Ten Years After Flight MH370 Vanished, the Mystery Endures

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 vanished with 239 people onboard on March 8, 2014. A decade later, it remains one of the most enduring aviation mysteries.

The plane’s disappearance sparked a sprawling, years-long search operation involving 30 countries, not to mention an in-depth analysis on Australia’s “60 Minutes” and a Netflix docuseries.

This past week, at a memorial event to mark the 10th anniversary of the jet’s disappearance, Malaysian Transportation Minister Anthony Loke said the government is open to a further search operation if there is credible evidence. An American company recently submitted a proposal to the government, sparking hope for closure among families of those who went missing.

Here’s a timeline of key events.

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2014: Flight MH370 vanishes

In the early hours of March 8, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing suddenly dropped from radar. There were 227 passengers and 12 crew members aboard the aircraft, a Boeing 777. The passengers represented 14 nations, but most were Chinese. None was heard from again.

The last communication from the plane was 38 minutes after takeoff, when it was over the South China Sea. Military radar captured it veering dramatically off its intended path, heading westward, before the signal was lost. It is believed to have fallen into the Indian Ocean inside Australia’s search and rescue area.

A search commenced, and Malaysian, Australian and Chinese authorities agreed to comb more than 23,000 square miles of ocean for evidence.

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2015: Malaysia declares MH370 an accident

Malaysian officials in January 2015 declared the disappearance of Flight 370 an accident and the passengers and crew aboard presumed dead, paving the way for the airline to pay settlements to the families.

The underwater search area was doubled to 46,300 square miles in April 2015 by Malaysia, Australia and China.

A clue appeared in July 2015, about 2,800 miles away from the search area. A piece of debris that was strikingly similar to a movable wing part found on Boeing 777s washed up on the small French island of Réunion in the Indian Ocean. French experts who examined the part, known as a flaperon, concluded that it belonged to the ill-fated plane.

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2016: More pieces of debris probably from MH370 found

More pieces of debris were recovered from several countries: part of a wing from the Indian Ocean island nation of Mauritius, just east of Réunion, segments of a door and the engine from beaches in Mauritius and South Africa, a section of a wing’s outboard flap off the coast of Tanzania, and pieces of a wing from Mozambique.

In May, the head of Australia’s Transport Safety Bureau, Martin Dolan, acknowledged the “decreasing possibility” of finding the missing plane.

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2017: Search by Malaysia, Australia and China ends

An underwater search of a section of the Indian Ocean between May 2014 and January 2017 ended without success. Australia led the operation with support from Malaysia and China, and officials from the three nations said the decision to call off the effort “has not been taken lightly nor without sadness.”

“Despite every effort using the best science available, cutting edge technology, as well as modeling and advice from highly skilled professionals who are the best in their field, unfortunately, the search has not been able to locate the aircraft,” they said in a statement.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau said in its report that the reason for the mysterious disappearance of the plane cannot be determined without locating the aircraft.

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2018: Search by Ocean Infinity; Malaysian aviation chief resigns over safety report

In January, Texas-based company Ocean Infinity began a new search for the plane’s wreckage, scouring 43,000 square miles of ocean based on drift analysis of the debris. It contracted with the Malaysian government for up to $70 million on a “no find, no fee” basis but came up short after more than three months of deploying unmanned vehicles equipped with underwater sonar.

In July, Malaysian authorities released a safety investigation report concluding that the plane was manually turned around from its flight path and ruling out a mechanical or computer failure as the reason for the plane’s disappearance.

The 495-page report pointed to lapses by Malaysia’s Air Traffic Control and prompted the resignation of the civil aviation chief.

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2024: Possibility of a fresh search operation touted

Family members of those who went missing with the flight demand answers and are pushing for the search to continue. Speaking at a remembrance with the families this week, Malaysia’s transportation minister, Loke, said that the government was ready to invite Ocean Infinity to discuss another “no-find, no-fee” search using new technology if credible evidence was ascertained. “I will do everything possible to get the cabinet’s approval to sign a new contract with Ocean Infinity for the search to resume as soon as possible,” he said.

The company’s chief executive, Oliver Plunkett, confirmed in an email that it had submitted a fresh proposal and that “we hope to get back to the search soon.” Since its last attempt, he added, the company has enhanced its ocean search capabilities with robotics and other technology.

One expert said a new search was warranted.

“On the one hand, the mystery, per se, may not be solved completely. Because I don’t know how much evidence is there to say what actually happened to the plane,” said Charitha Pattiaratchi, a professor of coastal oceanography at the University of Western Australia who has conducted drift analysis to predict the wreckage’s location. “But finding the wreckage, it will finally bring some closure to the actual people who lost their loved ones.”

(c) 2024, The Washington Post · Niha Masih, Frances Vinall