Malaysia’s transport ministry has confirmed the latest search effort to locate a Boeing 777-200ER that vanished over the southern Indian Ocean 12 years ago ended without result.
Spanning 24 days – from 31 December last year to 23 January this year – the search for the Malaysia Airlines twinjet, which disappeared while operating flight MH370 on 8 March 2014, was the second phase of a renewed hunt which was initiated a year ago.
The Malaysian government had reached a service agreement with undersea specialist Ocean Infinity in March last year.
Although the initial phase, carried out in the same month, lasted four days, the transport ministry says Ocean Infinity performed “several additional survey activities” in a wider search area before the formal agreement was signed.
“Throughout the operation, several disruptions occurred due to unstable weather and sea conditions,” the ministry says.
“To date, the search activities carried out have not found any clues that can confirm the location of the wreckage of [flight MH370].”
The search – on a ‘no find, no fee’ basis – concentrated on a zone of some 15,000km² and the overall 28-day hunt covered just over 7,570km² of the sea bed.
Malaysia’s government had previously indicated that the renewed search, conducted “intermittently”, would last 55 days. It says it remains “committed” informing the relatives of flight MH370’s passengers and crew about developments.
The aircraft had been operating from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
Its disappearance, after an apparent deviation from its course that lasted several hours, remains officially unexplained.
Several items of debris from the 777 have washed up on African coastlines but the location of the main wreckage site has not been identified.
