Search teams hunting for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 are facing a closing weather window, with still no sign of the Boeing 777's wreckage.
Specialist organisation Ocean Infinity's chief, Oliver Plunkett, says that the lack of positive results is "disappointing" – although the company has been pleased by the performance of its technological systems.
The search, which began towards the end of January, was originally expected to take around 90 days.
Weather conditions, as the southern hemisphere approaches its winter season, are likely to limit the company's ability to continue searching this year, but its vessel – the Seabed Constructor – will be heading to the exploration zone for a final effort, once it undergoes resupply at Freemantle shortly.
Ocean Infinity says it has searched almost 80,000km². Plunkett states that the search has gathered "significant amounts of high-quality data", particularly in the vicinity of the plateau known as Broken Ridge.
"There is still some search time remaining," he adds. "Everyone at Ocean Infinity remains absolutely determined for the remainder of the search."
Flight MH370 vanished while en route to Beijing in March 2014. Extensive searches have failed to determine the crash site, suspected to be located in the southern Indian Ocean, although a number of pieces of debris from the jet have washed ashore.
Source: Cirium Dashboard
