Update | Fresh analysis ‘refines’ search area for missing Malaysia Airlines jet MH370
Malaysia, Australia to share HK$376 million cost of underwater hunt
The search area for the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 in the southern Indian Ocean has been refined based on the latest analysis, officials said yesterday. They said the investigation into how the plane came to crash cannot proceed until the wreckage and black boxes are recovered.
Australian Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss said analysis of a failed attempted satellite phone call from the airline to the flight, which disappeared March 8, "suggests to us that the aircraft might have turned south a little earlier than we had previously expected".
We need to find the plane, we need to find the black box ... so that we can have a conclusion in the investigation
However, Truss said the overall search area of Australia's west coast remained unchanged. He did not elaborate on how that analysis was achieved.
Truss and Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in the search for the missing Boeing 777 as it progresses to the expensive next phase. The agreement shares the ongoing cost between the two countries.
China's deputy transport minister He Jianzhong, who also attended the Canberra meeting, said the ministers had all agreed that the search would not be interrupted or given up. Most of the plane's passengers, 153, were Chinese.
The airliner disappeared with 239 people aboard after flying far off course while on a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.