Perth - A robot mini-sub
hunting for Malaysian jet MH370 will make a second mission to the remote
southern Indian Ocean seabed on Tuesday after aborting its first search as it
encountered water deeper than its operating limits, officials said.The unmanned
submarine, loaded with sonar to map the ocean floor, was deployed on Monday
night from the Australian ship Ocean Shield, which has spearheaded the hunt for
the Boeing 777 that vanished on March 8."After completing around six hours
of its mission, Bluefin-21 exceeded its operating depth limit of 4 500 metres
and its built in safety feature returned it to the surface," Australia's
Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC) said, without detailing the exact depth
of operations.
"The six hours
of data gathered by the Autonomous Underwater Vehicle is currently being
extracted and analysed," JACC said. The US-made Autonomous Underwater
Vehicle (AUV) had been due to spend up to 16 hours collecting data.US Navy
Captain Mark Matthews explained that the vehicle had exceeded its programmed
operational limit and automatically resurfaced.Matthews, a search and recovery
expert, said the crew would now refine the task to cope with the depth
encountered.The US-made AUV Bluefin-21 would embark on a second mission during
the day, weather permitting, JACC said.
JACC chief Angus
Houston had announced on Monday the end of weeks of listening for signals from
the plane's black boxes and the launch of submarine operations.The vehicle
would survey the silty ocean floor for 16 hours at a time to gather a maximum
amount of data, he said."Bluefin-21 is planned to redeploy later today
when weather conditions permit," JACC added.
Malaysia Airlines
Flight MH370 went missing en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people
on board. The cause of the disappearance remains a mystery, with no debris
found despite an enormous search, involving ships and planes from several
nations.
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