MH370: Is it time to stop searching for pings?

[MindMover]

Last edited Mon Apr 14, 2014, 02:47 AM - Edit history (1)

Source: CNN

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (CNN) -- Is it time for underwater search vehicles to start scanning the ocean floor in the hunt for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370?

Some analysts say it is, because it's been days since anyone has picked up a possible signal from the missing aircraft's data recorders.

And the batteries powering the locator beacons inside the so-called black boxes are probably dead, a top official from the company that manufactures the beacons told CNN on Sunday. That means searchers may not be able to detect any more pings to help lead them to those pieces of the missing plane.

Meanwhile, the search area for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 grew over the weekend. And authorities say no one onboard the plane has been ruled out in connection with its disappearance.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/13/world/asia/malaysia-airlines-plane/index.html

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/13/world/asia/malaysia-airlines-plane/index.html

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Official says sub will be used in search for jet

PERTH, Australia — Search crews will for the first time send a sub deep into the Indian Ocean to try and determine whether signals detected by sound-locating equipment are from the missing Malaysian plane’s black boxes.

Angus Houston, the head of a joint agency coordinating the search off Australia’s west coast, said Monday that the crew on board the Ocean Shield will launch the underwater vehicle as soon as possible. The Bluefin 21 autonomous sub can create a sonar map of the area to chart any debris on the seafloor.

The move comes after crews picked up a series of underwater sounds over the past two weeks that were consistent with an aircraft’s black boxes.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/missing-planes-black-box-batteries-may-have-died/2014/04/13/2782a4dc-c372-11e3-9ee7-02c1e10a03f0_story.html?Post+generic=%3Ftid%3Dsm_twitter_washingtonpost

Submersible to search for MH370

Teams searching for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane are to deploy a submersible for the first time.

Search chief Angus Houston said work using the towed pinger locator would stop, with the Bluefin 21 submersible drone sent down as soon as possible.

He said no new acoustic signals thought to be from the missing plane had been detected since 8 April.

Air Chief Marshall Houston warned that the submersible search would be a long process that could yield no results.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-27017928?OCID=twitterasia


OFFICIAL SAYS SUB WILL BE USED IN SEARCH FOR JET

PERTH, Australia (AP) — Search crews will send a sub deep into the Indian Ocean on Monday for the first time to try to determine whether signals detected by sound-locating equipment are from the missing Malaysian plane's black boxes, the Australian head of the search said.

Angus Houston said the crew on board the Ocean Shield will launch the underwater vehicle sometime Monday evening. The Bluefin 21 autonomous sub can create a sonar map of the area to chart any debris on the seafloor.

The move comes after crews picked up a series of underwater sounds over the past two weeks that were consistent with an aircraft's black boxes.

"We haven't had a single detection in six days, and I guess it's time to go under water," said Houston, the head of a joint agency coordinating the search off Australia's west coast.

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/missing-planes-black-box-batteries-may-have-died


Searchers Will Deploy Sub in Search for Malaysia Jet Wreckage

Investigators scouring for the missing Malaysia Airlines jet will send a submarine deep into the Indian Ocean for the first time to try and figure out whether signals picked up by sound-locating equipment are from Flight 370's black boxes, taking the hunt underwater after six weeks of searching.

The crew aboard the Australian Navy vessel Ocean Shield will launch the Bluefin 21 autonomous underwater vehicle as soon as possible, said Angus Houston, the head of a joint agency coordinating the painstaking search off Australia's west coast, at a news conference just after 12 p.m. local time (12 a.m. ET).

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/missing-jet/searchers-will-deploy-sub-search-malaysia-jet-wreckage-n79521


MH370 search to shift focus to underwater scan

Australian authorities will deploy an underwater vehicle on Monday evening to continue the search for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane, as it is now believed unlikely there will be any further sonar detections of the black boxes.

The search for the missing plane, which is believed to have crashed in the Indian Ocean, claiming the lives of all 239 passengers on board, will enter a new phase now on the 38th day since the plane went missing, involving an underwater search vessel known as “Blue Fin 21” that will be deployed from the Australian defence vessel Ocean Shield.

The vehicle is sent out on 24-hour search cycles, and will spend four hours on the Ocean Shield after each search, having its batteries charged and allowing the data to be downloaded and analysed. Private contractors for the US navy from Phoenix International will analyse the data onboard the Ocean Shield.

The head of Australia’s joint co-ordination centre, Angus Houston, said on Monday: “We haven’t had a single detection in six days so it’s time to go underwater … The deployment of the underwater autonomous vehicle allows us to take a step forward.”

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/14/mh370-search-to-shift-focus-to-underwater-scan?CMP=twt_fd

[NYC_SKP]

1. I'm confident that CNN will thoroughly investigate this question over the next several weeks.

[MindMover]

2. LOL... nt

[RGinNJ]

3. DUzy!

[jakeXT]

4. Winter is coming

While the robot takes care of business on the ocean floor, work remains hard on the surface. “It can run for about 24 hours. It’s a bit like being on a space mission — you’ve got a wall of TV cameras and controls. You’re talking about 50 tons of equipment and a team of six to eight people to run and maintain the ROV.” The impending southern hemisphere winter may further delay operations. The extent of the recovery will also be affected by just what damage was done on impact. While sections of fuselage have remained after some crashes — and the tailfin of AF447 was retrieved almost intact — other planes have been utterly destroyed. The investigation into Swissair flight 111, that crashed in 1998 off the coast of Nova Scotia, recovered around 2m fragments from relatively shallow waters. Decisions on recovery will be shaped by the human tragedy of MH370. The authorities are now working with the assumption that somewhere, possibly trapped within the wreckage or elsewhere in the ocean, are the remains of the 239 passengers and crew who took off for Kuala Lumpur to Beijing five weeks ago. In the wake of AF447, one of the questions that divided grieving families was whether the deceased should be left in the ocean. Just over half of the bodies were eventually brought to the surface. In the Swissair crash, most could only be identified by dental records or DNA traces.

http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/robots-search-sea-bed-for-mh370/article5908527.ece

[Demeter]

5. this has got to be the worst mishandling ever

with the kind of technology available today, nothing was done except trading accusations and conspiracy theories for WEEKS.

[Baclava]

6. "technology" is only as good as the people using it

I still think they gave up on the witchdoctors angle too soon

[lululu]

7. At what point does this become an exercise in futility?

[Mister K]

8. when we find no black box and no plane or a black box without a plane

[jakeXT]

9. The voice recorder could be empty, because it only records the last 2 hours /nt

[lululu]

10. they've already found no black box and no plane...