— The
Malaysian government said Sunday
that it would step up efforts to
search the southern Indian Ocean
for Malaysia Airlines’ missing
Flight 370, in the latest indication
that a broad international effort to
find the plane will continue for
many months.
The Malaysian defense minister,
Hishammuddin Hussein,
announced at the opening here of a
photo exhibition dedicated to the
missing plane that Malaysia would
send one of its navy vessels with
deep-sea survey equipment as well
as two commercial vessels with
towed, sonar-equipped
submersibles.
Malaysia will also keep another
naval vessel in the southern Indian
Ocean, the Bunga Mas 6, which has
been providing logistical support to
other ships involved in the search.
“The search will not stop until we
find it,” Mr. Hishammuddin said.
The missing aircraft, a Boeing
777-200, disappeared on March 8
with 239 people aboard during
what was supposed to be a flight
from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Six
groups separately analyzing
satellite signals from the aircraft all
concluded that it had mysteriously
turned south after passing the
northern tip of the Indonesian
island of Sumatra, and then had
run out of fuel over the southern
Indian Ocean and crashed.
Australia already has a deep-sea
survey ship there that it chartered
to map the ocean floor in the area,
the Fugro Equator, which is
designed to withstand the towering
waves and powerful storms that
sometimes move through the area,
1,000 miles west of Perth. China
has also sent a deep-sea survey
vessel, the Zhu Kezhen, although
Angus Houston, the Australian
official overseeing the search, said
in a telephone interview last
month that the Chinese vessel was
less specialized for working in
heavy seas.
Australia stopped accepting bids
last week for a 60 million
Australian dollar, or $56 million,
contract for up to three towed
submersibles to spend as long as a
year scanning the ocean floor with
sonar for debris from the plane.
The Australian Transport Safety
Bureau has not yet chosen a
winner for the contract.
Deep-sea submersibles are more
reliable if they are towed fairly
close to the ocean floor —
sometimes as little as 100 feet from
the bottom. But the submersibles
can be wrecked if towed into a cliff
or other seafloor feature. So the
first step has been to map the
seafloor in considerable detail for
possible obstructions in the
planned paths of the submersibles.
Martin Dolan, the chief
commissioner of the bureau, said
in an email reply to questions that
Malaysia’s announcement on
Sunday was in addition to
Australia’s previously disclosed
plans.
“This is a Malaysian contribution
to the Australian-led search effort
and will be integrated with the
capability we are acquiring through
our tender process,” he said

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