do, we will be in touch.”

On Tuesday Loke welcomed Ocean Infinity’s proactive deployment in the southern Indian Ocean. He referred to the deployment as “positive news” for the next of kin, who had been awaiting the resumption of the search.

Grace Subathirai Nathan, whose mother, Anne Daisy, was on board MH370, told Changing Times: “After so many years of pushing for the search to resume it’s truly a relief that it has finally resumed because at least now we can have some hope again.

“Even then it’s so hard to hope freely because our hope has been shattered so many times over the last 11 years.”

Loke said: “Right now we are still finalising our contract. We just got the clearance from the AG’s [attorney general’s] chambers and there are some changes that need to be made in terms and conditions … so we are still finalising the details for the contract to be signed.”

He added: “Since Ocean Infinity has already started to mobilise their ships, of course we welcome it because we have given principal approval for the search to resume and just need to finalise the contract right now to be signed.”

Loke said that Ocean Infinity had provided assurances that it had combined findings from various expert researchers.

He said the company was very confident that the current search zone was more credible because they had covered a large area previously and were now searching an area they had missed in the past.

“They are confident this area will come back with a positive result, and they have convinced us that they are ready to take the risk and to resume the search. That’s why the Malaysian government is proceeding with it,” Loke added.

He said that hopefully MH370 would be found and this would bring answers not only for the next of kin but also for the aviation industry as a whole because, he said, this was “the biggest mystery in the history of aviation”.

Jiang Hui from Beijing, whose mother, Jiang Cuiyun, was a passenger on MH370, expressed his hope that, this time, Ocean Infinity would succeed in finding MH370, but he added: “If they can’t find it, I hope that the Malaysian government will move from these time-defined reward searches to a long-term, public reward search.

“This would remove the need to keep gaining approval for a new search for a defined period every time. This would be a great way of providing psychological support for the next of kin.”

It is nearly 11 years since MH370 went missing on March 8, 2014, with 239 passengers and crew on board. It was en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

It is more than two months since the Malaysian Cabinet agreed in principle to accept Ocean Infinity’s proposal to proceed with seabed search operations to locate the wreckage of flight MH370.

Loke said a defined time frame for the new search would be set out in the contract.

Ocean Infinity is seeking a US$70 million fee if the wreckage is found. This is similar to the fee proposed for the search in 2018.

The company is expected to focus on an area between latitudes 33°S and 36°S, wider from the 7th Arc than was previously searched.

The original decision to search for MH370 in the southern Indian Ocean was based on calculations by the British company Inmarsat that were based on satellite pings – or handshakes – from MH370. Inmarsat said MH370 was most likely to be found along what became known as the 7th Arc.

In its previous search in 2018, Ocean Infinity used a leased Norwegian vessel, Seabed Constructor, and its own Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs), capable of operating in depths up to 6,000 metres.

It now has new robotic vessels that can be operated completely remotely, with no crew on board.
The AUVs being used in the current search are able to spend up to four days submerged.

American amateur investigator Blaine Gibson, who has found, retrieved, and/or handed in 22 pieces of debris says he supports Ocean Infinity’s proposal, but, if the plane is not found between latitudes 33°S and 36°S, he would like to see the search extended north to about 28.3°S.

Any search should include the area from 28.3°S to 33.2°S, which is the area suggested by oceanographer Charitha Pattiaratchi from The University of Western Australia (UWA) in Perth, Gibson says.

Gibson and Pattiaratchi argue that any new search should not be focused too narrowly along the 7th Arc.
They have identified Broken Ridge, at 32.5°S 96.5°E, as the most important ‘hotspot’.

Independent investigator Richard Godfrey thinks that MH370’s location is further north than previously thought and he has urged Ocean Infinity to search the possible crash location defined in his most recent research: within a radius of 30 km centred on 29.128°S 99.934°E. Less than half of the area Godfrey suggests has been previously scoured.

Godfrey has conducted analyses using the Global Detection and Tracking of Any Aircraft Anywhere (GDTAAA) software based on WSPR data, which is publicly available on WSPRnet.

Some investigators find Godfrey’s analysis compelling, but others are more sceptical. Several professional pilots have asserted that WSPR data cannot provide information that is useful for aircraft tracking.

Godfrey monitored radio signals sent out by radio amateurs around the world. Hundreds of these signals are sent out every two minutes.

He explains that, when the radio signals cross the path of an aircraft, it is possible to detect changes in the signal level and in the frequency.

Areas that other investigators argue should be searched include one suggested by Jean-Luc Marchand from Belgium and retired Air France pilot Patrick Blelly that has not previously been searched and is around a 35.7°S 93°E centrepoint.

Blelly is providing tracking information for Armada 78 06 on the MH370-CAPTION website. He explains that the potential search area as presented in March 2024 during the 10th anniversary remembrance event in Kuala Lumpur is shown by the white lines and this includes the zone centred on 35.7°S 93°E.

The map pictured below, which shows the track of Armada 78 06, is interactive on the MH370-CAPTION website and the vessel’s position is updated at 30 minutes past the hour UTC (90 minutes behind real time).



Blelly explains that the orange line on the map illustrates the zone scanned during Phase 2 marine surveys conducted by the governments of Australia, Malaysia, and China between September 2014 and January 2017 and the red line illustrates Ocean Infinity’s search in 2018.

Image from February 28 courtesy of Jay Lowe:



Earlier image courtesy of the editor-in-chief of Airline Ratings, Geoffrey Thomas:



In 2018, Ocean Infinity spent more than three months searching for MH370 in the southern Indian Ocean. The company scoured, and collected data from, more than 112,000 square kilometres of ocean floor, which is far in excess of the initial 25,000-square-kilometre target and almost the same area as was examined in the previous search over a period of two and a half years.

The previous Australian-led underwater search was suspended on January 17, 2017, after an area spanning 120,000 square kilometres was scoured.

Latest image as of March 3 from the MH370-CAPTION website:




https://changingtimes.media/2025/02/25/m...finalised/