Zee Media Bureau/Supriya Jha
4:10 pm: Australian Air Force plane drops 84 buoys in search area
As the searchers race against time to locate the missing jet`s black box, Australia`s P-3 Orion military aircraft is said to have dropped 84 buoys some 570 nautical miles off the remote northwest coast of Australia - the same spot where fresh underwater pings were detected, reports the Wall Street Journal.
1:00 pm: Four transmissions heard so far
The two fresh signals heard on late Tuesday brings the number of transmissions detected so far in that area to four as earlier the same Australian Navy ship Ocean Shield had detected two pings on Saturday.
JACC head Angus Houston said that the first ping detected on Tuesday afternoon was heard for more than 5 minutes and in the evening another ping was detected for seven minutes.
12:20 am: Just want to find out the truth, says Malaysian minister
Stressing upon the urgency of finding black box of the missing Malaysia Airlines MH370 plane, Malaysia`s Acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said that the place of the investigation was not important and what mattered most was recovery of black box and the details within.
“Personally, I just want to find the truth. I want to know what happened to MH370. Doesn’t matter how or who or where,” he told The Straits Times in an interview.
11:00 am: Searchers confident of being "in the right area"
In a press conference, JACC chief Angus Houston said that the search area was now reduced to the region of signal detection.
A visual search area of over 75,000 square kilometers was under focus now after the signal detection.
"I believe we are searching in the right area but we need to visually identify aircraft wreckage before we can confirm with certainty that this is the final resting place of MH370."
The JACC added that the autonomous underwater vehicle will be sent down only after surface search possibilities are exhausted.
Search area reduced due to signal detections.
9:50 am: `Signals getting weaker`
Even though Wednesday came with a whiff of positive news for the MH370 investigators as two fresh signals were heard, the search coordinator chief Angus Houston cautioned that the signals were getting weaker, which could mean two things - either the searchers were moving away from the search area or the batteries of the black box pinger were dying.
9:20 am: Detection of more pings sparks optimism in MH370 black box hunt
With Australian ship detecting fresh pings on Tuesday, the optimism has shot up for finding the aircraft.
"I`m now optimistic we`ll find the aircraft, or what`s left of the aircraft, in the not too distant future," said the official.
9:00 am: Australian ship Ocean Shield continues search at northern end of search area
According to JACC statement, the underwater search continued today after the Australian Naval vessel Ocean Shield searching for the pings at the northern end of the defined search area,while Chinese ship Haixun 01 and HMS Echo at the southern end.
8:30 am: Pings heard again by Australian ship; Black Box of MH370 might be found?
In what is further expected to boost the chances of finding black box of the missing Malaysia Airlines jet MH370, Australian Naval ship Ocean Shield equipped with US-Navy supplied black box detector (Towed Pinger Locator) is reported to have detected two more `pings`.
Australian search coordinator Angus Houston told reporters that the signals detected on Tuesday afternoon and evening, were believed to "be consistent with the specification and description of a flight data recorder".
"Ocean Shield has been able to reacquire the signals on two more occasions, late yesterday afternoon and later last night," said Angus Houston, head of the Joint Agency Coordination Centre.
"I believe we are searching in the right area," he said.
Time is running out for locating the black box of the Malaysian jet as the batteries are said to be past their advertised shelf life.
Earlier on Sunday night, Australian ship had detected the pings twice, once for more than two hours and the investigators had called it the most promising lead available.
8:00 am: Search for MH370 resumes on Wednesday with 15 planes, 14 ships
The Joint Agency Coordination Centre has informed that the search continued today with up to 11 military aircraft, four civil aircraft and 14 ships roped in the search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370.
Today`s search area covers about 75,423 square kilometres, centered approximately 2261 kilometres north west of Perth, says AMSA.
A weak front is moving in from the south east, expected to bring scattered showers.
