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MH370 SIO search - Latest developments August 05.

Update to the WSJ article (above) courtesy of the Oz.. - MH370 hunt may be bogged down by French probe

..Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Infrastructure and Regional Development Warren Truss has confirmed that Australia – at the invitation of the French judiciary – has sent an expert from the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) to Toulouse, France, to take part in the examination of the B777 flaperon found on La Réunion.
 

Technical experts are preparing to examine whether a washed-up plane part belonged to missing flight MH370, raising hopes that some light may finally be shed on one of aviation’s darkest mysteries.

The Boeing 777 disappeared on March 8 last year when it inexplicably changed course en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board - including six Australians - and a colossal multinational hunt for the aircraft proved fruitless.

But last week’s discovery of a two-metre-long wing part called a flaperon on the French Indian Ocean island of La Reunion has raised fresh hopes for relatives desperate for answers.

The piece has been taken the southwestern French city of Toulouse, where it will undergo the high-profile examination. The case containing the wing part will be opened early Wednesday afternoon, a French source close to the case said.

MH370 - fact sheet

It will be opened in the presence of French and Malaysian experts, Boeing employees and representatives from China - the country that lost the most passengers.

It is as yet unclear whether their conclusions will be announced on the same day or later, added the source, who wished to remain anonymous.

“An investigator from the ATSB will join the French and Malaysian-led international investigation team today to examine aircraft wreckage found on La Réunion,” Mr Truss said.

“Malaysian authorities, who are responsible for investigating the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, have determined that the aircraft component retrieved from La Réunion is a flaperon from a B777 aircraft.

“Work is being undertaken by the Malaysian and French authorities to establish whether the flaperon originated from MH370.

“Malaysian and French officials may be in a position to make a formal statement about the origin of the flaperon later this week.

“In the meantime, I am advised that Australia’s CSIRO drift modelling, commissioned by the ATSB, confirms that material from the current search area could have been carried to La Réunion, as well as other locations, as part of a progressive dispersal of floating debris through the action of ocean currents and wind.

“For this reason, thorough and methodical search efforts will continue to be focused on the defined underwater search area, covering 120,000 square kilometres, in the southern Indian Ocean.”

Jean-Paul Troadec, the former head of France’s BEA agency that investigates air accidents, said the analysis would focus on two issues - whether the flaperon belongs to MH370 and if so, whether it can shed light on the final moments of the plane.

He pointed for instance to the paint on the piece - which has already been confirmed as coming from a Boeing 777 plane - as a key element of the probe.

“Every airline paints their planes in a certain way ... and if the paint used is used by Malaysia Airlines and other companies, there may be more certainty,” he said.

Pierre Bascary, former director of tests at the French Defence Procurement Agency, where the analysis will take place, added that the airline may have written maintenance information on the piece such as “Do Not Walk”.

“The phrase used and the way it was written also gives an idea of the origin of the plane.” Troadec said experts would also examine the way the part detached itself from the wing.

“Was it in a violent impact with the sea or not?” he said.

“This piece looks like it is in good condition, it doesn’t look like the part of a plane that fell vertically in the water at 900 kilometres an hour.” He added that experts may also look for traces of an explosion or fire.

Scientists have pointed to the barnacles that are attached to the flaperon, saying these could give an idea of how long the piece has been in the water, and perhaps where it has been. AFP...

Okay & here is the presser from the DPM's office - Australia to help examine aircraft wreckage from La Réunion

Also here is the link for the CSIRO Fact Sheet—MH370 Drift Analysis PDF: 963 KB

The above was also tweeted by the ATSB here & here .

Ben Sandilands on Planetalking has also posted on these latest revelations :

MH370 media messaging risks too much flapping around

Ben Sandilands | Aug 05, 2015 10:27AM |

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Another pile of rubbish on La Reunion's shores awaits checking for MH370 items
With respect, there is a risk that Australia is engaging in a bit of overreach with an official media release saying it will help in the investigation of the Boeing 777 wreckage from La Reunion which is taking place in Toulouse today.

Australia will have an expert from the ATSB at the testing laboratory today, when the package containing the flaperon is opened.

That is as it should be, and always would be, in an ICAO Annex 13 rules investigation into an air disaster in which Australians (six in total) were among the 239 who died when Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 went missing between Kuala Lumpur and Beijing on 8 March 2014.

It doesn’t mean that the Australian attendee will man an electron microscope or became intricately involved in the French examination of the part, which seems highly likely to have come from MH370.  Our man is there to observe, and be consulted, should the French suddenly find themselves stumped in the course of conducting their examination in a laboratory as advanced in its technology and expertise in aviation wreckage dissection as any in the world.

What Australia has done, to its credit, is manage on the direction of the Malaysian authorities, a very difficult and so far unsuccessful sea floor search for the solid and sunk wreckage of the jet in the far reaches of the south Indian Ocean.

There is a valid question to ask, in hindsight, as to whether Australia should have encouraged Malaysia to call for a more intensive and broader search of shorelines on which debris from the crash of MH370 could be expected to come ashore.

The CSIRO’s drift modelling for MH370 debris, which predicted that wreckage could reach Madagascar, which is further west in the Indian Ocean than La Reunion, can be studied here.

That analysis is accompanied by the history of drift modelling done on MH370 debris in Australia which shows that it was taken very seriously. It deals with an erroneous analysis that at one stage forecast wreckage would come ashore in Sumatra in the middle of last year but was promptly corrected.

The question that hangs in the air is whether or not more could have been done to engage authorities in the places where it might come ashore.

There has been much unfounded if not absurd criticism of the ATSB for not being on the shores of La Reunion or Madagascar or near them, awaiting the arrival of any debris.  None of those shores fall within the sovereign authority of Australia or its UN convention defined maritime search and rescue area and responsibilities.

Perhaps there should have been more action on alerting those jurisdictions. But the emphasis, and the dollars spent, in the Australian led sea floor search, was always about the main goal, finding the sunk wreckage....

  

Note: A regular commentator to Ben's MH370 articles - Simon Gunson - has IMO put up his best post so far, see here.

"...Wake up and smell the coffee ATSB. The defined search area was scoured by search planes from 18-31 March 2014, yet obviously this intensive search missed a flaperon found at la Reunion. How plausible is it therefore that they missed debris from an impact along the 7th Arc?...

...Commissioner Martin Dolan refused to consider all these debris because they do not fit ATSB’s theory.

It is grand lunacy when investigators ignore clues because they do not fit their theories. How about fitting theories to the facts?..."

Following on from those developments, this afternoon News Corp put out the following article (note a PAIN_Net tweet is also quoted... ):  

[/url]Independent experts identify new MH370 crash zone — at the opposite end of area currently being searched  



by: MARNIE O’NEILL
From: [url=http://www.news.com.au/]news.com.au
2 hours ago August 05, 2015 3:24PM


MISSING Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 will be found in the Southern Indian Ocean at the opposite end of the current search area, according to drift analysis based on the discovery of a wing part on La Reunion Island.
 

The new likely splash zone was identified by internationally respected physicist, mathematician and algorithm modeller, Dr Henrik Rydberg in a report released on Monday. It lies at the northern tip of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) search area, a significant distance from where searchers have been focusing in the south.

Dr Rydberg, who is based in Sweden and has worked with the independent group of MH370 investigators — a formidable panel of experts known as the IG — believes the Boeing 777 wing component known as a flaperon is “very likely to be confirmed coming from MH370”.

His findings take into account the possibility the flaperon may have washed up on the remote, French-governed island three months before it was announced on July 29.

MH370: More plane parts ‘still afloat’

“In spite of search efforts in other areas around the South Indian Ocean (SIO), nothing has yet been found,” Dr Rydberg said.

“Taken together, it is not unlikely that La Reunion and nearby Mauritius are in fact the initial recipients of debris from MH370. The notion of initial recipient is important. With that assumption, it turns out that we can work out approximately where the debris originated.

“The most likely origin of the flaperon is currently a 120 square nautical miles area, centred at (34S, 94E).”



The search is currently being undertaken in the purple area of the ATSB search zone but new analysis based on the discovery of possible debris from MH370 on la Reunion points to the northern end as the plane's likely resting place Source: Supplied




MH 370 Independent Group researcher Victor Iannello produced this map last August, predicting the same coordinates (34S, 94E) as the likely point of impact. Source: Supplied

Erik van Sebille @ErikvanSebille

Interesting simulation by @deltares showing debris on reunion island likely from northern region of search zone https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0W7tcObbEw …

Prof Moninya Roughan @moninya
@ErikvanSebille @deltares The engine texts back to Boeing also pinpoint the aircraft going down in the northern sector of the search zone.

 
That conclusion matches the results of analysis undertaken by specialists from all over the world, working independently of each other, in the wake of the flaperon find.

The momentum has finally reached the ATSB, which released its new CSIRO drift model this morning in a 9.30am email that appears to take credit for the revised crash zone — despite being the last to pinpoint a northern impact zone.

Looking in the wrong place for 16 months has left Australian taxpayers with a bill of $100 million so far.

“The most recent drift modelling indicated that the net drift of most debris in the 16 months to July 2015 is likely to have been north and then west away from the accident site,” the ATSB communication states.

“The drift analysis undertaken by the CSIRO further supports that the debris from MH370 may be found as far west of the search area as La Reunion Island.”

Independent Dutch research institute Deltares has released a simulation model illustrating why investigators are looking in the wrong place.

“The model shows us that the ocean currents are able to carry the debris from the search area west of Australia to Réunion,” hydrodynamics expert Maarten van Ormondt said.

“It also suggests that it is more likely that the debris originates from the northern section of the search area than from the southern part.”

Mike Chillit @MikeChillit

This #ATSB “map” is buffoonish. They came up with it the day they got word something washed up on Reunion. #MH370 pic.twitter.com/oVPoVjJaof
 
PAIN_NET @PAIN_NET1
@MikeChillit UFB the fact they didn't put out a BOLO 4 debris & strategically place SLDMBs along length of 7th Arc will come back to haunt

Erik van Sebille @ErikvanSebille


Interesting simulation by @deltares showing debris on reunion island likely from northern region of search zone

 

Deltares used a particle tracking routine to compute the movement of debris from different locations in the search area. The calculation was made using surface currents (assuming that they are the most relevant for the floating debris) from the global HYCOM model.

“The results show how debris moves with the counter-clockwise gyre in the Southern Indian Ocean and quickly disperses over large areas,” van Ormondt said.

“Particles released in the northern section of the search area arrive at the African coast first within a year of the release time. Those released in the southern section do not travel as far and do not make it to Africa within the simulation period.”

Joel Sudre, an oceanographic engineer at France’s National Centre for Scientific Research, agrees MH370 is unlikely to be resting in a position much further north than is currently being searched.

“The chaotic nature of the ocean means that we can’t track the exact location, but we can pin it down to an area a few hundred miles in diameter off the coast of northwestern Australia,” he said.

The ATSB’s new drift model released this morning.

No comment required..... ----

 MTF...P2