There will be a third search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370

With permission of Amelia Earhart and the Bermuda triangle, what happened with Malaysia Airlines flight MH 370 on March 8, 2014 constitutes one of the greatest mysteries of modern commercial aviation: It seems that he disappeared from the face of the Earth without a trace*. 12 years later, we still have not found an explanation for his disappearance and it is not the first time we have tried: in fact, the third search mission has just been reactivated.

We are going to D-Day, H-Time. A Boeing 777-200ER with 239 people on board (227 passengers and 12 crew) left from Kuala Lumpur International Airport at 12:41 am to Beijing International Airport, with an expected landing time at 6:30 local time. It never reached its destination. At 1:19 a.m. Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah he said goodbye from the Malaysian controllers with a “Good night Malaysian three seven zero”. It was the last time they contacted.

A few minutes later and according to the radar record collected in the final report According to the Malaysian Ministry of Transport, the aircraft’s secondary radar went out at 01:21 over the South China Sea. Likewise, it registered a turn towards the west as if it were returning towards Malaysia, passing near the island of Penang and continuing towards the Strait of Malacca.

Although it had its communication systems turned off, it continued to send a satellite signal that was key to following its subsequent trajectory. Using a methodology based on Doppler effectthe scientific team of the British satellite company Inmarsat determined that the ship was moving away from the satellite towards the south.

He final report of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) confirms these facts, concluding that the combination of radars and mathematical data from satellite signals allowed us to conclude that the plane allegedly flew for just over six hours until its fuel was exhausted. in a remote area of ​​the southern Indian Ocean.

In the following hours, the news broke. At that time, the CEO of Malaysia Airlines, Ahmad Juahari Yahya, explained that there were no indications that the pilots sent a distress signal and their willingness to collaborate with the authorities in the search, since no remains had been sighted, as USA Today collected.

A missing plane, a huge area to explore and many unknowns

Shortly after, the airline updated its statement reiterating that it had not “established any contact or determined the whereabouts of flight MH370.” Malaysia’s Transport Minister at the time, Hishammuddin Hussein, explained that although there was no reason to suspect terrorism, all possibilities were being studied. Days later, the country’s prime minister, Najib Razak, declared that it was clear that the radars and flight data transmission system were deliberately turned off by someone trying to conceal the position and heading of the plane.

The first search operation was international in nature, although it was led by the Australian ATSB and extended from 2014 to 2017, in which it was classified at the time as the most expensive search in aviation historywith an approximate investment of at least 44 million dollars by Australia, China, the United States and Vietnam, Reuters estimated.

This operation included the deployment of military ships and aircraft in an area of ​​120,000 square kilometers in the Indian Ocean and South China Sea defined by the analysis of Inmarsat satellite data and called “Seventh Arc”. After almost three years of tracking with high-resolution sonar, the search was officially suspended in January 2017. without finding remains of the fuselage. The conclusions of the report detailed that it was not possible to determine with certainty the cause of the disappearance and that this change of course: “It cannot be explained by a known technical failure or by adverse weather conditions”, pointing to a “probably intentional” route modification.

Which yes it has been found over time they have been more than 30 fragments identified as belonging to MH370such as parts of the wing, tail, cabin or engine in places as diverse as the coasts of East Africa and various islands such as Réunion, Mauritius or Madagascar. No human remains have been found, but it is assumed that all the people who traveled on the flight died.

In fact, the first piece of the aircraft was identified by French experts on a beach on Reunion Island a year after the disappearance. More specifically, it was the flaperon, a mobile part with a wingspan of almost three meters placed on the trailing edge of the wing that is used to increase aerodynamic resistance.

In 2018 the first Ocean Infinity missiona private robotics company specialized in the study of seabeds. In his history, helped locate the Endurance of the legendary explorer Ernest Shackleton in 2022 providing specialized personnel and underwater robots. On the table, initially an area considered a priority of 25,000 square kilometers located to the north of the previously explored area taking into account the new drift analyzes of the remains found on African beaches.

Finally, 112,000 square kilometers were covered in just over three months thanks to a fleet of eight autonomous underwater vehicles, faster than the vehicles used in the initial search. It was not enough: in June 2018 he ended his mission with disappointing results, as its CEO explained.

After a few years in standbyin Malaysian government has authorized a new search mission to an old acquaintance: Ocean Infinity, which got to work on December 30, 2025 after accepting the order in modality no find, no fee aka, what If they don’t find anything, they won’t be paid.. If you do so, the maximum reward will be 70 million dollars, about 60 million euros, according to El País. It is not much for the cost of the operation, but it would be the definitive boost to consolidate Ocean Infinity as the best underwater search company in the world.

Little has emerged about the operation, beyond the fact that it will last 55 effective days in a much smaller and more precise region of the Indian Ocean, of “only” 15,000 square kilometers. This region has been delimited considering new analyzes of radio signals that use technology WSPR. For the mission they will use the Armada 86 ship and a fleet of Hugin 6000 autonomous underwater robots with multibeam sonar, HD cameras and laser scanning to create 3D maps of the seabed up to 6,000 meters deep.

Recovering information from the black boxes is viable as long as they are not damaged, but they no longer have the battery to emit an acoustic signal (it barely lasts 30 days), so all that remains is to visually track the ocean floor. Of course, the Indian Ocean is an ocean rich in deep canyons, active volcanic areas and irregular walls thousands of meters deep that will make the mission difficult even if the area is correct.

Third time lucky? Almost 12 years later, what happened to flight MH370 remains a mystery: neither the ship has been recovered nor is there reliable evidence that allows the reconstruction of the events. The passengers and crew were exonerated as no evidence was found that implicated them, although the possibility of “unlawful interference” has not been ruled out. With this latest attempt, the government of the Asian country showed its commitment to “providing closure to the families affected by this tragedy” in the face of a sensitive issue that has given rise to all kinds of hypotheseslike a CIA or North Korean kidnapping.

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Cover | Saim Munib

Photo of Samuel T. in Unsplash