With time running out, the vessel looking for the jet dashes north to the area where scientists say it went down, suggesting that something significant has shown up.
The Daily Beast has learned that in the final days of the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, the search vessel scouring the depths of the Indian Ocean has suddenly moved at high speed to a new location more than 200 miles north. The site is close to an area that experts have recently identified as far more likely to contain the remains of the Boeing 777.
The Dutch-owned vessel Equator is using an autonomous underwater vehicle in a pattern of maneuvers near the seabed similar to that used on two previous occasions when significantly large objects were identified. Both of these turned out to be shipwrecks.
This change of mission was detected by Dr. Richard Cole, of University College, London, who has been following the search operation for many months via satellite tracking.
It comes after the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, directing the search operations, admitted that the area of 46,000 square miles that has been searched for 27 months is unlikely to contain the remains of the jet. Equator was making its final sweeps in that area when it was suddenly diverted.
The Australians determined, after an intense scientific effort, that the most likely site was further north, between latitudes 32 to 36 degrees south. The Equator is now operating close to latitude 32 degrees south.
Cole told The Daily Beast: “Equator has re-centered the search to the north, away from the area originally identified in late 2014 by the Australian Defense Science and Technology Group. Using a sonar system, it is now checking sea floor not previously scanned. The search has only limited time left, but they are investing this remaining time in scanning the area they now believe is the most likely location of MH370.”
Although this part of the sea floor had not previously been scanned for wreckage it had been mapped, using bathymetric technology that would not detect debris or wreckage.
THE DAILY BEAST
