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Bar the shouting, OI MH370 search is all over - 

Via the ABC/Reuter news:

Malaysia Airlines flight MH370: The latest search for missing plane is over. So what happens now?

By Peter Marsh, wires Updated earlier today at 6:18am


Photo
The families of passengers aboard Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 are still waiting for answers.

Reuters: Kim Kyung-Hoon

The latest search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 ends today.

Last week the Malaysian Government announced there would be no extensions to a search by US-based Ocean Infinity that hoped to find the plane by the end of June.

There was a pay day up to $93 million on offer if Ocean Infinity was able to find the plane within 90-days.

So, what now?
Is all hope of finding MH370 lost?
The underwater search is ending … for now

The current search by Ocean Infinity is ending for a couple of reasons:

• The decision by the Malaysian Government to end the search (more on this later)
  
• Ocean Infinity finished scouring its targeted search area in April
  

The Malaysian Government's new Transport Minister Anthony Loke Siew Fook said Ocean Infinity had requested an extension to the 90-day search until today.

But he confirmed there would be no more extensions after that.

But this is a long way from being over
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Photo Blaine Gibson has spent much of his spare time searching for debris which has helped investigators.
Facebook: Blaine Gibson

Blaine Gibson is a self-styled wreck hunter who has found about 15 pieces of wreckage confirmed or deemed likely to have come from MH370.

He said now was the time to hold off on offshore searches and re-assess what data we do have.

"Where we go next is exactly what the Prime Minister of Malaysia said. We're going to look at everything. We're going to look and see if there are any documents that can explain it.

They'll look to see if someone knows something and they talk. And they go over all of the data," Mr Gibson said.

If new analysis turns up a new avenue of investigation, Mr Gibson believes a new search could begin as early as October this year.

The political situation in Malaysia is tricky

And it has real ramifications for where the search for MH370 heads next.

The country is adjusting to life after recent elections saw opposition parties, led by 92-year-old Mahathir Mohamad, take power for the first time in six decades.

Dr Mahathir's administration is pushing to rein in government spending, and he's said many of the figures regarding Malaysia's financial position may be false.

He had previously said the agreement with Ocean Infinity was up for review as part of that push despite the fact it was a "no cure, no fee" search.

But in the not-too-distant future, Dr Mahathir plans to step down and hand power over to Anwar Ibrahim, the opposition leader who has been released from prison and pardoned.
While the underwater search is stopped for the moment, Mr Anwar told The Weekend Australian there was "further digging" to be done.

"I am not ruling out further searches in the future depending on what these domestic investigations bring up," he said.

The investigation will concentrate on things other than finding the plane
According to Mr Gibson, at least.

"Since we have not yet found it in the underwater search, it's now time to go back and focus on what we can," he said.

"And that's the surface debris, actual pieces of the plane. Any documents that the Prime Minister (of Malaysia) was talking about that they may be able to find. Anyone who's ready to talk who didn't before … do a thorough investigation of all of that."

Mr Gibson believes the next stage should focus heavily on the confirmed pieces of debris from MH370.

"I'm sure that there's a lot more debris out there that is either buried in sand, floating around or maybe some kids picked it up. Probably just sitting around some village in Madagascar," he said.

Mr Gibson has found personal items on the beaches of Madagascar, Mozambique and Mauritius.



Photo A camera case possibly from MH370, found on Riake Beach, Madagascar
Aircrash Support Group Australia : Blaine Gibson

While none have been confirmed as being from MH370, he said the fact that some match pictures from CCTV video of passengers getting on the plane means there is room for further investigation.

He turned over the items, which included bags, shoes and pieces of clothing, to Malaysian authorities.

"They've never published a report and we need to see that report and I hope that the new government will ensure that happens and take a really close look at those personal effects and see if any are from the plane," Mr Gibson said.

"If any one of those is from the plane that would move the crash site much closer to where they washed ashore."

Malaysia's Transport Minister Mr Loke said a full report into the investigation of MH370's disappearance would be released once the offshore search ends, but has not given a date for that to happen.

GIF: MH370's known flight path, the search area, and where debris has washed up

Groups representing relatives of those on board say that's a good thing

Voice 370 called on the new government to review all matters related to MH370.

"We urge the new government to include as part of its agenda in the next 100 days … a further investigation and inquiry into any act or omission across the entire spectrum of operations that may have impaired tracking, search, rescue and recovery," a statement released by the group said.

Ganesan Nethi, a lawyer who had represented the families of victims from MH370, said the approach the new Malaysian Government was taking was a "heartening and refreshing change".

MH370 search will end next week, with no more extensions

There are still a couple of longshot chances

A new scientific project launched last week aims to map the ocean floor by 2030.
Satinder Bindra, director of the $3 billion Seabed 2030 project, said analysis of data from underwater drones, merchant ships amd fishing boats would shed light on everything from tsunami wave patterns to a possible location of MH370.

And Mr Gibson said there didn't need to be an official government search for the hunt to continue.

"There's nothing to prevent anyone with a ship and some money from going out there and looking for it. There is still hope," he said.

"It's not acceptable to just leave this as a mystery. We need to find out."

ABC/Reuters

And via the CBC daily newsletter:

Malaysia Airlines MH370 search halted, government to make 'full and final' report public
Newsletter: A closer look at the day's most notable stories


Jonathon Gatehouse · CBC News · Posted: May 28, 2018 2:06 PM ET | Last Updated: May 29


A girl gets her face painted in Kuala Lumpur during the annual remembrance event for the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 on March 3. The government is officially halting the search for the missing plane and those who were aboard. (Lai Seng Sin/Reuters)
Welcome to The National Today newsletter, which takes a closer look at what's happening around some of the day's most notable stories. [url=http://subscriptions.cbc.ca/forms/thenationaltoday]Sign up here and it will be delivered directly to your inbox Monday to Friday.

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TODAY:[/size]

• Four-year, $200-million search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 will end tomorrow, government promises to make "full and final" report public
  
• New Zealand to cull 150,000 cows to try and stop the spread of an invasive bacteria
  
• Missed The National last night? Watch it here
  

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Search for flight MH370 ends

After four years and hundreds of millions of dollars, the search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 comes to an official end tomorrow, with more theories than answers about what befell its 239 passengers and crew.

The Boeing 777-200 disappeared from radar screens during trip from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Beijing on March 8, 2014. It is believed to have crashed somewhere in the vast expanse of the Indian Ocean after running out of fuel.



A man takes pictures of a flight information board still displaying the overdue arrival of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 (top, in red) at the Beijing Capital International Airport in Beijing on March 8, 2014. (Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters)An initial three-year search by Malaysian, Chinese and Australian authorities failed to find any trace of the plane, despite scouring 710,000 square kilometres of ocean floor and surface.

A new effort covering an additional 90,000 square kilometres, led by American underwater exploration company Ocean Infinity Ltd., has also come up bust.

Last week, Anthony Loke, Malaysia's transport minister, said he was unwilling to grant the firm another extension, even though the search is being performed on a "no-find, no-fee" basis.

Speaking with the media in Kuala Lumpur today, Loke pledged to make a "full and final" report on the international probe into the crash available to the public.

"It will be released to the public without any prejudice, in a transparent manner. This includes even if there are any controversial elements in it," Loke said.

The only hard clues to the fate of MH370 have come from three dozen bits of wreckage — including a flaperon and a damaged Chinese suitcase — that washed up on the beaches of Réunion Island and Mozambique, thousands of kilometres from the plane's likely crash site.



Officers recover pieces of debris later confirmed to be from flight MH370, which had washed ashore on Saint-Andre de la Reunion island on July 29, 2015. (Raymond Wae Tion/EPA)Earlier this month, Larry Vance, a Canadian aviation expert and former crash investigator, made international headlines with his new book MH370 Mystery Solved, which claims that the plane was "intentionally ditched" by its pilot, Zaharie Ahmad Shah, in an alleged act of murder-suicide.

But the Australian investigators who have led the four-year, $200 million hunt for the plane have dismissed Vance's conclusion. They noted that the flap found off the coast of Tanzania in 2015 was not in a deployed position, suggesting the plane hit the ocean at speed.

The Australian Transportation Board's investigation concluded that Shah and his co-pilot were probably unconscious at the time of the crash, perhaps victims of a sudden cabin depressurization.



Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 pilots Zaharie Ahmad Shah, right, and Fariq Abdul Hamid. (facebook)There have, however, been suggestions that Shah was experiencing marital difficulties and had researched a "suicide route" out over the Indian Ocean on a home flight simulator.

This week, Sakinab Shah, the pilot's sister, dismissed the murder-suicide speculation as "preposterous," telling an Australian newspaper that he was a man who "loved life, loved fun."

The sister admitted that things were not always perfect between Shah and his wife, but maintained that the situation was far from irreparable. "He was naughty, I admit that," she said. "But at the end of the day he always went home. He took care of his wife. They were high-school sweethearts."



Ocean Infinity's search vessel, Seabed Constructor, deployed underwater robots with sensitive sonar technology as part of its mission to locate MH370. It has been searching for the missing 777 airliner under a 'no-find, no-fee' arrangement with the Malaysian government. (Ocean Infinity)Blaine Gibson, an American blogger and wreck hunter who found a number of pieces of the plane's wreckage, remains a fierce critic of the formal search and recovery efforts. The Malaysian government would have been better off offering a reward for the drifting pieces of the plane than scouring the ocean floor for what might have sunk, he says.

"This should have been done a long time ago," Gibson told the Western Australian newspaper. "There is so much more out there, and pieces I have handed in to local authorities have not been collected by the Malaysians. A reward would galvanize many villagers to collect pieces that are just lying on beaches. Some of these could be critical to the investigation."

The extensive and expensive ocean-floor mapping during the hunt for MH370 did discover two other wrecks, however — ships that went missing in the 19th century. Both merchant vessels had been transporting coal when they sank 2,300 kilometres off the coast of Australia.


A map of the major search areas for flight MH370. (CBC)

http://www.cbc.ca/news/thenational/natio...-1.4675883
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And finally from the New York Times:

A Search for MH370, Missing Since 2014, Ends ‘With a Heavy Heart’


The Seabed Constructor, a ship operated by Ocean Infinity, set out in January for the search of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.CreditOcean Infinity, via EPA

By Megan Specia

• May 29, 2018
  
  The latest search for MH370 — the Malaysia Airlines plane that disappeared four years ago en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people onboard — has ended in failure, the company behind the search said on Tuesday.
  
  The company, Ocean Infinity of Houston, which scoured the seabed for any sign of wreckage with support from the Malaysian government, announced that the search was winding down with no evidence of the plane’s whereabouts.
  
  
  “Part of our motivation for renewing the search was to try to provide some answers to those affected,” Oliver Plunkett, Ocean Infinity’s chief executive, said in a statement. “It is therefore with a heavy heart that we end our current search without having achieved that aim.”
  
  He did not rule out a future resumed hunt.
  
  The plane, a Boeing 777 operated by Malaysia Airlines, deviated from its planned route north on March 8, 2014, for reasons that are still unknown. After traveling south over the Indian Ocean, the plane is believed to have flown for about five hours before probably running out of fuel and disappearing.
  
  Debris that may have come from the plane has washed up in Madagascar, Réunion Island and Tanzania.
  
  The governments of Australia, Malaysia and China suspended the official search after scrutinizing about 46,000 square miles of the Indian Ocean floor at a cost of more than $150 million. Officials then concluded that the probable crash site was farther north.
  
  The Malaysian government began the latest search in partnership with Ocean Infinity after pressure from families of the missing.
  
  Ocean Infinity agreed to participate as part of what the Malaysian government called a “no cure, no fee” agreement, under which the company could have received up to $70 million if it found the wreckage or data recorders, and nothing if it did not. The Seabed Constructor, a ship operated by the company, set out in January to being searching.
  
  In a little over three months of searching, the investigation covered almost the same-sized area as the previous search had completed in two and a half years, Ocean Infinity said in its statement.
  But the investigators came no closer to finding the plane.
  
  Mr. Plunkett thanked Seabed Constructor crew members “who have worked tirelessly,” and called the Australian Transport Safety Bureau’s dedication to find the plane “unwavering.”
  
  “We sincerely hope that we will be able to again offer our services in the search for MH370 in future,” he said.
  

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/29/world...&smtyp=cur