Malaysia probe to feature experts from around world
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A CHINESE patrol ship hunting for the missing Malaysia Airlines jetliner detected a pulse signal in the south Indian Ocean yesterday, state news agency Xinhua reported, in a possible indicator of the underwater beacon from a plane’s “black box.”
A black box detector deployed by the vessel Haixun 01 picked up the “ping” signal at around 25 degrees south latitude and 101 degrees east longitude, Xinhua said. It has not been established whether the ping is related to Flight MH370.
A reporter with state broadcaster CCTV, quoting a crew member on the Haixun, said four pings were detected over the course of 15 minutes.
The signal picked up by the detector had a frequency of 37.5kHz per second, identical to the beacon signal emitted by flight recorders.
This came nearly a month after the Malaysian jetliner disappeared en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.
Australian and British vessels are currently involved in a round-the-clock underwater search in the southern Indian Ocean, hoping to pick up a signal from the plane’s black box recorder, but the battery powering those emissions is nearing the end of its roughly 30-day life span.
“Suspected pulse signal picked up by Haixun 01 has not been identified yet,” the China Maritime Search and Rescue Center said on a verified microblog last night.
Australian Defence Minister David Johnston said he had not received a report on the signal and warned that it may not be from the plane.
“This is not the first time we have had something that has turned out to be very disappointing,” he told ABC television.
“I’m just going to wait for (Joint Agency Coordination Centre chief) Angus (Houston) and the team ... to come forward with something positive because this is a very, very difficult task.”
Xinhua also said a Chinese military plane spotted a number of white floating objects in the search area.
Malaysia said yesterday it had launched an investigation into the March 8 disappearance of MH370 that would comprise experts from around the world, while the huge hunt for the Boeing 777 airliner intensified in the Indian Ocean.
Authorities have not ruled out mechanical problems as a cause but say the evidence, including the loss of communications, suggests Flight MH370 was deliberately diverted thousands of kilometers from its scheduled route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
Up to 10 military planes, three civilian aircraft and 11 ships are scouring a 217,000-sq-km area of ocean some 1,700 km northwest of Perth, Australia near where investigators believe MH370 went down a month ago.
Defence and acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein told a news conference that Australia, China, the United States, the United Kingdom and France had agreed to send representatives to take part in the investigation.
The extensive search and rescue operation has so far included assets from around 26 countries.
Under International Civil Aviation Organization regulations, the country where the aircraft is registered leads the investigation when the incident takes place in international waters.
A spokesman from the UN agency said that it received official notification of the accident on 28 March, meaning that the investigation was considered officially launched on that date.
Hishammuddin said that the investigation would be made up of three groups: An “airworthiness” group would examine maintenance records, structures and systems; an “operations” group would study flight recorders, operations and meteorology; and a “medical and human factors” group would look into psychology, pathology and survival factors. The Malaysian government has also set up ministerial committees to oversee everything pertaining to the next of kin of the 239 passengers and crew on board the aircraft, the appointment of the investigation team and the deployment of assets in the search operation.
Searchers yesterday launched the most intensive hunt yet in the southern Indian Ocean, trying to find the plane’s black box recorders before their batteries run out.
This came on the same day as China’s Xinhua news agency said that a Chinese vessel taking part in the search had reported that an underwater sensor had picked up a “pulse signal,” raising hopes that it could be the black box.
The black box is equipped with a locator beacon that transmits “pings” when underwater, but its batteries may only last 30 days.
Dozens of flights by a multinational taskforce have failed to turn up any trace of the plane.
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