Malaysia, China and Australia have agreed to re-examine all data related to missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 to better pinpoint the search area, Malaysia's acting transport minister said yesterday, as the hunt for the plane enters a new phase.

The three countries also agreed at a meeting in Canberra last week to undertake a survey to map the ocean floor and procure more deep-sea search vehicles and other equipment to scour it, minister Hishammuddin Hussein told reporters in Kuala Lumpur.

"I briefed the Malaysian cabinet yesterday on the outcome of the meeting and it has been deliberated. I now have the mandate to announce that the details of the transition phase have been approved," he said.

The Boeing 777 with 239 passengers and crew disappeared on March 8 during a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. About two-thirds of the passengers were Chinese.

Australia will have responsibility for procuring new search assets from commercial contractors, Hishammuddin said, while Malaysia and China will assign additional equipment and services for the search.

He will discuss the possibility of more help from the United States with US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel at a summit in Singapore later this month.

Hishammuddin said it was vital to carry out the undersea bathymetric survey to map the new search area so that the expensive and scarce deep-sea autonomous vehicles and towed sonar scanners could be deployed safely.

From Monday, the three governments will hold weekly video conferences to coordinate the search.

Based on analysis of satellite "pings" sent from the aircraft before it disappeared, searchers believed they knew the position of wreckage of the plane about 1,550 kilometers northwest of Perth. The search was narrowed on the basis of acoustic signals believed to have come from the aircraft's black box recorders before their batteries ran out.

But a search operation involving satellites, aircraft, ships and sophisticated underwater equipment capable of scouring the ocean floor has failed to turn up any trace of the plane.

The US said earlier in May it would contribute its Bluefin-21 underwater drone for one more month, putting pressure on Australia, China and Malaysia to find funding for the next phase of the search.

Officials have said it could take a year to search the 60,000- square-kilometer area where the plane is believed to have crashed, and questions about how to proceed and split the bill.

The search hit a fresh snag yesterday after the Bluefin drone was found to be damaged.

"A hardware defect exists in the transponder mounted on the Ocean Shield and a defect may also exist in the transponder on the Bluefin-21," said a statement by JACC, the Australian agency coordinating the search, referring to the naval vessel towing the drone.

"This inhibits the ability of the two devices to communicate with each other," it said.

Parts to repair the Bluefin will not arrive in Australia until Sunday and it will take several days to reach the search area once repairs are completed.

Go to Forum >>0 Comment(s)