1.32 pm: How searchers are looking for the MH370 black box
Searchers looking for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane have discovered new signals consistent with those emitted by so-called black boxes in the Indian Ocean, but they do not want to send a submersible down yet to look for the plane. For now, they will continue to use the towed pinger locator to get a better fix on the location. Here's why:
The Australian navy vessel Ocean Shield picked up the signals using a US Navy device called a towed pinger locator. It's essentially a long cable with a listening device, or hydrophone, attached to the end. It's pulled behind the boat at a depth of 3 kilometers (1.9 miles).
The pinger locator is designed to detect signals at a range of 1.8 kilometers (1.2 miles), meaning it would need to be almost on top of the black boxes — the flight data and voice recorders — to detect them if they were on the ocean floor, which is 4.5 kilometers (3 miles) under the surface.
The first signal from the black boxes was picked up Saturday evening and lasted two hours and 20 minutes before it was lost as the ship moved forward. The ship then turned around and a few hours later picked up a second signal that lasted for 13 minutes. It picked up signals again on Tuesday.
The signals picked up twice on Tuesday lasted 5 and a half minutes and 7 minutes but they were weaker, indicating that the black boxes are running out of battery. They have a stated shelf-life of 30 days, but sometimes they last longer. The plane disappeared just over a month ago, on 8 March. The signals have given searchers a better idea of the location of the devices, which are now believed to be within a roughly 20-kilometer (12-mile) radius. Still, that is a 1,300-square -kilometer (500-square-mile) plot of the ocean floor, an area as wide as a large city.
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Why not send an underwater craft?
When crews determine the best possible location, the next step will be to send down the US Navy's autonomous underwater vessel Bluefin 21, an unmanned submersible that can create a sonar map of the seafloor and any wreckage, as well as take photos.
But the sonar can scan only about 100 meters (330 feet). As for its ability to take photos, it can see with lights and cameras only a few meters away in a landscape that is completely dark.
So, even after the search area has been narrowed down, deploying the underwater vehicle now to find the black boxes would be the equivalent of looking for a desktop computer-sized object in a city the size of Los Angeles.
This means the Bluefin 21 will take six times longer to cover the same area than it does the towed pinger locator.
11.20 am: Ocean debris left by jet depends on angle, speed of aircraft
Exactly how the plane hit the water makes a big difference to the teams undertaking the painstaking search for the wreckage. Investigators have frustratingly little hard data to work out how Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 came down in the Indian Ocean on March 8 with 239 people on board.
If the plane ran out of fuel at its normal cruising altitude and the pilots were incapacitated, the autopilot would stop working and the aircraft could dip into an increasingly steep and rapid dive, aviation experts said. Under this scenario, the plane could hit the water nose-first and close to perpendicular with the surface, piercing the ocean like an arrow.
As far as the plane landing safely on water, the chances are very slim. According to Graham Edkins, a former Australian government senior air crash investigator, said it requires an almost unbelievable confluence of skill, conditions and luck.
More details here.
9.55 am: Details emerge on the two new pings that have been located
According to agency reports, one ping was detected on Tuesday afternoon and lasted five minutes, 25 seconds, while a second was picked up on Tuesday night and lasted seven minutes. The pings are a hopeful sign that ship could be found soon.
MH370 went missing on 8 March, nearly a month back with 239 people on board. The batteries on the ship's blackboxes will run out this month and thus it is crucial that the ship is found soon, if the investigators are to know what went wrong with the plane that caused it to crash.
8.30 am: Two more signals located
According to an AP alert, Australian official have said that the search equipment has relocated underwater signal in hunt for missing jet. More updates as they unfold.
A ship searching for the missing Malaysian jet has detected two more underwater signals, raising hopes the wreckage of the plane will be spotted soon, the Australian official in charge of the search said Wednesday, reports Associated Press.
Angus Houston, the head of a joint agency coordinating the search for the missing plane in the southern Indian Ocean, said that the Australian navy's Ocean Shield picked up the two signals in a sweep on Tuesday.
"I think we are looking in the right area but I am not prepared to confirm anything until such time someone lays eyes on the wreckage," he said.
Searchers looking for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane have discovered new signals consistent with those emitted by so-called black boxes in the Indian Ocean, but they do not want to send a submersible down yet to look for the plane. For now, they will continue to use the towed pinger locator to get a better fix on the location. Here's why:
The Australian navy vessel Ocean Shield picked up the signals using a US Navy device called a towed pinger locator. It's essentially a long cable with a listening device, or hydrophone, attached to the end. It's pulled behind the boat at a depth of 3 kilometers (1.9 miles).
The pinger locator is designed to detect signals at a range of 1.8 kilometers (1.2 miles), meaning it would need to be almost on top of the black boxes — the flight data and voice recorders — to detect them if they were on the ocean floor, which is 4.5 kilometers (3 miles) under the surface.
The first signal from the black boxes was picked up Saturday evening and lasted two hours and 20 minutes before it was lost as the ship moved forward. The ship then turned around and a few hours later picked up a second signal that lasted for 13 minutes. It picked up signals again on Tuesday.
The signals picked up twice on Tuesday lasted 5 and a half minutes and 7 minutes but they were weaker, indicating that the black boxes are running out of battery. They have a stated shelf-life of 30 days, but sometimes they last longer. The plane disappeared just over a month ago, on 8 March. The signals have given searchers a better idea of the location of the devices, which are now believed to be within a roughly 20-kilometer (12-mile) radius. Still, that is a 1,300-square -kilometer (500-square-mile) plot of the ocean floor, an area as wide as a large city.
___
Why not send an underwater craft?
When crews determine the best possible location, the next step will be to send down the US Navy's autonomous underwater vessel Bluefin 21, an unmanned submersible that can create a sonar map of the seafloor and any wreckage, as well as take photos.
But the sonar can scan only about 100 meters (330 feet). As for its ability to take photos, it can see with lights and cameras only a few meters away in a landscape that is completely dark.
So, even after the search area has been narrowed down, deploying the underwater vehicle now to find the black boxes would be the equivalent of looking for a desktop computer-sized object in a city the size of Los Angeles.
This means the Bluefin 21 will take six times longer to cover the same area than it does the towed pinger locator.
11.20 am: Ocean debris left by jet depends on angle, speed of aircraft
Exactly how the plane hit the water makes a big difference to the teams undertaking the painstaking search for the wreckage. Investigators have frustratingly little hard data to work out how Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 came down in the Indian Ocean on March 8 with 239 people on board.
If the plane ran out of fuel at its normal cruising altitude and the pilots were incapacitated, the autopilot would stop working and the aircraft could dip into an increasingly steep and rapid dive, aviation experts said. Under this scenario, the plane could hit the water nose-first and close to perpendicular with the surface, piercing the ocean like an arrow.
As far as the plane landing safely on water, the chances are very slim. According to Graham Edkins, a former Australian government senior air crash investigator, said it requires an almost unbelievable confluence of skill, conditions and luck.
More details here.
9.55 am: Details emerge on the two new pings that have been located
According to agency reports, one ping was detected on Tuesday afternoon and lasted five minutes, 25 seconds, while a second was picked up on Tuesday night and lasted seven minutes. The pings are a hopeful sign that ship could be found soon.
Two new pings have been heard. AP
8.30 am: Two more signals located
According to an AP alert, Australian official have said that the search equipment has relocated underwater signal in hunt for missing jet. More updates as they unfold.
A ship searching for the missing Malaysian jet has detected two more underwater signals, raising hopes the wreckage of the plane will be spotted soon, the Australian official in charge of the search said Wednesday, reports Associated Press.
Angus Houston, the head of a joint agency coordinating the search for the missing plane in the southern Indian Ocean, said that the Australian navy's Ocean Shield picked up the two signals in a sweep on Tuesday.
"I think we are looking in the right area but I am not prepared to confirm anything until such time someone lays eyes on the wreckage," he said.
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