Comment
The Malaysian Government can no longer evade its responsibilities to locate MH370 after the dramatic revelations this morning from the Australian Transport Safety Bureau and Geoscience Australia that identify an almost precise location of the missing jet.
The further refined drift analysis plus the detailed investigation of satellite images from a French satellite have revealed a debris trail that must be from MH370.
And the Malaysians have a no-find no-fee offer from US exploration company Ocean Infinity which will use a collection of underwater drones to sweep the search area now thought most likely to contain the wreckage of MH370.
They would be paid only if they find the wreckage and while there are no details about what that would entail, it is understood the company is not seeking excessive compensation outside the realms of normal commercial expectations.
Deputy Malaysian Transport Minister Aziz Kaprawi has confirmed to Reuters that authorities had received the offer recently but said at the time that no decision had been made on whether it would be accepted.
Malaysia must now act swiftly to end the torment of the relatives and to find the cause of this unprecedented disaster that took the lives of 239 passengers and crew on March 8, 2014.
There is no question that the handling by the Malaysian government and its aviation authorities into the loss of MH370 has been sub-optimal.
The first weeks were best described as a shambles with first confusion then contradiction which left relatives of those aboard certain that there was a cover-up.
Certainly, the loss of MH370 is unprecedented in modern times but the Malaysian Government’s performance over this tragedy has been a muddled disaster and that has only fueled the conspiracy theorists, who have had a field day.
Almost every utterance — mostly via social media — from the host of Malaysian officials and military was a PR disaster.
That view is supported by noted aviation commentator and former senior air safety investigator with the US National Transportation Safety Board, Gregory Feith, who told The West Australian last month that the public’s confidence in the search had suffered badly.
However, Australia’s performance in the leading the search for the missing Boeing has won praise from Mr Feith.
“The Malaysians were out of their depth with MH370 and were lucky Australia took over, said Mr Feith.
The suggestion that something is dodgy in Kuala Lumpur will only gain credibility if the Malaysians fail to act on this new irrefutable evidence.
Reverse drift modelling work by the CSIRO last year based on the debris that has washed up narrowed the search to a new area of 25,000sq km just outside the main search area and that has been refined twice to a relatively tiny area.
And the new satellite imagery of debris has confirmed this area.
The exact cost of the search thus far is unclear but most analysts believe it is about $190 million split three ways with Malaysia paying $100 million; Australia $70 million and China just $20 million.
China’s contribution has been pitiful given MH370 was also a code-share with China Southern Airlines and carried the airline’s flight number CZ748. There were 153 Chinese aboard and China needs to contribute more.
When an airline code-shares (places its flight number and sells tickets at a profit on another airline’s plane) it must bear full responsibility for all aspects of the flight.
The hollow rhetoric of the Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tong Lai saying “the aspirational goal” is to find MH370 simply isn’t good enough for families needing answers and closure.
READ: Unprecedented MH370 findings boost pressure to resume search
