Will MH370 Ever Be Found? Search For Missing Flight To Resume

Malaysia’s government could be joining forces with a United States based technology firm in a bid to restart the search for missing flight MH370. The government said it was discussing a new search with Ocean Infinity, a seabed exploration company based out of Houston, Texas.

Passenger jet Flight MH370 vanished in March 2014 while traveling from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. All 239 passengers on board disappeared and no bodies were ever recovered. The search for the missing aircraft was called off in January of this year after an exhaustive and costly scouring of the Indian Ocean yielded no sign of the plane. More than 46,000 square miles of ocean were searched.

Ocean Infinity initially proposed resuming the search in August. Ocean Infinity would operate its search for the plane on a “no find, no fee” basis, meaning they would accept payment only if the aircraft was found.

Malaysia’s Department of Civil Aviation confirmed Friday it had received “several proposals from a number of interested parties” to re-ignite the search for the plane.

“These offers have been thoroughly assessed by the response team and the governments of Australia and China and have been informed this development in line with the spirit of tripartite cooperation,” the government said. “In this regard, the Government of Malaysia has given the permission for the response team to proceed negotiating the terms and conditions with Ocean Infinity.”

Ocean Infinity and the Malaysian government had not yet arrived at an agreement regarding the terms, the government noted. Once such an agreement was finalized, families of those aboard MH370 would be notified and the search would begin. The new search was set to focus on an area of the seafloor that was already identified by experts.

“While I am hopeful of a successful search, I’m conscious of not raising hopes for the loved ones of those on board,” Darren Chester, Australia’s Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, said in a statement. “I hope that this new search will bring answers, both for the next of kin and for the rest of the world.”