[Peetwo]

Captain's Log 01.11.16: ATSB with cap in hand?

Via ABC PM radio program:

Plans to extend hunt for MH370, at potential cost of $30 million
        
 
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Just when it seemed the search for missing Malaysia MH370 was drawing to a frustrating close with no result, PM can reveal that a plan is taking shape to extend the hunt.

The focus may shift north, to an area around the 34th parallel.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau reckons it needs another $30 million to mount the search.

It'll host a three day 'back to first principles' meeting of experts in Canberra from tomorrow.

The aim is to shape a proposal for the Transport Minister to take to his Malaysian and Chinese counterparts.

Today, Malaysia Airlines also agreed to give lawyers for the victims access to a huge cache of potentially sensational company records - so far released only to the still secret Malaysian police report.

It includes maintenance log books of the Boeing 777, and medical and personnel records of the captain and co-pilot.

Update 02/11/16: Courtesy ATSB

[ Download PDF: 2.68MB]
 
MH370 – Search and debris examination update
Published: 2 November 2016

Executive summary

This report provides an update to the MH370 search area definition described in previous ATSB reports. It comprises further analysis of satellite data, additional end of flight simulations, a summary of the analysis of the right outboard wing flap, and preliminary results from the enhanced debris drift modelling.

For background information, please refer to the ATSB publications available online at www.atsb.gov.au/mh370:

• Definition of underwater search areas, 18 August 2014
  
• Flight Path Analysis Update, 8 October 2014
  
• Definition of Underwater Search Area Update, 3 December 2015.
  

The Australian Defence Science and Technology (DST) Group[1] conducted a comprehensive analysis of the Inmarsat satellite communications (SATCOM) data and a model of aircraft dynamics. The output of the DST Group analysis was a probability density function (PDF) defining the probable location of the aircraft’s crossing of the 7th arc.

Details of this analysis and the validation experiments are available in the open source published book here: http://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-10-0379-0.

Additional analysis of the burst frequency offsets associated with the final satellite communications to and from the aircraft is consistent with the aircraft being in a high and increasing rate of descent at that time. Additionally, the wing flap debris analysis reduced the likelihood of end-of-flight scenarios involving flap deployment.

Preliminary results of the CSIRO’s drift analysis indicated it was unlikely that debris originated from south of the current search area. The northernmost simulated regions were also found to be less likely. Drift analysis work is ongoing and is expected to refine these results.

 
Further update: Via the Oz

MH370 ’not landing, ditching’
BRENDAN NICHOLSON
Examination of wreckage from the missing MH370 jet indicates that its flaps were in a “cruise” position.

Examination of wreckage from the missing Malaysia Airlines jet MH370 indicates that its flaps were in a “cruise” position and not lowered for a controlled landing when it hit the ocean 2600km off the coast of WA.

MH370 and its 239 passengers and crew vanished on March 8 soon after taking off from Kuala Lumpur on a flight to Beijing.

The latest report by the Australian Transport Safety Bureau includes the results of an examination of a wing flap believed to have been torn from the jet as it hit the ocean surface.

It says the flap is unlikely to have been deployed for landing as it would have been had there been a pilot at the controls.

The flap appears to have drifted for over a year and eventually washed up on the coast of Tanzania in East Africa.

It was part of the right wing positioned next to another control surface known as a “flaperon” which washed up on Reunion Island.

The report also includes detailed analysis by local and international aviation and communications specialists of the last brief signals received from the aircraft which support the view that it fell very fast after it ran out of fuel and that it is likely to have hit the water within the area being searched.

The report says the signals data indicated that the aircraft was “in a high and increasing rate of decent at that time”.

Transport Minister Darren Chester said the search of 120,000 square km of sea floor, up to 6km deep in places, is likely to end early next year.

There is still 10,000 square kms of sea floor to be searched.

Mr Chester described the search as both “historic” and “heroic” and said it was hampered at times by very rough weather with waves seven to nine metres high.

He said the report contained important new information about what was believed to have happened at the end of MH370’s flight.

The members of an international advisory team of aviation and communications specialists are in Canberra to carry out a “first principles review” all of the evidence accumulated to identify the likely search area.

“The First Principles Review Summit brings together the extraordinary team of Australian and international experts, who have been involved in the search for MH370, to review all the available data and analysis associated with the search to date,” Mr Chester said.

“The experts will also inform the remainder of the search effort, and develop guidance for any future search operations.”

The latest report also details sophisticated drift analysis carried out by the CSIRO to narrow down the area from where about 20 pieces of likely MH370 wreckage were carried by ocean currents.

MTF...P2