Thai satellite spots 300 floating objects in search for MH370
A Thai
satellite is the latest to spot floating objects in the Indian Ocean close to the spot where a massive search operation is on for the Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, reported The Nation daily.
The Thai newspaper said Thailand Earth Observation Satellite (Thaichote) has spotted 300 floating objects about 200 kilometres southwest of the area where multinational aircraft and ships had been scouring the waters for possible debris from the Boeing 777 aircraft.
AFP reported that the objects, ranging from two to 15 metres in size, were scattered over an area about 2,700 kilometres southwest of Perth, Western Australia, according to the Geo-Informatics and Space Technology Development Agency.
"But we cannot - dare not - confirm they are debris from the plane," the agency's executive director, Anond Snidvongs, told AFP.
This is the fifth satellite sightings of possible debris from the plane which disappeared from the radar on March 8.
Based on satellite data, the plane is believed to have crashed into the southern Indian Ocean with no survivors.
The images (see pic below), the daily said, had been given to the caretaker premier who will forward it to Malaysia.
Yesterday, satellite images provided by Airbus Defence and Space based in France taken on March 23, showed 122 potential objects in the southern Indian Ocean.
Acting Transport Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein had said that some of the objects were a metre in length while others were as much as 23 metres in length, adding that some of the objects appeared to be bright, possibly indicating solid material.
The first possible sighting was announced by Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott last Thursday.
He said that a “credible” sighting had been made in the Indian Ocean, about 2,500km southwest of Perth, based on satellite imagery of two large objects.
On Saturday, images taken on March 18 by a Chinese satellite were released, appearing to show an object measuring 22 metres by 13 metres about 1,550km southwest of Perth.
Malaysia also said on Sunday that new French satellite images showed "potential objects" related to the flight in the seas off Australia.
However, none of the objects spotted have been found or positively identified as from the missing aircraft.
On Monday, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak announced that new information from the Inmarsat satellite data showed that flight MH370 ended in the middle of the Indian Ocean, indicating that it had crashed there as there were no possible landing sites in the remote location.
Search efforts for the missing jetliner in the southern Indian Ocean have been temporarily called off due to bad weather, which is expected to last for the next 24 hours.
The Australian Maritime Safety Agency was reported as saying that all planes have returned to Perth but ships will continue searching. – March 27, 2014.
