Australia Rebooting Search For MH370

McGruber (1417641) writes "The Wall Street Journal reports that two months after pausing its search for the missing Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777-200ER, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) is ready to reboot its search. The ATSB is poised to select among bids from the world's most-advanced deep-water specialists, including offshore oil-and-gas companies, maritime research institutions and treasure hunters eager to use their technologies and experience to solve the Flight 370 riddle—and potentially raise their own profiles in the process. ... With no hard evidence of where the plane went down, the search will test the recovery industry's abilities like nothing before. In June, Australian authorities shifted the search zone for a third time — by about 600 miles to the southwest — after reanalyzing satellite transmissions. Even then, they said it was impossible to know whether the fresh search area would prove correct."

Comments

Time for Restart

[smittyoneeach]

Time for restart
Mustn't lose heart
For Malaysian air dart
That went all Earhart
Burma Shave

More information

[GumphMaster]

A current bathymetric survey progress map is here. The earlier underwater search area was around the Zenith Plateau region. Elsewhere on that site are routine updates, although they are getting less frequent of late.

Re:More information

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sorry about all the people who were on the plane, but if there's any bright side in this it is that the world will get to map a bit more of what's around us. It's shocking how little we know about the depths of the oceans.

So I hope all the multibeam data collected about the sea floor features gets published to free and open databases like GMRT:

http://www.marine-geo.org/port...

ANOTHER reboot?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is J.J. Abrams going to direct the search this time?

Re:ANOTHER reboot?

[jythie]

Well, lens flare might make it easier to find at least.

I hope they find it

[mtthwbrnd]

Just so that people stop sending me links to conspiracy theories about it. The problem with all of the conspiracy theories about MH370 that I have encountered so far is:

1. There is no motive for a conspiracy.
2. There is no evidence of a conspiracy.

Other than that all of the conspiracy theories are "interesting".

Re:I hope they find it

[Black Parrot]

Just so that people stop sending me links to conspiracy theories about it.

Since when did facts put an end to conspiracy theories?

Re:I hope they find it

[bill_mcgonigle]

1. There is no motive for a conspiracy.
2. There is no evidence of a conspiracy.

We should be honest in our assessment of what these people think, even if we disagree with their conclusions. The predominant theory holds that MH370 was hijacked to Diego Garcia for future use as a false flag operation (motive). They point to things like the window configurations being the same in the MH17 wreckage and MH370 but different in ground shots of MH17, or rotten corpses in the wreckage (evidence, if it were true).

Their theories have trouble more on the level of "OK, so what happened to the real MH17 then?" and other logical inconsistencies, or even just showing evidence that "evidence" is in fact true ("why do you think that window configuration photo is MH17, because somebody said so? - where's the wide shot with the tail number?").

It doesn't help them much that Joe Biden's son just got appointed to the board of Gazprom in Ukraine or that Israel launched a ground invasion of Gaza as soon as MH17 went down - the willingness of certain groups of people to do evil, nefarious things isn't in question.

Re:I hope they find it

[TemporalBeing]

Just so that people stop sending me links to conspiracy theories about it. The problem with all of the conspiracy theories about MH370 that I have encountered so far is:

1. There is no motive for a conspiracy. 2. There is no evidence of a conspiracy.

Other than that all of the conspiracy theories are "interesting".

Well, you don't really know any motive until you can identify who did it.

While I'm not one for conspiracies, I think the MH370 incident is a prime example of what could be the next "9/11" - hi-jack an airline in remote region, kill everyone on board, transport it somewhere where you want to make a statement, then load with explosives and make your statement; only after which you announce you were behind it. Such a task could take years to carry out, so it's not going to be evident for potentially a long time who did it or why; and you'll only discover it by looking at the wreckage (if recoverable) after the final terrorist act occurs.

The only thing that gives the above any credence is the fact that they haven't found it yet.

Could there be other explainations? Certainly; but the likelihood is low given the (public) information and critical timing (e.g the plane "disapparing" just after a hand-off between two regions in a remote area that had little if any radar coverage, among government regions that are fighting each other more than helping out so as to point the finger elsewhere, etc).

Do I hope the find it? Certainly; but the current information (or rather lack thereof) only makes my hypothesis (sadly) stronger.

Why the Australians?

[nukenerd]

Serious question, why are the Australians taking the lead in this? There were only 6 Australians on board out of 239 people, and waters near (but not all that near) Australia are only one area of many that the plane might have ended up. Most pasengers were Chinese or Malaysians. I'm suprised no-one has come up with a conspiracy theory on this point - there have been some more fantastic ones.

Re:Why the Australians?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because it's in Australia's maritime search zone - see https://www.amsa.gov.au/search-and-rescue/sar-in-australia/arrangements-in-australia/ for more info.

Re:Why the Australians?

[Richard_at_work]

It took 2 years of searching before the black boxes from Air France flight AF447 were found, and during that period there was a massive amount of speculation and doubt about what happened, leading to total uncertainty about how to prevent another crash. Airbus took a beating as everyone assumed it was an aircraft fault which led to the crash.

When they found the black boxes, the real problem turned out to not be a systems fault (although there was a momentary loss of air speed data due to icing, it didn't cause the crash) but a crew training problem so spending the time and money to find and recover them after 2 years has lead to small systems changes but significant pilot training changes.

So while everyone assumes that MH370 crashed due to the pilot committing suicide, there is always that element of doubt because we really don't know what transpired until we have evidence - so what happens if that assumed 0.001% chance of this particular crash being caused by something else, something mechanical or systems related, comes real and it causes another crash?

Re:Why the Australians?

[Charliemopps]

That says why Australia, but a more important question is why at all?

This isn't a search and rescue mission. There's no one to rescue. How long and how much money should be dedicated to finding why 239 people drowned, and how much is there really to be gained from knowing this information in full?

Because if an Australian airline went down in Chinese waters they'd expect China to expend the same amount of effort. In the modern world we don't just let people vanish if we can help it.

Re:Why the Australians?

[Black Parrot]

See also the first entry in this list.

Re:Why the Australians?

[plaukas pyragely]

Maybe they're just being nice?

Re:Why the Australians?

[AikonMGB]

Using your number of 0.001% probability of this crash being something technical, and my estimated value of MH370 of $2.6B, then $26,000. The 777 has a lot of flight hours; if there's a technical problem with it, its a corner-case quirk, not a fundamental design issue. Maybe it doesn't sit well with you, but it is not reasonable to expect 100% safety from any system -- it would be prohibitively expensive.

Re:Why the Australians?

[jittles]

It took 2 years of searching before the black boxes from Air France flight AF447 were found, and during that period there was a massive amount of speculation and doubt about what happened, leading to total uncertainty about how to prevent another crash. Airbus took a beating as everyone assumed it was an aircraft fault which led to the crash.

When they found the black boxes, the real problem turned out to not be a systems fault (although there was a momentary loss of air speed data due to icing, it didn't cause the crash) but a crew training problem so spending the time and money to find and recover them after 2 years has lead to small systems changes but significant pilot training changes.

So while everyone assumes that MH370 crashed due to the pilot committing suicide, there is always that element of doubt because we really don't know what transpired until we have evidence - so what happens if that assumed 0.001% chance of this particular crash being caused by something else, something mechanical or systems related, comes real and it causes another crash?

There is a serious control fault with the Airbus that did result in the crash of AF447. One pilot was nosing the plane up as hard as he could. The other was nosing it down as hard as he could. There was absolutely no feedback from one pilot to the other indicating that they were fighting each other. Instead, the control system took the stronger force and allowed the plane to continue to try and climb and eventually stall and fall from the sky. Was there a huge mistake on the part of the pilots? Absolutely. But you can't deny that there was a critical problem with the controls in the aircraft as well. A problem that so many people try to say doesn't exist.

Re:Why the Australians?

[thegarbz]

And the Airbus crashed in a more known search region in far shallower water. Before we found the black box air travel was the safest form of travel available. After we found the black box nothing changed. Statistically with enough planes in the air eventually one would fall from the sky. Now if every plane from that model starts exhibiting a problem then you damn well want that flight recorder.

But right now, how much money do you want to our into the search for this plane for the potential to find out that there write likely was nothing wrong with it and if there was that it was an isolated incident? Saying we should spend years is foolish. Spending the time looking for the Airbus was equally foolish given the money and effort spent on a disproportionately small improvement in safety.

Re:Why the Australians?

[Richard_at_work]

Actually, no, your description of what happened was completely wrong. Airbus side sticks have a "priority" button, there is no "fighting each other" - if a pilot wants to take over command then all he has to do is press the priority button and he has command authority.

What happened to AF447 had little to do with how the Airbus controls are set out - after all, the exact same thing (pilots stalling the aircraft because they were unsure as to what was happening) has happened on both the 767 and the DC-9, which both have linked control columns.

What really happened to AF447 is that the pilots lost their situational awareness, they didn't carry out the right procedures in the case of an airspeed mismatch, they didn't recognise that they were approaching a stall, and then they disregarded further airspeed warnings after the airspeed issue was resolved - by reacting badly to the initial fault, they stalled the aircraft and didn't realise until far too late.

The right hand seated pilot kept his stick hard back, which is against all of his training - he shouldn't have been trying to raise the nose that much at all, and yet he kept the stick hard back for minutes at a time. It wasn't until the senior pilot, being summoned from the cabin where he was resting, queried the action being taken that the pilot flying stopped his action, but by then they were seconds away from hitting the water.

There is no issue with the Airbus flight controls, despite what many anti-Airbus people say - as I said above, the same issue has happened on non-Airbus aircraft.

Also a side note - at abso-fucking-lutly no time should two pilots be "fighting for control over each other". Should never happen. The designated pilot flying should be the only one on the controls, the designated pilot-non-flying should be doing the instrumentation and only ever have his hands on the controls at the explicit request of the pilot flying. Your "description" of what happened would be a huge failure of training and crew relationships.

Re:Why the Australians?

[Richard_at_work]

The inability for people to read an entire paragraph is simply astounding....

Oh, and the pitot tube icing issue had been highlighted nearly a year before, and Air France aircraft were undergoing staged replacements under an Airworthiness Directive at the time of the AF447 crash.

Re:Why the Australians?

[jrumney]

As always, it was a combination of factors. No one of the factors by itself was the cause of the crash. The absence of any one of the factors would have saved the plane. If the pitot tube was not frozen, then the control systems would not have detected conflicting inputs and reverted to "direct law" (manual override), and the infamous Airbus fly-by-wire autopilot would not have allowed the copilot to stall the plane. If the controls had positive feedback, the pilot would have noticed that the co-pilot was doing the opposite of what he was being instructed to do. If the training for managing such a situation had been better, the co-pilot may have handled the situation calmly and been able to think through what he was doing better.

Re:Why the Australians?

[Cochonou]

Yes, but you should read the investigation report which is publicly available instead of second sources on the internet.
You would see that both the pilot flying (junior) and the pilot non flying (senior) successively had the controls. You would also see that they had the same reaction: pull back on the stick.
The point is at no time, any of the 3 pilots were aware that they were in a stall, despite the stall warning sounding repeatedly. They were just puzzled at what was happening. And one of the main reasons for this is that they were inadequately trained to recognize this situation.
Finally, you would see that the investigation authority made numerous recommendations about pilot training, about the display of the cockpit instruments (behavior of the stall warning, behavior of the flight directors, etc..), and none about the control inputs.

Re:How much have they spent already?

[geogob]

Still no clue whatsoever?

And this is exactly why we should keep searching for the wreckage and find it. Knowing what happened is the key to prevent it from happening again. More than in any other fields, aviation safety is build upon knowledge gained from past incidents and accidents. This is why it is worth investing both the time and the money to understand the events that lead to the crash.

Hey, MH370:

[tux0r]

âoeWhere the bloody hell are ya?!â

Re:How much have they spent already?

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's my problem.

It went into the ocean. Everyone is pretty certain of that. Since it did, it either broke up, or was able to remain intact. Highly unlikely it remained entirely intact, statistically speaking, given what we know about pilots, aircraft, water landings.... So, that means it broke up. Now I imagine most debris would sink. Most! However, there was quite a bit of material on that plane that wouldn't, or shouldn't sink. Ever! I realize the ocean is big, and search efforts are rather small comparively, but I have a hard time believing we haven't found a single shred of debris from the plane. Maybe it's just a matter of time, but to me, the most disconcerting things is that we've found no trace of it, at all! Nothing!

Re:How much have they spent already?

[AikonMGB]

You are of course correct for the initial search, but at some point you hit diminishing returns. Even if the failure were a technical one, the value of locating the wreck and determining the cause is likely of limited value. There are only so many systems that can fail, and we already do thorough failure modes analyses when designing aircraft. That's why flying is so safe these days.

The 777 has a pretty good track record with 1,212 units built and five hull losses, only two of which were due to failure of flight systems. If the hull cost $261.5M and you estimate the value of a human life $10M, then the MH370 incident had a base cost of around $2.6B. If you only had one failure out of 1,212 hulls, that suggests you'd be willing to spend 0.08% or ~$2.1M to make sure it doesn't happen again.

This is just one formulation of the cost/benefit and of course excludes some important factors like the public relations cost to MA and airlines in general, but hopefully it illustrates that there's a bound on how much we should reasonably be expected to invest in understanding the events of the incident, and that it is not an absurdly high value.

Re:How much have they spent already?

[Cinnamon Beige]

You are of course correct for the initial search, but at some point you hit diminishing returns. Even if the failure were a technical one, the value of locating the wreck and determining the cause is likely of limited value. There are only so many systems that can fail, and we already do thorough failure modes analyses when designing aircraft. That's why flying is so safe these days.

You forget to factor in that sometimes the point of the search will (has, likely, already) become more than anything else a way to improve and prove the techniques used to search, and hopefully they're keeping good records.

There will, I assure you, be scientists waiting patiently to mine the data for things useful to their own research, that they would have been unable to justify the costs of doing themselves. It's like basic research that way.

Re:How much have they spent already?

[Deadstick]

Yes, pieces of debris should start washing up on beaches, but it can take a while. The first of the "lost rubber duckies" of 1992 took ten months to be found, and finds continued for at least fifteen years: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F...

Also, the floating debris won't include a lot of specifically airplane material. It will be seat cushions, clothing, plastic bottles...and the sea is already full of floating crap, so an object isn't certain to be recognized even if it appears on Waikiki Beach.

Re:How much have they spent already?

[mikael]

The first things we'd expect to find or see from satellite photographs are bits of wing and tail. The shock of a crash-landing would fracture them off. Then if the fuel tanks were ruptured, those would create oil slicks even if they were underwater. Live vests and seat cushions should also float, as well as bits of trimming from the passenger cabin. Then all sorts of passenger belongings should also float.

So the chances are the pilot aimed for a controlled landing in the ocean. There were witnesses who claimed to see a burning aircraft (from an oil-ring), and another who said they saw an aircraft flying low towards Garcia Diego.