MH370 search ‘could take weeks’

Former Defence Chief Angus Houston says the search and rescue operation of MH370 is the most challenging he has ever seen.

There are reports the Malaysian PM will travel to Perth to observe the search for missing flight MH370.

Searching ... crew members look out from an RAAF Orion. Source: AFP

FORMER Defence chief Angus Houston says the search operation to find the missing Malaysia Airlines plane could take weeks and is the most challenging he has ever seen.

The retired Air Chief, who is co-ordinating the search for the plane, told a media conference in Perth this afternoon the search area was the size of Ireland.

"I have to say in my experience, and I have a lot of experience in search and rescue over the years, this search and recovery operation is probably the most challenging one I have ever seen," he said.

READ MORE: THE FINAL HORRIFYING HOURS OF MH370

READ MORE: MH370 PILOT'S FAMILY LASHES OUT

The retired Air Chief Marshal warned the effort to find debris from MH370 could drag on for a long time.

"We have the best experts in the world helping the Australian Maritime Agency to find where the best area to search is," he said.

Hard yards ... former Defence Force chief Angus Houston, with Prime Minister Tony Abbott, has warned the search operation for MH370 could take weeks. Source: Getty Images

"At this stage it's very important to pursue the leads, the evidence that has been presented to us. I think they give us a starting point.

Air Chief Marshal Houston said the team was working from "a very uncertain starting point".

"I just wanted to reinforce that because it will take time. It's not something that will necessarily be resolved in the next two weeks, for example.

"We will continue pursuing the search with much vigour."

Air Chief Marshal Houston said the operation was "very complex, very demanding".

"We don't have hard information like we might normally have," he said.

Hunt for debris ... HMAS Success searches for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane. Source: Getty Images

He said unlike MH370, the Air France plane which went down in the Atlantic Ocean in 2009 was flying on a well-travelled route and it still took two years to find the black boxes.

"What we really need now is to find debris, wreckage from the aircraft and that will change the whole nature of our search."

"Inevitably if we don't find wreckage on the surface we are eventually going to have to, probably in consultation with everybody who has a stake in this, review what we do next," he said.

When asked about Danica Weeks - the wife of missing Perth passenger Paul Weeks who visited the RAAF Pearce air base today - Air Chief Marshal Houston said he had passed on his personal phone number to her and urged her to come to the centre for a one-on-one briefing.

He said the updated information about the pilot's final words also provided some clarity.

"The last communication was more formal than what was reported some weeks ago,'' he said.

Wreckage hunt ... former Defence chief Angus Houston says finding debris will change the whole nature of the search. Source: AFP

Meanwhile, Malaysia's Defence and acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein, has been using his Twitter account to answer questions whilst enroute to Hawaii for a defence meeting.

Asked, why is the pilot's wife not being seriously interrogated, Mr Hussein replied: "I am sure she has."

And he said speculation about the pilot was "not fair 2 his family."

Mr Hussein has vowed never to give up in the search for the plane.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has confirmed the Malaysian Prime Minister will visit Perth tomorrow.

Mr Abbott said Najib Razak will see "first-hand" the dedication and skill of the international contingent searching for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane.

"I extended a personal invitation to the Prime Minister to officially visit Australia and receive briefings on the search effort for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370," Mr Abbott said in a statement.

"He will tour RAAF Base Pearce and personally thank the international forces taking part in the search."

"We continue to hope that answers to the baffling mystery behind MH370 will be found to give some comfort to the grieving family and friends of passengers and crew," he added.

Mr Abbott and Defence Minister David Johnston will tour the base with Mr Razak.

Out in force ... Tony Abbott says the Malaysian PM will see "first-hand" the dedication and skill of the international contingent searching for the missing plane. Source: AP

Air Chief Marshal Houston said the role of the Joint Agency Coordination centre was to work with all the agencies - both national and international.

"When the families come to Perth we will be working very closely with them to ensure they hve a seamless experience, a trouble-free experience," he said.

POOR CO-ORDINATION BLAMED FOR DELAYS

Earlier, the Wall Street Journal reported that poor coordination between the many bodies trying to find Flight MH370 has caused delays and confusion in search efforts.

sources "familiar with the matter" as saying the abrupt shift in search area last Friday had been the end product of two separate investigative processes by different international teams of experts trying to establish where the Boeing 777 must have gone down.

One team based the plane's likely speed and rate of fuel consumption upon data extrapolated from radar contacts and aircraft performance modelling based on the manufacturer's data.

A second team focused on tracking and measuring the "pings" from automated data transmitting equipment aboard the aircraft which were recorded by relay satellites, the newspaper said.

It was only when the two groups combined their data that the new search area was established.

The original Southern Ocean search area had been determined by the satellite tracking team. After three days of an unproductive hunt at the extreme edge of search-aircraft endurance, it was suddenly moved about 1000km northeast.

False alarm ... fishing debris spotted in the search for MH370. Pic: Rob Griffith. Source: AFP

This was after the updated speed and fuel-consumption statistics were discovered and taken into account.

The resulting search area follows "the most credible path" for MH370 and focuses on a point at which "the aircraft is likely to have crashed into the water," according to Martin Dolan, chief commissioner of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau.

A spokeswoman for the US National Transportation Safety Board, which contributed to the speed estimate, told The Wall Street Journal: "The teams are working together and concurrently on various aspects of the data."

SEARCH SHIP DEPARTS

Early this morning the Australian naval ship Ocean Shield set sail from Perth en route to the search zone.

Ahead of it go 10 planes and nine ships which will form today's search team, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre said.

Military aircraft from Australia, Malaysia, China, the US, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand will take to the skies.

Weather in the search area is expected to be poor with areas of low visibility.

Ocean Shield itself is carrying a variety of sensors and undersea drones to pinpoint the location of MH370's 'black box' flight data recorders. But the ship does not yet have a final destination.

Wreckage from the missing aircraft must first be recovered and its location plugged into a complex analytics process to determine how far it has been pushed by winds and ocean currents since the aircraft went into the water.

Only then would Ocean Shield have a "start point" for a search for wreckage at the bottom of the ocean.

Ocean route ... info from MarineTraffic.com shows Ocean Shield en route. Source: Supplied

Defence Minister David Johnston says it will take two or three days for the Australian naval vessel to reach the search zone.

The satellite "pinger" within the missing plane's black box has about 30 days of battery life.

"We've got about a week (left), but it depends on the temperature of the water and water depth and pressure as to how long the battery power will last,'' Senator Johnston told ABC radio.

Ocean Shield conducted sea trials of hi-tech detection equipment yesterday before embarking upon its 1850km journey to a tract of the southern Indian Ocean west of Perth.

The trials included a US Navy black box detector, an unmanned underwater vehicle and other acoustic detection equipment.

While the vessel is expected to take up to four days to reach the huge, 319,000 square kilometre search zone, another navy ship, the frigate HMAS Toowoomba, reached the area by midmorning Monday after operating at high speed for two days.

Search continues ... the shadow of a Royal New Zealand Air Force P3 Orion aircraft is seen on low cloud cover while it searches for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane. Source: Getty Images

FINAL WORDS REVISED AGAIN

The last words from the cockpit of MH370 before it disappeared from civilian radar were actually "Good night, Malaysian three seven zero", not "all right, good night" as Malaysian authorities had previously claimed.

The sign off is much more formal than the words that were originally reported.

The final words were said as the plane left Malaysian airspace and was about to enter that of Vietnam at 1.19am on March 8.

The Malaysia Airlines plane then turned around, flew back over Malaysia and disappeared over the southern Indian Ocean, off Perth.

Malaysia's Defence and acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein clarified the sign off via Twitter. Mr Hussein said authorities are currently conducting forensic investigations to determine whether it was pilot Capt Zahari Ahmad Shah or the copilot who said them.

And he said the full transcript of the final conversations between the cockpit of MH370 and air traffic controllers would be released to relatives families at the next briefing.

False account ... Malaysia's acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein. Source: AP

He refused to be drawn about its contents but he said: "I don't think it is going to show anything sinister."

RUDD DEFENDS MALAYSIA OVER SEARCH

Former prime minister Kevin Rudd has defended Malaysia over the search for MH370, declaring we should be "fair" to the country.

"I think it's important to be fair to our friends in Malaysia," Mr Rudd said in an interview with Harvard University, where he is now a senior fellow.

In defence ... Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Razak would have dedicated every single resource available to try to locate the missing plane, says former PM Kevin Rudd. Source: AFP

"I know Prime Minister Najib of Malaysia well. He's a good man. He would have dedicated every single resource available to his government to try to locate this plane," he said.

"Of course not everything has been perfect, it never is."

Mr Rudd, who has a deep interest in China, said his heart goes out to all the families concerned.

"Having been in Beijing recently and going again soon, this has really cut to the quick with so many Chinese families, for whom foreign travel is a relatively new experience," he said.

The ex-Labor leader believes the search, for a common purpose, has broader benefits.

"I think when you've got such a large number of ships and aircraft dedicated to plainly a humanitarian task, it does actually help increase cooperation, but more importantly also levels of trust."

Nightmare ... grieving relatives leave a hotel in Beijing after being told that Flight MH370 had plunged into the Indian Ocean. Source: AFP

"Think about it for a moment, you have high sophisticated surveillance aircraft normally dedicated to military purposes working together at the moment, from the United States, Peoples Republic of China and Australia … for the single humanitarian purpose, out of an Australian airbase and Australian naval base."

DEBRIS HOPES QUASHED AGAIN

Monday proved to be another disappointing day in the search. It now appears the Indian Ocean is strewed with garbage, misleading analysts who thought they were studying satellite images of possible debris fields.

Orange objects spotted by a plane searching for the missing jet on Sunday turned out to be nothing more than fishing equipment.

The orange objects seen by an Australian P-3 Orion spotter plane had been described by pilot Russell Adams as the most promising lead in the search so far.

Yet despite another false alarm, Prime Minister Tony Abbott said the search will not be scaled down.

"I'm certainly not putting a time limit on it ... We can keep searching for quite some time to come,'' Mr Abbott said on Monday at RAAF Pearce, the Perth military base coordinating the operation.

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak will travel to Perth on Wednesday to visit the base and see operations first hand and thank the search teams.

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