What Next In Search For Missing Flight MH370?
Updated: 10:50am UK, Friday 30 May 2014
By Jonathan Samuels, Australia Correspondent
The news that teams searching for missing flight MH370 have finished combing the patch of Indian Ocean 1,000 miles off the coast of Western Australia is a huge setback.
The search focused on that area because four pings - or acoustic signals - were detected almost two months ago which were thought to have come from the plane's two flight recorders.
Nothing has been found and now it appears the noises did not come from the black box recorders at all.
It has been rumoured for some time they could have been caused by the search vessels themselves.
Now the US Navy's deputy director of ocean engineering has said much the same.
"Our best theory at this point is that (the pings were) likely some sound produced by the ship ... or within the electronics of the towed pinger locator," Michael Dean told CNN.
"Always your fear any time you put electronic equipment in the water is that if any water gets in and grounds or shorts something out, you could start producing sound."
The pings may have come from another source - sound plays strange tricks that deep in the ocean - and the US Navy has officially said the comments are "speculative".
Either way, it looks like the search is back to square one.
So now it moves to a new stage.
All existing information and data will be re-examined and the whole of the 23,000 square mile 'southern arc' will again be in the frame.
A bathymetric survey will be carried out, essentially mapping out the sea floor.
It is work already partly underway by the crew of the Chinese ship Zhu Kezhen.
Commercial contractors will then be brought in to carry out the new deep sea search.
It's possible they won't start for a couple of months, and the job will be both long and expensive.
Australia has previously said this work could cost around £40m. It is not clear how expensive the search operation has been so far.
Scott Hamilton, managing director of US-based aerospace consultancy Leeham, said all the data will have to be re-examined "from start to finish".
However, he does not believe the search will be called off any time soon.
"I think it will be some time, perhaps years, before they completely throw in the towel," he said.
And for some, news the search has ended in the area which has been the focus so far is, in a way, welcome.
Sara Bacj, whose partner Philip Wood is among the missing passengers, told Sky News: "If they'd found the hull of the plane under the water then our loved ones would be dead for sure ... (but) most family members are not willing to accept that.
"They believe something else has happened to the plane so this is validation for them that keeping their hopes alive is not crazy."
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