mh370.radiantphysics.comMH370 and Other Investigations

Following the Data towards Discovery Search Site Go Home About Me Papers Radiant Physics Inc. Ocean Infinity Proposes New Search for MH370 by Victor Iannello Posted: Tuesday, 3/5/2024 On Sunday, MH370 family member V.P.R. Nathan presented several slides highlighting Ocean Infinity’s willingness to conduct another subsea search for the debris field of the aircraft. The search area, which may be refined later, extends along the 7th arc from about 33°S to 36°S, and out to about 45 NM (83 km) on either side of the arc. Ocean Infinity also plans to fill-in” areas that were previously searched that had low quality or missing data due to equipment failures or challenging terrain. The proposal is broadly consistent with the flight reconstruction and recommended search area that we presented in UGIB 2020 and the subsequent drift study . In fact, the Last Estimated Position” (LEP) presented in those studies is designated the IG Hotspot” in the slide. The proposed search area will also incorporate our high priority area due south of the LEP that was missed by the previous searches by the ATSB and Ocean Infinity due to the steeply sloping terrain in that area. So, will Malaysia accept Ocean Infinity’s offer to conduct another search with the proposed terms of no-find, no-fee”? At Sunday’s event, Transport Minister Anthony Loke expressed an interest in discussing the new proposal with Ocean Infinity. However, both he and Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim cautioned that a new search would be conducted only if there was credible new evidence”. So, although we may be seeing progress towards a new search, it is unclear whether or not Malaysia will accept Ocean Infinity’s proposal. Posted in Aviation | 408 Comments » Man-Made Objects Detected on Seabed Are Possibly from MH370 – Updated by Victor Iannello Posted: Thursday, 11/2/2023 A shipwreck found during the subsea search for MH370 The total subsea search for MH370 comprised more than 240,000 km 2 of seabed in the Southern Indian Ocean (SIO) along the 7th arc, which is derived from the metadata from the last transmission from MH370’s SATCOM terminal. The search of the first 120,000 km 2 was managed by the Australian Transport and Safety Bureau (ATSB), and included the areas that Australia’s Defense Science and Technology Group (DSTG) deemed most likely as the Point of Impact (POI). The ATSB’s subsea search along the 7th arc extended in latitude from 39.4 S to 32.8 S, varying in width from 130 km at the southern end of the search area to 40 km at the northern end. An additional 120,000 square kilometers of seabed was scanned by Ocean Infinity (OI) using a fleet of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs). OI extended the length and width of the ATSB’s search so that a full 110 km width was scanned along the 7th arc north to a latitude 31.5 S. The search area was then narrowed to a width of 84 km and extended north along the 7th arc to a latitude of 24.8 S. Despite this unprecedented large search in the area deemed most likely to find the debris field, the search was unsuccessful. So why wasn’t MH370’s debris field identified? There are only three realistic possibilities: The aircraft was manually piloted after fuel exhaustion and glided beyond the area that was previous searched. Although the final BFO values suggest an increasingly high rate of descent that would certainly have resulted in an impact within kilometers of the 7th arc if there had been no further pilot inputs, there is a possibility that the pilot arrested the steep descent and transitioned into a long, efficient glide. The point of impact (POI) occurred along the 7th arc further south than 39.4 S or further north than 24.8 S. For instance, although the statistical match to the satellite and drift model data is not as strong, Ed Anderson has discovered an acoustical event along the 7th arc at 8.4 S that he believes is related to MH370. Meanwhile, Paul Smithson believes an impact further south than 39.4 S is within the uncertainty limits of the fuel consumption and drift models, and should not be excluded. The debris field lies on the seabed within the area already searched, but was not identified due to challenging terrain, low quality data, or equipment issues. Here we address the third possibility. In particular, we again consider whether the debris field might be located in the high probability search area previously identified , which is in proximity of the last estimated position (LEP) calculated in the UGIB 2020 study . We further consider whether parts of MH370 were detected but were never fully investigated because they were not part of a larger debris field. In the figure below, the two inner yellow lines show the approximate limits of the area searched by the vessel GO Phoenix (under contract with the ATSB), and the outer lines show the limits of the Ocean Infinity search area. Also shown in the figure are olive-green areas which represent areas that were not scanned by GO Phoenix’s towfish due to steep terrain. The outlines of these and other areas of missing or low-quality data were made available by Geoscience Australia . There is a steep slope to the south of the LEP, and the portion of the steep slope that was not scanned by the GO Phoenix towfish is about 60.3 km 2 . Of this, about half was later scanned by Ocean Infinity AUVs, leaving about 30.5 km 2 of seabed surrounding S34.53° E93.84° that was never scanned. We designated this area as a High Priority Search Area”, and it may be here that the debris field lies. The subsea search for aircraft wreckage that many deem most similar to the search for MH370 was the search for Air France 447 (AF447), which was an Airbus A330 that crashed off the coast of Brazil in June 2009 in around 3000 m (9,800 ft) of water. Floating remnants of the aircraft were found within 2 days of the crash, but the subsea search was not successful in locating the debris field until April 2011, about 2 years after the crash. The sonar image from the debris field, which measured around 200 m x 600 m, is shown below. AF447 is believed to have impacted the ocean surface without breaking up in flight and with a nose-up attitude. As such, the debris field that AF447 generated may be significantly different from the debris field created by the impact of MH370, as the final two BFO values suggest a high downward acceleration of 0.7g, and descent rates greater than 15,000 fpm. Without pilot intervention, MH370 possibly entered the water at a descent angle greater than 45 deg and at an airspeed approaching or exceeding Mach 1. The debris from MH370 may more closely resemble the debris from SilkAir 185 rather than the debris from AF447. SilkAir 185 was a Boeing 737 that crashed into the Musi River near Palembang, Sumatra, Indonesia in December 1997. The aircraft experienced a rapid, nearly vertical dive that the US NTSB attributed to control inputs from the captain. During the high speed descent, parts of the control surfaces, including a large portion of the tail section, separated from the fuselage due to the high aerodynamic forces from the high speeds. The airspeed of the fuselage before impact is believed to have exceeded Mach 1. SilkAir 185’s debris was found in two areas: the main debris field of around 60 m x 80 m at the bottom of the Musi River, which was only 8 m (26 ft) deep; and other larger debris, mainly flight control parts that separated before impact, that were widely scattered on land no closer than 700 m (2,300 ft) from the main debris field. According to the accident report, due to the high energy of the impact, the parts recovered from the river were highly fragmented and mangled on impact” which made identification difficult. If MH370 experienced the rapid descent suggested by the final BFO values, then it is probable that the fuselage broke apart before impact, and also probable that many large parts would be found outside of the main debris field. The flaperon recovered on Reunion Island is a...