If confirmed, underwater signal is 5th picked up during Indian Ocean hunt for jet
The Associated Press Posted: Apr 10, 2014 1:11 AM ET Last Updated: Apr 10, 2014 11:15 AM ET
No needle, but we found the haystack 2:01
An Australian aircraft Thursday detected what may be the fifth signal coming from a man-made device deep in the Indian Ocean, adding to hopes that searchers will soon pinpoint the object's location and send down a robotic vehicle to confirm if it is a black box from the missing Malaysian jet.
The Australian air force P-3 Orion, which has been dropping sound-locating buoys into the water near where the original sounds were heard, picked up a "possible signal" that may be from a man-made source, said Angus Houston, who is coordinating the search off Australia's west coast.
"The acoustic data will require further analysis overnight," Houston said in a statement.
If confirmed, the signal would further narrow the hunt for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, which vanished on March 8 while flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people aboard.
The Australian ship Ocean Shield picked up two underwater sounds on Tuesday, and two sounds it detected Saturday were determined to be consistent with the pings emitted from a plane's flight recorders, or "black boxes."
The Australian air force has been dropping sonar buoys to maximize the sound-detectors operating in a search zone that is now the size of the city of Los Angeles.
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Royal Australian Navy Commodore Peter Leavy said each buoy is dangling a hydrophone listening device about 300 metres below the surface. The hope, he said, is that the buoys will help better pinpoint the signals, along with the Ocean Shield, which is slowly dragging a U.S. navy pinger locator through the water.
The underwater search zone is currently a 1,300 square kilometre patch of the ocean floor, and narrowing the area as small as possible is crucial before an unmanned submarine can be sent to create a sonar map of a potential debris field on the seabed.
The Bluefin 21 sub takes six times longer to cover the same area as the pinger locator, and it would take the vehicle about six weeks to two months to canvass the underwater search zone, which is about the size of Los Angeles. That's why the acoustic equipment is still being used to hone in on a more precise location, U.S. Navy Capt. Mark Matthews said.
The search for floating debris on the ocean surface was narrowed Thursday to its smallest size yet — 57,900 square kilometres, or about one-quarter the size it was a few days ago. Fourteen planes and 13 ships were looking for floating debris, about 2,300 kilometres northwest of Perth.
MH370 search map (CBC News)
Crews hunting for debris on the surface have already looked in the area they were crisscrossing on Thursday, but were moving in tighter patterns, now that the search zone has been narrowed to about a quarter the size it was a few days ago, Houston said.
Houston has expressed optimism about the sounds detected earlier in the week, saying on Wednesday that he was hopeful crews would find the aircraft — or what's left of it — in the "not-too-distant future."
Separately, a Malaysian government official said Thursday evening that investigators have concluded the pilot spoke the last words to air traffic control, "Good night, Malaysian three-seven-zero," and that his voice had no signs of duress. A re-examination of the last communication from the cockpit was initiated after authorities last week reversed their initial statement that the co-pilot was speaking different words.
The senior government official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to the media. The conclusion was first reported by CNN.
Investigators suspect the plane went down in the southern Indian Ocean based on a flight path calculated from its contacts with a satellite and analysis of its speed and fuel capacity, but the content of the flight data and cockpit voice recorders is essential to solving the mysteries of why the plane was lost.
The search for the black boxes is increasingly urgent because their locator beacons have batteries that last about a month and may fail soon.
An Australian government briefing document circulated among international agencies involved in the search on Thursday said it was likely that the acoustic pingers would continue to transmit at decreasing strength for up to 10 more days, depending on conditions.
Once there is no hope left of the Ocean Shield's equipment picking up any more sounds, the Bluefin sub will be deployed.
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