30 Mar 2014

No new clue in ship search for MH370

12:58 pm on 30 March 2014

Naval ships have retrieved objects from a new search area in the southern Indian Ocean but none have been identified as from the missing Malaysia Airlines plane.

A Chinese military aircraft reported sighting three objects on Saturday and an Australian Air Force Orion spotted multiple objects in different parts of the search area. Chinese and Australian ships retrieved a number of items during the day but none were been confirmed to be related to the missing plane.

Chinese rescue and salvage ship Nan Hai Jiu is in the search zone.

Chinese rescue and salvage ship Nan Hai Jiu is in the search zone. Photo: AFP / Pool

Flight MH370 disappeared on 8 March after veering sharply off course while heading from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 passengers, including two New Zealanders, and crew.

Investigators believed the Boeing 777 crashed in the southern Indian Ocean off the coast of Western Australia, where planes and ships have been looking for more than two weeks in the hope of recovering debris.

The New Zealand Orion Zealand crew is searching an area that includes a commerical fishing lane and items they spotted on Saturday were also deemed unrelated to the missing airliner. New Zealand Air Vice-Marshal Kevin Short said the objects could have been from vessels that use the fishing zone.

An RNZAF Orion crew has spotted objects in the southern Indian Ocean search zone.

An RNZAF Orion crew has spotted objects in the southern Indian Ocean search zone. Photo: AFP

Four ships were in the search zone on Saturday and more vessels, including Royal Australian Navy ship HMAS Toowoomba are heading to the area. Commodore Peter Leavy said the navy vessel has high-tech radar equipment on board which complement the more traditional search methods being used.

"Very effective radar for surface assets - it really picks up ships and boats not things that are submerged. So the primary tool for detection will be a visual search and of course that's made all the more difficult in the very extreme weather conditions they often experience in the search area."

One of the Australian ships, due to leave for the search area on Monday, will have on board a black box locator which is able to pick up electronic signals from a flight data recorder.

The search operation was on Friday re-focused 1100 kilometres from its original location following analysis of radar and satellite data that showed the missing plane had travelled faster than had been previously calculated, and so would have burned through its fuel load quicker.