The Hunt for MH370

Zaharie Ahmad Shah, 53, arrived at the airport about an hour before boarding the Boeing 777-200ER registered 9M-MRO. He reported to Malaysia Airlines’ operations centre, received the computerised flight plan, and reviewed the Notices to Airmen relevant to the route. Zaharie was a highly experienced captain with 18,423 total flight hours, including 8,659 hours on the Boeing 777, and held the rank of Type Rating Instructor and Examiner. His co-pilot for the flight was 27-year-old Fariq Abdul Hamid, a rookie on the 777 with 39 hours on the aircraft type who was undergoing final training before his own check ride.

Following Malaysia Airlines’ standard operating procedure, First Officer Fariq Abdul Hamid requested pushback and start clearance from Kuala Lumpur Area Control Centre. The aircraft was carrying 227 passengers of 14 nationalities and 10 cabin crew, along with the two pilots, for a total of 239 people on board. The passengers included 153 Chinese and 38 Malaysian nationals, along with citizens of Indonesia, Australia, India, France, the United States, New Zealand, Ukraine, Canada, Russia, Taiwan and the Netherlands, plus two Iranians travelling on stolen passports. After completing pre-taxi checks, the pilots taxied the aircraft to the threshold of runway 32 Right.

Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 lifted off from Kuala Lumpur International Airport, bound for Beijing on a scheduled flight time of five hours and 34 minutes. Zaharie had ordered 49,100 kilograms of fuel, giving the aircraft an endurance of seven hours and 31 minutes — nearly two hours more than the standard contingency reserve. Kuala Lumpur air traffic control cleared the flight to climb to 18,000 feet and track toward waypoint IGARI in the South China Sea. It was the last time the aircraft’s wheels touched the ground.

IGARI – An aviation waypoint in the South China Sea located at the boundary between the Kuala Lumpur and Ho Chi Minh Flight Information Regions (FIRs). MH370 was approaching, but did not reach, IGARI when it stopped communicating normally and turned away from its planned route.

At 43 minutes past midnight, Kuala Lumpur controllers advised Ho Chi Minh Area Control Centre in Vietnam of MH370’s estimated arrival at waypoint IGARI, along with its secondary radar transponder code, A2157. At 47 minutes past midnight the flight crew was cleared to climb to 25,000 feet, and a minute later to 35,000 feet. At 56 minutes past midnight, the crew confirmed they were maintaining that altitude. These were routine, unremarkable exchanges consistent with a normal flight.

The last Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS) transmission from MH370 was sent through the aircraft’s satellite communication system. ACARS automatically relays flight and engine performance data to ground stations and airline maintenance engineers. No further ACARS transmissions were received after this point. The system’s automatic reporting function was not active again for the remainder of the flight.

Kuala Lumpur air traffic control instructed the MH370 flight crew to contact Ho Chi Minh Air Control Centre on radio frequency 120.9 MHz. Four seconds later, Zaharie acknowledged with the words “Good night, Malaysian Three Seven Zero.” According to Malaysia’s official safety investigation report, this was the last recorded radio transmission from the aircraft. It was also the last time anyone on board MH370 was heard from.

Near waypoint IGARI, MH370 unexpectedly departs its planned route. Military radar would later reveal that the aircraft makes a brief right turn before entering a continuous left turn toward the southwest. At nearly the same moment, the aircraft’s transponder stops transmitting, causing it to disappear from civilian secondary radar.

The Malaysian safety investigation report states that the symbol representing MH370 dropped from radar display at 1:20am. Malaysian military radar, along with radar sources in Vietnam and Thailand, also recorded the disappearance of the aircraft’s radar position symbol at this time. The secondary radar transponder, which identifies an aircraft and relays its altitude, speed and position, stopped broadcasting at 1:21am. A minute later, the aircraft passed through waypoint IGARI, the point at which responsibility for MH370 was to be handed from Malaysian to Vietnamese air traffic control.

Playback of Malaysian military primary radar showed the aircraft’s blip at 10 nautical miles south of Penang Island, on a heading of 261 degrees. Primary radar, unlike secondary radar, does not identify which aircraft is which but can still detect an object in the sky. At the same time, First Officer Fariq’s mobile phone made contact with the Penang mobile network tower; Malaysian authorities determined this was an automatic log-on and not an attempted call or text. The Malaysian Chief of Air Force, General Rodzali Daud, was later informed of a mysterious radar track that began where MH370 disappeared and curved back across the Malay Peninsula.

Primary radar tracked the aircraft heading north-west along airway route N571, passing through waypoints VAMPI and MEKAR beyond the northern tip of Sumatra. Ten nautical miles beyond MEKAR, the aircraft passed beyond the roughly 250-kilometre range of primary radar and disappeared from all tracking. This was the last radar contact of any kind with MH370. From this point, investigators had to rely on satellite data alone to reconstruct the aircraft’s path.

An automatic satellite transmission, or “handshake,” was recorded between MH370 and the Inmarsat satellite positioned over the Indian Ocean. This was the first in a series of seven roughly hourly handshakes that would later prove critical to narrowing the aircraft’s possible location. The handshake placed the aircraft on a band consistent with the area near the northern end of Sumatra. Investigators would not realise the significance of this data for some time after the disappearance.

Handshake – An automatic signal exchange between an aircraft’s Satellite Data Unit (SDU) and an Inmarsat satellite. While it does not reveal the aircraft’s exact location, it confirms that the satellite communication system is powered and establishes data used to estimate the aircraft’s position.

Malaysia Airlines operations officers told the Kuala Lumpur control shift supervisor that the commercial flight-tracking software, Flight Explorer, had been showing MH370’s projected course rather than its real, live position. The software had misled airline officials into believing the aircraft was still proceeding normally toward Beijing. By this time, the aircraft had already flown back across the Malay Peninsula, turned north-west up the Straits of Malacca, and gone out of radar range. The realisation contributed to a critical delay in raising the alarm.

The second of MH370’s seven hourly “handshakes” with the Inmarsat-3F1 satellite occurred at 3:41am MYT (19:41 UTC), a routine ground-station-initiated check-in rather than an aircraft-initiated log-on. Analysis of this handshake’s Burst Timing Offset later helped investigators establish that the aircraft was still moving away from its earlier position.

Independent researchers have since identified this as one of the points where the aircraft’s distance from the satellite was near its closest point of the entire flight. The raw data from this handshake was not released publicly until 27 May 2014, more than two months after the disappearance.

The third handshake, recorded at 4:41am MYT (20:41 UTC), continued the hourly pattern of automatic communication between MH370’s satellite terminal and Inmarsat-3F1. Like the surrounding handshakes, it produced a Burst Timing Offset value used to calculate the aircraft’s approximate distance from the satellite at that moment.

Independent analysts, including members of the self-styled “Independent Group,” used this and neighbouring handshakes to help reconstruct the aircraft’s southward track. No radar or radio contact existed at this stage of the flight, making this handshake data one of only a handful of data points investigators had to work with.

A senior Malaysia Airlines captain, asked for information about the flight, stated that based on known information “MH370 never left Malaysian airspace.” Ten minutes later, the Kuala Lumpur air traffic control watch supervisor formally notified the Kuala Lumpur Aeronautical Rescue Coordination Centre that MH370 was missing. This came more than four hours after the aircraft’s last radio contact. Malaysia’s then civil aviation chief, Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, later said the delay was primarily attributable to Vietnamese controllers, who held responsibility for the aircraft after its handover at IGARI.

Malaysia’s Department of Civil Aviation (DCA) activated the initial search-and-rescue radius at 20 nautical miles (37 kilometres) from waypoint IGARI, the aircraft’s last confirmed position. The Kuala Lumpur Aeronautical Rescue Coordination Centre (ARCC) coordinated the response, with the Royal Malaysian Air Force and the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency deploying the first vessels and aircraft into the South China Sea and Gulf of Thailand. Vietnam’s air traffic and search authorities were also notified early, given the aircraft’s position near the Malaysia–Vietnam flight information boundary. DCA Director-General Azharuddin Abdul Rahman later described this starting point directly, saying: “Initially it was a radius of 20 nautical miles from Igari, we have increased it to 50 nautical miles.”

At 5:41am MYT (21:41 UTC), the fourth hourly handshake was recorded, continuing the pattern established after the aircraft’s satellite communication system resumed transmitting following its earlier interruption. This data point falls roughly in the middle of the seven-handshake sequence and was later used alongside the others to help define the shape of the search corridor along the southern Indian Ocean.

Researchers noted the aircraft’s distance from the satellite was steadily increasing again by this point, consistent with a continued southward track. The handshake’s underlying data remained unpublicized until the full raw signalling log was released in May 2014.

At Beijing Capital International Airport, the arrivals board showed “Flight MH370, from Kuala Lumpur, STA 6:30. Delayed” throughout the morning before the listing disappeared without explanation just after 1:00pm local time. Malaysia Airlines issued a statement confirming the aircraft was missing and that a press conference would follow. Malaysia Airlines chief executive Ahmad Jauhari Yahya publicly confirmed the loss of contact, telling reporters, “We are deeply saddened this morning.” News networks including CNN reported that air traffic control had lost contact with the flight at 2:40am, about two hours after take-off.

The fifth handshake occurred at 6:41am MYT (22:41 UTC), roughly ninety minutes before the aircraft’s presumed fuel exhaustion. By this stage of the flight, the calculated distance from the satellite had grown substantially compared to the earlier handshakes, consistent with the aircraft continuing on a southerly track deep into the Indian Ocean.

This data point became one of the key inputs the ATSB used in its 2014 report defining the underwater search area. Along with the sixth and seventh handshakes, it later formed part of the critical final stretch of data investigators used to estimate the aircraft’s fuel-exhaustion location.

Within hours of MH370’s disappearance, Malaysia, its regional neighbours, the United States and Australia launched a large-scale search centred on a 20 nautical mile radius around the aircraft’s last known contact point at waypoint IGARI in the South China Sea. Australia sent two RAAF Orion maritime patrol aircraft, while the US Seventh Fleet began committing ships and aircraft to the effort. China deployed warships and satellites, and Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia and Singapore also joined the search on this first day.

The effort produced a string of false leads, including an oil slick that tested negative for aviation fuel and debris that turned out to be canvas and a cable-reel cap. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak personally led the government’s press briefings as international media descended on Kuala Lumpur. At this early stage, the search remained narrowly focused on the South China Sea, still operating under the assumption that the aircraft had gone down near its last radar contact point.

The sixth, and final complete, handshake was recorded at 8:11am MYT (00:11 UTC), roughly eight minutes before the aircraft’s presumed fuel exhaustion. This is the specific handshake whose Burst Timing Offset ring was split into the northern and southern corridors announced by Malaysian officials on 15 March 2014.

Because it was the last full, successful exchange between the aircraft and the satellite, it became a critical anchor point for the ATSB’s search-area calculations. Investigators used it alongside the seventh, partial handshake to bound the range of possible final positions along the arc.

At 8:19:29am MYT (00:19:29 UTC), MH370’s satellite terminal sent an unscheduled, partial log-on request lasting only a few seconds — widely believed to indicate the aircraft’s engines had just lost power from fuel exhaustion, causing a brief electrical interruption before backup power restored the connection.

This final transmission produced the famous “7th arc,” the line that anchored the entire ATSB and Ocean Infinity underwater search boundary for the following decade. No further signals were ever received from the aircraft after this point. The 7th arc’s location — roughly 4,932 km from the satellite — remains the single most important geographic reference point in the entire search effort.

One day into the search, Malaysian authorities more than doubled the search radius from 20 to 50 nautical miles (92.6 kilometres) from IGARI. The Malay Mail reported the intensified effort, noting that “search for MH370 intensifies with 74 vessels, 50 nautical miles near last-known site.” China, the United States, Singapore and the Philippines joined the operation at this stage, with the US Navy’s Seventh Fleet dispatching the destroyer USS Pinckney to assist. The expanded zone remained centered on the South China Sea, reflecting the still-prevailing assumption that the aircraft had gone down near its last radar contact point.

As the fourth day of search-and-rescue operations began, Malaysian authorities tripled the radius again, this time to 100 nautical miles (185.2 kilometres) from waypoint IGARI. The New Straits Times reported that “the search area for MH370 over the South China Sea has been tripled to cover a 100 nautical miles radius from waypoint Igari,” with officials signalling the zone would keep growing if the aircraft remained unfound. By this stage 12 countries were participating, with a combined 42 ships and 39 aircraft in the water and air, including a second US Navy destroyer, USS Kidd, alongside continuing Malaysian, Vietnamese, Chinese, Singaporean and Philippine assets. This expansion also extended coverage west to include the Strait of Malacca, foreshadowing the shift in search focus that would follow days later.

One week after the disappearance, Prime Minister Najib Razak told the media: “Today we can confirm MH370 did indeed turn back consistent with deliberate action by someone on the plane.” He said investigators had narrowed the aircraft’s last known satellite contact to one of two vast corridors — a northern corridor stretching across central Asia and a southern corridor covering open ocean toward Antarctica. The finding effectively ended the search in the South China Sea and confirmed MH370 had reversed course over Malaysia. Attention turned again to the possibility of hijacking, and the Royal Malaysian Police, assisted by Interpol, began investigating the backgrounds of all passengers and crew.

The Australian government agreed to search a vast stretch of ocean roughly 3,000 kilometres south-west of Perth, based on Inmarsat’s southern corridor data. The Australian Maritime Safety Authority said the search zone would initially cover 600,000 square kilometres. A single RAAF Orion began searching the area north and west of the Cocos Islands, while another continued searching west of Malaysia. This marked the beginning of Australia’s central role in the hunt for MH370.

Citing new analysis from Inmarsat and the UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch, Najib told reporters: “Inmarsat and the AAIB have concluded that its last position was in the middle of the Indian Ocean west of Perth… This is a remote location far from any possible landing site.” Malaysia Airlines sent relatives a text message stating: “We have to assume beyond all reasonable doubt that MH370 has been lost and none of those on board survived.” Some family members at the briefing venue had to be taken out on stretchers. The announcement shifted the search exclusively to the southern Indian Ocean, ending efforts elsewhere.

The Royal Navy’s Trafalgar-class nuclear submarine HMS Tireless arrived in the southern Indian Ocean to join the hunt for MH370, bringing advanced sonar capable of detecting the aircraft’s black box “pings.” The submarine worked alongside the survey ship HMS Echo, which assisted with debris detection and search optimization using its environmental assessment equipment.

Malaysia’s Defence Minister Hishammuddin Hussein confirmed the deployment following a call with his British counterpart, calling it a valued contribution from a close ally. HMS Tireless was ultimately the only submarine involved in the search, and was stood down on 24 April 2014 after searching roughly 7,000 square nautical miles over 16 days without detecting further black box signals.

Data recovered from Zaharie’s home flight simulator, analysed by the FBI in March and April 2014, was formally provided to the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) on this date. Six weeks before the accident, Zaharie had used the simulator to fly a route up the Straits of Malacca before turning left into the southern Indian Ocean — a path with notable similarities to MH370’s actual course. The ATSB later acknowledged it had used this information when considering the underwater search area. Australian officials did not publicly disclose the simulator data’s significance for some time after receiving it.

Malaysia formally established the Annex 13 Safety Investigation Team for MH370 in April 2014, appointing Dato’ Ir. Kok Soo Chon — a former Director-General of Malaysia’s Department of Civil Aviation and former Malaysian representative to the ICAO Council — as Investigator-in-Charge. The 19-member international team included accredited representatives from seven countries: the US, UK, France, China, Singapore, Indonesia, and Australia.

Kok would go on to lead the investigation for over four years, ultimately presenting the final Safety Investigation Report to victims’ families in July 2018. His appointment marked the formal start of the parallel safety investigation that ran alongside, but separately from, the physical underwater search.

In the weeks following MH370’s disappearance, relatives of the passengers and crew organized as Voice370, a support and advocacy group representing next-of-kin from across the 14 nationalities aboard the flight. On 8 May 2014, the group published an open letter to the heads of state of Malaysia, Australia, and China, urging authorities to analyze all available data “without predetermination or bias.”

Voice370 went on to launch a crowdfunding campaign seeking US$5 million to fund a private search effort, and became the primary organized voice for families in dealings with Malaysian officials over the following decade. The group refused to refer to victims as “deceased,” instead using “missing,” a stance it maintained for years afterward.

A small group of aviation, satellite, and physics specialists — including Duncan Steel, Mike Exner, Don Thompson, and Richard Godfrey — formally organized themselves, initially calling their collective “The BFO Group” after the Burst Frequency Offset satellite data they were analyzing. The group grew into what became known simply as the “Independent Group” (IG), a crowdsourced collective of credentialed experts working outside official channels to independently analyze MH370’s satellite data.

Over the following decade, the ATSB itself formally acknowledged the IG’s contributions, crediting members by name in official communications. Individual IG members, including Victor Iannello and Richard Godfrey, continued publishing influential independent analyses of the case well beyond the group’s original formation.

The Dutch marine survey company Fugro won the tender to conduct a bathymetric, or seabed-mapping, survey of the search zone, deploying its vessel Fugro Equator. The Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC), which held responsibility for MH370 media relations, said the survey of the 60,000 square kilometre zone was expected to take about three months. Multi-beam echo-sounders aboard the survey vessels collected raw data used by Geoscience Australia to produce detailed three-dimensional maps of the ocean floor. The seabed in this remote part of the Indian Ocean was found to include a massive escarpment called Broken Ridge, along with previously uncharted undersea mountains, canyons and valleys.

Relatives of Chinese passengers gathered outside Malaysia Airlines’ office in Beijing seeking to formally deliver appeals and demands for more information, only to be turned away. The protest reflected growing frustration among the roughly 150 Chinese families — the largest national group aboard MH370 — over what they saw as inadequate transparency from both Malaysia Airlines and the Malaysian government.

Chinese families remained among the most vocal and persistent advocates throughout the following decade, frequently organizing separate protests and press conferences distinct from the international Voice370 group. Tensions between Beijing and Kuala Lumpur over the handling of the search became a recurring undercurrent of the investigation’s early months.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau released a paper titled MH370 – Definition of Underwater Search Areas, outlining its rationale for the target search zone. The report identified three key factors: the location of the aircraft’s final turn south, aircraft performance limitations, and analysis of the satellite handshake data. It noted the last primary radar contact at 2:22am, a satellite handshake three minutes later at 2:25am suggesting the same track, and a subsequent handshake at 3:41am indicating a turn to a south/south-easterly direction. Because the precise time of the southern turn could not be fixed within this window, the ATSB adopted parallel modelling approaches to estimate the aircraft’s likely path.

Four months after MH370 disappeared, a second Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200ER, Flight MH17, was destroyed by a surface-to-air missile while flying over rebel-held eastern Ukraine, killing all 298 people on board. The aircraft had departed Amsterdam bound for Kuala Lumpur. Although unrelated in cause, the second tragedy compounded the reputational and emotional toll on Malaysia Airlines within the same year. Some Malaysian political observers later suggested the twin disasters affected the national mood ahead of the 2018 election.

A JACC operational bulletin reported that the Chinese support vessel Haixun 01 was “stationed at the Port of Fremantle,” reflecting the logistical difficulty of sustaining the search fleet. A follow-up bulletin two weeks later said the vessel remained in port for repairs. The search fleet by this stage included the vessels Fugro Equator, the Chinese ship Zhu Kezhen, the Malaysian survey ship KD Mutiara, and support vessels Bunga Mas 6 and Haixun 01. Despite the setbacks, the bathymetric survey work continued.

The vessel GO Phoenix, chartered by the Malaysian government with equipment and experts from Phoenix International, arrived in the search area and began underwater search operations along the Seventh Arc. The JACC’s operational bulletin announced: “Following system checks and vehicle deployment, underwater search operations commenced on the Seventh Arc.” By early October 2014, about 120,000 square kilometres of seabed had been surveyed as part of the preliminary bathymetric mapping. ATSB search director Peter Foley began a routine of reviewing sonar reports every morning at 5:30am, a habit he maintained throughout the search.

Malaysia’s Department of Civil Aviation formally declared MH370 an “accident” under the ICAO’s Chicago Convention, with all 239 passengers and crew presumed dead. Director-general Azharuddin Abdul Rahman said “survivability in the defined area is highly unlikely,” citing 327 days of searching without result.

The declaration was a legal necessity, not a change in the search effort — it allowed families to begin pursuing compensation claims under international aviation law. The announcement, made just weeks before the disappearance’s first anniversary, asked families to “resume their normal lives” even as the physical search continued.

Boeing 777 captain and flight instructor Simon Hardy, who had spent six months independently analyzing MH370’s flight data, published a theory that the aircraft’s course past Penang Island was deliberate — Zaharie Shah taking “one last look” at his hometown before a controlled ditching further south. His analysis, first published in Flight International magazine in January 2015, proposed a specific search location based purely on mathematical and navigational reasoning.

The ATSB described his work as “credible” and met with him multiple times, and by September 2015 the search had moved into the area he had identified — though officials maintained this was coincidental, reflecting their own search sequence rather than his theory.

By the start of March 2015, close to the first anniversary of MH370’s disappearance, search vessels had covered 24,000 square kilometres, or more than 40 per cent of the 60,000 square kilometre target zone. Crews aboard vessels including Fugro Discovery worked 12-hour shifts, seven days a week, for six-week rotations, a routine the crews nicknamed “mowing the lawn.” No trace of the aircraft had been found. A memorial event was held for the families of the 239 people lost, at which opposition leader Bill Shorten quoted the poet Shelley in his remarks.

Coinciding with the disappearance’s first anniversary, Malaysia’s Annex 13 Safety Investigation Team released its first legally mandated interim statement, required under ICAO rules whenever an accident investigation remains unresolved past its anniversary. The statement summarized available factual data without drawing conclusions about the cause of the disappearance.

It marked the first of what would become a recurring annual pattern of interim statements released each March 8th in the years the case remained unsolved. Malaysian officials confirmed the investigation was being conducted with support from seven other countries, including the US, UK, France, and Australia.

The Weekend Australian’s Hedley Thomas travelled to the remote Maldivian island of Kuda Huvadhoo and reported accounts from locals, including fisherman Abdu Rasheed Ibrahim, who described seeing a large aircraft with red and blue markings flying low on the morning of 8 March 2014. The story, though reported cautiously, was picked up internationally. Two months later, French journalist Florence de Changy published a rebuttal identifying the aircraft as a Maldivian domestic flight that had landed at nearby Thimarafushi Island at 6:33am that morning. Civil aviation records confirmed the flight, a Dash 8 operated by an airline with similar red, white and blue livery to Malaysia Airlines, closing the Maldives theory.

By April 2015, 60 per cent of the original 60,000 square kilometre search zone had been covered without result, and the search was due to conclude by the end of May if the aircraft was not found. Transport ministers from Australia, Malaysia and China met in Kuala Lumpur and agreed to double the target search area to 120,000 square kilometres. In a joint statement, the ministers said the additional area might take up to a year to complete given adverse weather in the coming winter months. No timeline was set for ending the search beyond this expanded zone.

Sonar imaging from the vessel Fugro Equator detected “multiple small bright reflections in a relatively small area of otherwise featureless seabed” at a depth of 3,900 metres, according to search director Peter Foley. An autonomous underwater vehicle deployed with a camera photographed an anchor and a scatter of coal-sized black objects, later identified as the remains of an early 19th-century wooden shipwreck. A second shipwreck was discovered later in the search, with sonar imagery clearly showing its bowsprit. Neither find was related to MH370, though Foley noted the discoveries showed that any debris field within the search area would likely be detected.

Local council worker Johnny Begue, cleaning the coastline at Saint-Andre on Reunion Island, discovered a roughly two-metre piece of aircraft debris with unrusted screws while on his morning break. “I knew immediately it was part of an aircraft,” Begue told the Associated Press. French gendarmes secured the site and flew the debris to a military aviation laboratory in Toulouse for analysis. French and international aviation experts quickly identified it as a flaperon from a Boeing 777.

Within a week of the Toulouse examination, investigators matched a serial number on the flaperon conclusively to 9M-MRO, the aircraft that operated MH370. Najib Razak announced the confirmation, telling reporters: “Today, 515 days since the plane disappeared, it is with a heavy heart that I must tell you that an international team of experts have conclusively confirmed that the aircraft debris found on Reunion Island is indeed from MH370.” The ATSB said the find was “consistent with the currently defined search area.” The French judiciary, which had opened its own criminal investigation because four French nationals were on board, retained custody of the flaperon rather than handing it to Malaysian or Australian authorities.

South African teenager Liam Lötter discovered a roughly one-metre piece of metal debris on a beach near Xai-Xai in southern Mozambique while on holiday, noticing a stencilled code, “676EB,” in a font matching Malaysia Airlines’ livery. He did not realize the item’s possible significance for months, only reporting it in March 2016.

The piece was later identified as part of MH370’s flap track fairing, a component that protects the wing flap mechanism and reduces aerodynamic drag. It became the second confirmed piece of MH370 wreckage after the Réunion flaperon, though its delayed reporting meant it wasn’t publicly linked to the aircraft until months after Lötter found it.

American adventurer and self-funded MH370 debris hunter Blaine Gibson found a stabilizer panel piece bearing the stencilled words “NO STEP” on a sandbar near Vilankulo, Mozambique. Gibson had been searching Indian Ocean coastlines for MH370 wreckage for months without success before this discovery, working in coordination with University of Western Australia oceanographer Charitha Pattiaratchi’s drift-model predictions.

Investigators later confirmed the piece was “almost certainly” from one of MH370’s horizontal stabilizer panels. This discovery marked the beginning of Gibson’s much larger role in the search, as he went on to personally find or help recover dozens more suspected debris pieces over the following years.

On the eve of the second anniversary of MH370’s disappearance, 76 family members representing 32 passengers filed a civil suit at Malaysia’s High Court against the Malaysian government, Malaysia Airlines, the Department of Civil Aviation, and the Royal Malaysian Air Force. The suit, filed just before a legal deadline for claims expired, alleged conspiracy, fraud, and failure to fulfil statutory obligations, though the plaintiffs did not specify a compensation amount.

Lawyers Tommy Thomas and Ganesan Nethi represented the families domestically, with a Miami-based aviation litigation firm seeking to join the case. The suit was among several legal actions families pursued across multiple jurisdictions in the years following the disappearance.

On the second anniversary of MH370’s disappearance, Malaysia’s Annex 13 investigation team released its second mandated interim statement, again summarizing factual findings without reaching conclusions on cause. Voice370 marked the anniversary with public remembrance events, continuing to press Malaysian authorities not to abandon the search.

By this date, multiple debris pieces had washed ashore in Mozambique and South Africa within the preceding months, giving families and investigators alike their first tangible physical evidence beyond the Réunion flaperon. The underwater search itself, however, remained without result after two full years.

South African archaeologist Neels Kruger discovered a roughly 70cm by 70cm panel bearing Rolls-Royce-style lettering on a beach at Mossel Bay, South Africa. The lettering style and font matched components used by Malaysia Airlines, prompting Australian and Malaysian investigators to examine the piece as likely MH370 debris.

It was recovered less than a month after the two Mozambique pieces, adding to the growing pattern of debris washing ashore along the western Indian Ocean rim roughly two years after the disappearance. The find reinforced drift-model predictions that wreckage would continue appearing along the African coastline for years to come.

Australian investigators confirmed that both the Liam Lötter and Blaine Gibson Mozambique finds were “almost certainly” from MH370, based on component analysis conducted with assistance from Boeing specialists. The confirmation came less than two weeks before a further piece from Mauritius was sent for analysis in early April 2016.

This marked the first time multiple independently-found civilian debris pieces had been officially validated in quick succession, lending significant credibility to the growing network of amateur searchers combing African beaches. The finding intensified media and family attention on the western Indian Ocean coastline as a productive search zone for physical evidence, even as the underwater search continued to come up empty far to the east.

About a week after the Mossel Bay discovery, a vacationing couple found a chunk of aircraft interior cabin panel on Rodrigues Island, a remote outer island of Mauritius roughly 560 km east of the main island. The piece notably showed small barnacle growth, providing additional biological drift-timing evidence for oceanographers studying how long debris had been at sea.

It became one of several pieces recovered from the broader Mauritius island group, distinct from the Ilot Bernache flap found two months later in May 2016. The discovery underscored how widely scattered MH370 debris had become across the western Indian Ocean’s island chains.

The rear edge of MH370’s left outboard flap was found and recovered on an islet off Mauritius. The discovery followed independent recovery campaigns launched by MH370 family members and others, including American lawyer Blaine Gibson, who searched beaches along the southern and eastern coasts of Africa. The find added to the small but growing collection of confirmed MH370 wreckage recovered from the western Indian Ocean. It was sent for analysis alongside other confirmed debris.

Continuing his self-funded search efforts, Blaine Gibson located additional suspected debris pieces on Madagascar’s coastline and reported the find to the Australian Transport Safety Bureau. Malaysian authorities, who held lead investigative responsibility, indicated they had procedures in place to examine any newly reported debris, with Australia assisting analysis when requested.

The discovery came roughly two months after Gibson’s Mozambique find, reinforcing his emerging role as the search’s most prolific independent debris hunter. By this point, Gibson had begun actively coordinating with drift-modelling scientists to target specific coastlines more systematically rather than searching at random.

A largely intact section of MH370’s right flap was discovered on Pemba Island off the coast of Tanzania and sent to the ATSB in Canberra for analysis. Serial numbers and other identifying markings enabled a conclusive determination that the part belonged to MH370. Investigators noted the flap showed trailing-edge damage similar to that seen on the flaperon recovered on Reunion Island a year earlier. Debris from MH370 was ultimately recovered across a wide area spanning Mozambique, Tanzania, South Africa, Mauritius, Madagascar and Reunion.

Nine Network reporter Ross Coulthart’s prime-time 60 Minutes Australia story featured veteran air crash investigator Larry Vance, who said flatly: “Somebody was flying the airplane at the end of its flight. Somebody was flying the airplane into the water.” The report examined the FBI’s findings on Zaharie’s home flight simulator and the flap and flaperon damage evidence. It also featured an interview with Danica Weeks, wife of passenger Paul Weeks, who said of the Malaysian authorities: “It just tells me that they are hiding something.” The broadcast brought mainstream attention to growing doubts about the ATSB’s working theory that no one was flying MH370 when it went down.

Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai announced that 22 pieces of debris had been found across South Africa, Mozambique, Mauritius, and Tanzania, with two formally confirmed as MH370 wreckage and a further four considered “almost certain.” Liow said the confirmations were important for understanding “how the incident could have occurred,” even without locating the aircraft’s main wreckage.

The tally reflected the rapidly accumulating body of physical evidence gathered largely through independent searchers like Blaine Gibson rather than official government search efforts. It marked one of the most comprehensive public accountings of debris to date, more than two and a half years after the disappearance.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau published its “MH370 – First Principles Review,” a report re-examining the underlying assumptions behind the search area’s definition as the original 120,000 km² zone approached completion without success. The review reassessed satellite data, aircraft performance limits, and debris drift analysis to determine whether the search zone required adjustment before the search was suspended.

It represented a rare moment of formal self-scrutiny by investigators, conducted specifically because of the search’s lack of results despite extensive coverage. The review’s findings fed into the decision-making that led to the search’s suspension the following month.

After nearly three years and roughly 120,000 square kilometres of seabed searched along the Seventh Arc, the ATSB-led underwater search for MH370 was suspended without finding the aircraft. Boeing 777 captain Simon Hardy, who had proposed an alternative search area based on a piloted glide scenario, said he continued raising his theory with the ATSB search team until the end of the search in January 2017 and beyond. The suspension left the fate and exact location of MH370 unresolved nearly three years after its disappearance. Search assets and personnel were subsequently stood down.

On the third anniversary of MH370’s disappearance, and less than two months after the underwater search’s suspension, Malaysia released its third mandated interim statement. Voice370 used the anniversary to formally lobby Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai, delivering personal letters requesting the search’s resumption during a meeting held in Perth.

The anniversary carried particular weight, coming so soon after the search’s suspension without result, deepening families’ frustration with the state of the investigation. Malaysia reiterated that it remained open to resuming the search if credible new evidence emerged.

Geoscience Australia examined four French military satellite images taken shortly after MH370’s disappearance and identified at least 70 objects of interest, with 12 assessed as “probably” man-made and a further 28 “possibly” man-made. The resolution was insufficient to conclusively identify aircraft debris. The ATSB passed the findings to the CSIRO, whose drift-modelling team, led by David Griffin, used the imagery to propose a highly specific new search coordinate of 35.6 degrees south, 92.8 degrees east. This analysis helped build the case for a renewed search of the seabed.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau published its final report on the search effort. The report publicly acknowledged for the first time that data from Zaharie’s home flight simulator had been recovered and analysed in March and April 2014, and that the ATSB had received and used this information on 19 April 2014 in considering the search area. It confirmed there were “enough similarities” between Zaharie’s simulated route and MH370’s actual flight path for investigators to take the data seriously. The admission came more than three years after the flight simulator revelation was first reported publicly.

In Putrajaya, Ocean Infinity chief executive Oliver Plunkett and Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai signed an agreement for the Houston-based company to conduct a new underwater search. Under the deal, Malaysia would pay Ocean Infinity between US$20 million and US$70 million depending on where within the search zone the aircraft was found, but nothing if it was not found within 90 operational days. Ocean Infinity’s vessel, Seabed Constructor, had already set sail from Durban toward the search zone before the contract was finalised. The arrangement represented the first major private-sector attempt to find MH370.

Seabed Constructor arrived in the southern Indian Ocean and deployed eight autonomous underwater vehicles simultaneously to scan the seabed, a far larger operational capacity than any single vessel used in the ATSB-led search. The search zone was divided into four sequential “sites,” each subdivided into “areas,” with progress reported in weekly Malaysian government bulletins. After the first fortnight, the vessel had covered roughly 7,500 square kilometres. No aircraft debris was found, though the crew did identify unusual underwater sand dune formations and a closed wooden chest at about 4,000 metres, a remnant of an earlier-discovered 19th-century shipwreck.

The fourth anniversary of MH370’s disappearance fell in the middle of Ocean Infinity’s active private search, which had begun in January 2018 and would conclude without result in late May. This made it the first anniversary in several years to coincide with an ongoing underwater search rather than a suspended one, offering renewed hope to families even as the search progressed without finding wreckage.

Malaysia’s newly elected Mahathir Mohamad government, only months into office following May’s election, faced its first MH370 anniversary while overseeing the Ocean Infinity contract inherited from the previous administration. Family representatives continued pressing for transparency about the search’s progress and the terms of its “no find, no fee” arrangement.

By the end of April 2018, Ocean Infinity’s search had covered more than 70,000 square kilometres, about two-thirds of its target zone, without finding any trace of MH370. In four months, the company had covered roughly the same area the ATSB-led search had taken more than two years to survey. The search continued to be based on the same underlying assumption used in the ATSB search: that no one had been flying the aircraft at the end of the flight. This assumption meant the search did not cover an alternative area proposed by airline captains Simon Hardy and Byron Bailey based on a piloted-glide scenario.

The Australian published an exclusive story and extracts from air crash investigator Larry Vance’s book, MH370: Mystery Solved, arguing that a pilot had deliberately flown the aircraft to the end and carried out a controlled ditching. The story reported that Vance had produced “compelling evidence” contradicting the ATSB’s assumption that MH370 crashed unpiloted after running out of fuel. Vance had deliberately timed the release to coincide with the end of the Ocean Infinity search, so as not to undermine the search while it was still active. The story drew significant international readership.

The Malaysian government, under new Transport Minister Anthony Loke, extended the Ocean Infinity contract only to this date before it lapsed, by which time the company had covered its full target search area. Ocean Infinity chief executive Oliver Plunkett said in a statement: “While clearly the outcome so far is extremely disappointing, as a company we are truly proud of what we have achieved.” Between the ATSB-led search and Ocean Infinity’s effort, roughly 250,000 square kilometres of the southern Indian Ocean seabed had been searched without locating the aircraft. Ocean Infinity said it would be willing to resume the search in future under a similar arrangement.

A lawsuit brought by Danica Weeks against Boeing in United States courts failed on jurisdictional grounds. Weeks had said she pursued the case in the hope of pressuring Boeing to fund a renewed search for MH370, as Airbus had done for the manufacturer’s own lost aircraft, Air France Flight 447. That same month, Ocean Infinity — the company that had searched for MH370 earlier in 2018 — was employed by the government of Argentina and located its lost submarine, ARA San Juan, in the Atlantic Ocean at a depth of 800 metres. As of the book’s publication, the wreckage of MH370 itself had not been found.

Next-of-kin of MH370 passengers presented Malaysian Transport Minister Anthony Loke with five pieces of debris said to have been found off the coast of Madagascar. Grace Nathan, whose mother Anne Daisy was on board MH370, said the continued discovery of debris meant “the investigation should still be live… it shouldn’t be closed.” Loke said the government remained open to new search proposals but would need credible leads before committing to one. In January 2019, Malaysian authorities confirmed that at least one of the pieces, a section of floor panel, was likely from MH370.

On the fifth anniversary of MH370’s disappearance, the Malaysian government stated it remained willing to review any “credible leads or specific proposals” for a renewed search. No new search was launched at this time, and the aircraft’s resting place remained unknown five years after it vanished. Family members continued to press Malaysian, Australian and Chinese authorities to keep the case open. The anniversary drew renewed international media coverage revisiting the unresolved case.

The sixth anniversary of MH370’s disappearance passed with no active underwater search underway, more than two years after Ocean Infinity’s 2018 effort had concluded without result. Family advocacy continued through Voice370 and individual representatives, though public attention on the case had noticeably diminished compared to earlier anniversaries.

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020 further limited the scale of memorial gatherings and media coverage that had characterized previous anniversaries. Malaysia’s government reiterated its standing position that it remained open to reviewing credible new evidence, without committing to any specific new search action.

The seventh anniversary of MH370’s disappearance was marked amid continued independent research efforts, including ongoing work from members of the Independent Group and early developments in what would become Richard Godfrey’s WSPR-based tracking analysis. No official underwater search was active at this time, with Ocean Infinity’s renewed interest still roughly a year away from public announcement.

Family groups continued annual remembrance events despite pandemic-related restrictions still affecting large gatherings in several countries. The case remained formally open with Malaysian police, though officials acknowledged no new leads had emerged in the criminal investigation.

Ocean Infinity announced it was ready to seek approval from the Malaysian government to resume the hunt for MH370 as early as 2023 or 2024, using new robotic search vessels to replace the Seabed Constructor used in 2018. The company said it believed it would benefit from experience gained since 2018 searching for other lost vessels, including the Argentine submarine ARA San Juan and the bulk carrier Stellar Daisy. The proposal was pending approval from the Malaysian government and represented the first serious move toward reopening the underwater search since it ended in 2018. No new search began immediately following the announcement.

Malaysian Transport Minister Anthony Loke marked the ninth anniversary of MH370’s disappearance by saying the government would not “close the book” on the case and would give due consideration to any future search if there was “new and credible information” about the aircraft’s location. Separately, Malaysia’s lead criminal investigator on the case, Datuk Mohd Khalil Kader Mohd, said publicly for the first time that the police investigation had never been formally closed and remained open pending new evidence. He said investigators had been unable to establish a criminal motive despite extensive scrutiny of the pilots, cabin crew and passengers.

Netflix released all three episodes of the British-made docuseries MH370: The Plane That Disappeared, directed by Louise Malkinson, to coincide with the ninth anniversary of the disappearance. The series presented three competing theories about the aircraft’s fate through interviews with family members, journalists and scientists. The documentary drew criticism from reviewers for giving a platform to unsubstantiated conspiracy theories, and Vietnam’s foreign ministry publicly objected to the first episode’s portrayal of Vietnamese search efforts, leading Netflix to edit the episode. The series renewed global public attention on the case nine years after the flight vanished.

Responding to a Freedom of Information Act request, the FBI indicated that its investigation concerning Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah remained open nine years after MH370’s disappearance. Under US law, an FBI investigation into a named individual generally stays open, and related records withheld, until that person is no longer considered a suspect or is confirmed dead. The response suggested Zaharie remained the primary named subject of the FBI’s inquiry into the flight’s disappearance. The bureau did not release further details of its findings.

Researchers led by Nasser Al-Qattan and Gregory Herbert published a study in the journal AGU Advances analysing barnacle shells that had attached themselves to the recovered flaperon after it entered the ocean. The barnacles’ growth layers act as a chemical archive of the sea-surface temperatures the debris passed through, which the researchers used to help reconstruct the flaperon’s drift path back toward its likely point of origin. The findings offered a novel, biology-based line of evidence to complement existing satellite and oceanographic drift-modelling efforts. It represented one of the first applications of barnacle geochemistry to an aviation search case.

Independent aerospace engineer Richard Godfrey, working with Dr. Hannes Coetzee and Professor Simon Maskell, published a 232-page report proposing a specific MH370 crash location using Weak Signal Propagation Reporter (WSPR) technology — a method that analyzes disturbances in amateur radio signals to detect aircraft movement. Drawing on 125 identified signal disturbances, the team presented 67 estimated aircraft positions across the flight’s final six hours and 27 minutes, proposing a prime crash location at 29.128°S, 99.934°E.

The report’s authors said their findings aligned with prior Boeing, Inmarsat, and University of Western Australia drift-modelling analyses, and recommended Ocean Infinity’s planned search proceed based on the refined coordinates. The report predates, by roughly three weeks, the barnacle-shell drift study published in AGU Advances, both surfacing within the same late-summer 2023 stretch of renewed independent research activity.

Nearly ten years after the disappearance, Beijing’s Chaoyang District People’s Court began hearing compensation claims filed by families of the roughly 153 Chinese passengers aboard MH370. More than 40 families had filed suit against Malaysia Airlines, Boeing, Rolls-Royce, and insurer Allianz, with lawyer Zhang Qihuai noting the litigation sought both compensation and “finding the truth behind the flight’s disappearance.”

Jiang Hui, whose mother was aboard the flight, told CNN ahead of the hearings that families who had refused earlier settlement offers had received “no apology or a penny of compensation” in the intervening years. It remained unclear what enforcement power the Chinese court held over the international corporate defendants named in the suit.

Marking ten years since MH370 vanished, Malaysia’s government said it would consult with Australia about possibly collaborating on a new search expedition with Ocean Infinity. At a gathering in Malaysia around the anniversary, family member V.P.R. Nathan presented a proposal from Ocean Infinity for a renewed search covering the Seventh Arc from about 33 to 36 degrees south, extending roughly 45 nautical miles either side of the arc. The proposal also called for re-searching earlier areas with poor-quality or missing sonar data. Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said the government was “happy to reopen” the search if there was reason for renewed hope.

Swedish airline captain and YouTuber Petter Hörnfeldt, host of the aviation channel Mentour Pilot, released a documentary titled “MH370 – A New Hope,” describing it as presenting “a new trace” in the mystery. Independent researcher Richard Godfrey praised the documentary as “a well researched forensic analysis of the evidence,” noting it avoided speculation while examining the technical and scientific record in detail.

The documentary recommended searching two specific candidate areas, including a 1,200 km² zone based on analysis by French investigators Patrick Blelly and Jean-Luc Marchand. Hörnfeldt’s film reached a large general-aviation audience beyond the specialist MH370 research community, broadening public awareness of the independent research effort ahead of the tenth anniversary.

Researchers at Cardiff University, led by Usama Kadri, published a study in Scientific Reports examining underwater hydrophone data from the time of MH370’s presumed crash. The team found only a single, relatively weak acoustic signal within the official search timeframe and location, unlike the clear pressure signatures recorded in other known aviation crashes at sea. Kadri said it was “implausible” that a significant aircraft impact would fail to generate a detectable pressure signature, suggesting the official crash time or location might need reassessment. The researchers proposed controlled underwater explosion experiments to help calibrate and verify the acoustic method.

Ocean Infinity representatives, including chief technology officer Josh Broussard, presented a new underwater search proposal to Malaysian Transport Minister Anthony Loke in Kuala Lumpur. Former ATSB search director Peter Foley, who had led the original 2014–2017 search, attended the meeting as an adviser to Ocean Infinity. Also present was Professor Simon Maskell of the University of Liverpool, a scientific adviser researching the use of Weak Signal Propagation Reporting (WSPR) radio data to help trace aircraft flight paths. Loke confirmed the company had submitted a formal proposal paper for his ministry’s review.

Retired University of Tasmania scientist Vincent Lyne published a paper in The Journal of Navigation arguing that MH370’s final two satellite signals were more consistent with a controlled, eastward descent than with the long-accepted theory that the aircraft ran out of fuel and entered an uncontrolled dive. Lyne described the prevailing “death dive” interpretation, on which years of official search strategy had been based, as “fundamentally flawed.” The paper added to a body of independent research questioning the ATSB’s original search assumptions. It was published shortly before Malaysia’s decision to approve a new search.

The Malaysian government announced it had agreed “in principle” to a new underwater search to be conducted by Ocean Infinity, covering a 15,000 square kilometre area of the southern Indian Ocean. As with the 2018 search, the arrangement was proposed on a “no find, no fee” basis, with Ocean Infinity to be paid an estimated $70 million (£56 million) only if the wreckage was found. The announcement came almost exactly ten years after the aircraft disappeared. Formal contract terms were still to be finalised in the weeks that followed.

Malaysian Transport Minister Anthony Loke confirmed that Ocean Infinity had resumed searching for MH370 in the newly agreed 15,000 square kilometre area of the southern Indian Ocean, even though a final contract had not yet been signed. The vessel Armada 78 06, carrying a team of autonomous underwater vehicles, began the first phase of the renewed search. It marked the first underwater search activity for MH370 since Ocean Infinity’s earlier effort concluded in 2018. Family representatives welcomed the resumption after years of lobbying for a new search.

The eleventh anniversary of MH370’s disappearance fell during a rare active-search period, with Ocean Infinity’s renewed search having resumed in February 2025 and formally contracted the preceding week on 19 March. This made it only the second anniversary in the timeline’s history — after the fourth, in 2018 — to coincide with a live underwater search rather than a suspended one.

Malaysian officials and family representatives marked the anniversary with cautious optimism, given the search’s early results were still pending at this stage. Voice370 and other advocacy groups continued to emphasize that eleven years without resolution remained an extraordinary and unprecedented case in commercial aviation history.

Malaysia’s Transport Minister Anthony Loke announced that the Malaysian cabinet had agreed to the terms and conditions of the new search agreement with Ocean Infinity on 19 March 2025. A group representing MH370 victims’ families announced on 26 March 2025 that the no-find, no-fee contract had been formally signed, under the previously announced terms of a $70 million payment contingent on finding the wreckage. The contract formalised the search that Ocean Infinity had already begun in late February. The first defined search phase ran from 25 to 28 March 2025.

Malaysia announced that Ocean Infinity had suspended its search for MH370 after less than six weeks of operations, citing deteriorating seasonal weather conditions in the southern Indian Ocean. Transport Minister Anthony Loke said the search would resume toward the end of 2025, when conditions in the search area were expected to improve. The suspension followed a similar seasonal pattern to the original 2014–2017 search, which had also been affected by the Southern Ocean’s harsh winter weather. No wreckage had been located during the initial weeks of the renewed search.

The Chaoyang District People’s Court ordered Malaysia Airlines to pay compensation exceeding 2.9 million yuan (approximately US$410,000) to each of eight families of MH370 passengers, more than a decade after the disappearance. The court based its ruling on the Montreal Convention and Chinese law, covering death compensation, funeral expenses, and mental anguish damages.

A further 47 of the originally filed cases had been resolved through out-of-court settlements, while 23 remaining cases stayed under judicial review pending families’ completion of formal deceased-declaration procedures. The ruling came just three weeks before Ocean Infinity’s second 2025–2026 search phase was set to begin on 30 December.

Ocean Infinity resumed its search for MH370 with a second operational phase, planned to run for approximately 55 days in targeted high-probability areas along the Seventh Arc. The Malaysian Transport Ministry issued an official statement confirming the resumption. The renewed effort used the vessel Armada 86 05, deploying autonomous underwater vehicles to extend the systematic search pattern begun in the March 2025 phase, working outward from the Seventh Arc between roughly 33 and 36 degrees south. January through March was regarded as the most favourable weather window for the search based on historical patterns.

Ocean Infinity announced that its latest search phase had concluded on 23 January 2026 without locating MH370, after covering more than 140,000 square kilometres of seafloor cumulatively since the company’s searches began in 2018. Between the two 2025–2026 phases — 25 to 28 March 2025 and 31 December 2025 to 23 January 2026 — the renewed search covered approximately 7,571 square kilometres of previously unsearched or lower-quality seabed. The company said it had spent a cumulative 151 days at sea on MH370-related search efforts since 2018. Ocean Infinity stated that the inconclusive result did not end its commitment to eventually finding the aircraft.

Ahead of the twelfth anniversary of MH370’s disappearance, US businessman Randy Rolston released a 19-page independent report proposing a new candidate crash site roughly 1,100 km west of Coral Bay, Western Australia — about 1,600 km north of the area authorities consider most likely. Rolston’s proposal centered on a spike in atmospheric carbon monoxide detected by NASA satellite instruments on the morning of the disappearance, which he argued could indicate an ocean impact at his proposed site within the Wharton Basin.

His theory diverges from the ATSB’s official finding that the aircraft continued flying, unpiloted, until fuel exhaustion, instead proposing a deliberate effort by the pilot to conceal the wreckage in deep water. The proposal adds to a long line of independent, non-consensus search-location theories proposed by researchers outside the official investigation over the preceding decade.

On the twelfth anniversary of MH370’s disappearance, Malaysia’s Air Accident Investigation Bureau informed victims’ families that the most recent search operation had not produced any findings confirming the location of the wreckage. Malaysia said its decision to approve and support the renewed 2025–2026 search reflected a continuing duty to pursue every credible lead. The US National Transportation Safety Board and Australia’s Transport Safety Bureau both contributed technical representatives to assist the Malaysian-led effort. More than a decade after the disappearance, the aircraft’s resting place, along with its flight data and cockpit voice recorders, remained undiscovered.