SYDNEY: Salvagers are confident debris and human remains can be recovered if Malaysia Airlines MH370 is finally found, despite the pitch-black darkness, crushing pressure and ice-cold water awaiting them.
The disappearance of the Boeing 777 carrying 239 passengers and crew almost four years ago is one of aviation’s greatest mysteries, with an Australian-led hunt across a 120,000 square-kilometer (46,000 square-mile) zone failing to reveal the crash site.
Yet a new probe now underway by private firm Ocean Infinity — commissioned by Malaysia on a “no find, no fee” basis — has revived hopes the doomed plane might be found.
If the wreckage is located in treacherous terrain up to six kilometers (19,685 feet) deep — far off Western Australia and north of the earlier search site — experts say high-tech underwater robots can handle the demands of recovery.
“They (searchers) are working at the extreme edge of what’s capable,” South African salvage master Nick Sloane, who led the operation to recover the stricken Italian cruise ship Costa Concordia, told AFP.
“(But) the benefits to the manufacturers of the aeroplane, operators and the families are that if you actually locate the wreckage, it’s worthwhile to go ahead and take the next step and recover it.”
That expedition would require cutting-edge technology, likely last months and potentially cost more than the maximum $70 million reward Malaysia is offering Ocean Infinity, according to deep-ocean salvagers.
To aid the previous search — the largest in aviation history — the ocean floor was mapped in detail for the first time, revealing the varied underwater terrain.
It showed seafloors more than 4,700 meters deep, vast mountains 1,500-meters high and kilometers wide, deep canyons and massive underwater landslides of sediment, Geoscience Australia said.
If debris is found between 2,000-6,000 meters — known as the abyssal zone — salvagers would work in a perpetually dark and near-freezing region where the pressure can reach up to 9,000 pounds per square inch (psi).
Wreckage has been recovered from such depths previously: Air France 447 at nearly 4,000 meters in the Atlantic, the cargo ship El Faro (4,500 meters) off the coast of the Bahamas, and South African Airways 295 (4,900 meters) off Mauritius — far deeper than where oil and gas companies operate.
Machines that can operate at such extremes include deep-ocean operator Odyssey Marine Exploration’s remotely-operated vehicles, which have frames constructed out of high-strength aluminum. A handful of other companies have similar technology.
The ROV, tethered to the mother ship, is fitted with LED lights that illuminate the dark environment and can record high-definition footage, Odyssey Marine’s chief operating officer John Longley told AFP.
The submersible — remotely driven by pilots on a surface ship — has two manipulator arms that function like “human hands” and can retrieve smaller objects, added deep-sea shipwreck hunter David Mearns.
Larger parts such as the jet’s wings can be brought to the surface using baskets or slings.
Mearns said such underwater journeys could take several hours with the overall mission possibly lasting up to half a year.
“But once you get into a position on the seabed, it’s remarkable the dexterity of these ROVs in terms of what they can do,” he added.
On the surface, the ROV pilots would be supported by a vast array of hardware — including support vessels — as well as crew that could number more than 100, senior salvage master Wytse Huismans of high-profile global operator SMIT Salvage told AFP.
The team would also have to grapple with rough seas — which could make its vessels inoperable during the winter in a few months’ time — and the remoteness of the area, which is several sailing days from Australia’s Fremantle port.
But not all parts of the wreckage have to be recovered to determine what may have happened, the experts said, stressing that the black boxes could still hold key clues to the airliner’s disappearance.
Other parts of the wreckage may be hauled to the surface if needed to help unravel the mystery.
Most of the plane’s debris is likely scattered within a 1.5-kilometer field, wreck-hunter Mearns told AFP.
“So even if it’s in a challenging environment in terms of the terrain, they will have the capability to handle it, to recover it,” he said, adding that a priority would be to retrieve human remains.
From the Air France 447 wreckage, “also at a very extreme depth in the middle of the ocean, they were able to recover surprisingly a large number of bodies,” he told AFP.
“I think the authorities owe them (victims’ families) the highest possible level of sensitivity to their needs.”
Extreme conditions await MH370 recovery if wreckage found
Extreme conditions await MH370 recovery if wreckage found
Survivors still trapped after deadly Tanzania building collapse
- The four-story block came down at around 9:00 a.m. on Saturday in the east African country’s busy Kariakoo market
- Dar es Salaam has been the scene of a frenetic property boom with buildings shooting up at speed, often with scant regard for regulations
The four-story block came down at around 9:00 am (0600 GMT) on Saturday in the east African country’s busy Kariakoo market, in the center of the commercial capital Dar es Salaam.
Five people have been confirmed dead from the disaster, the fire brigade said. At least 70 people had been retrieved alive from the site.
Dar es Salaam regional commissioner Albert Chalamila on Sunday said there were more people still trapped in the basement floor of the shattered building, without specifying how many.
“We are communicating... and already we have supplied them with oxygen and water,” he said.
“They are stable and we believe they will be rescued alive and safe.”
The fire brigade chief John Masunga said the search and rescue had been hampered by the many walls making up the structure of the building.
In the aftermath of the building’s floors rapidly buckling beneath each other until they formed a mountain of debris, hundreds of first responders used sledgehammers and their bare hands to pull away masonry for hours.
Cranes and other heavy lifting equipment were then brought in to help.
It is not clear why the commercial building collapsed but witnesses told local media that construction to expand its underground business space began on Friday.
The incident has renewed criticism over unregulated construction in the Indian Ocean city of more than five million people.
One of the world’s fastest growing cities, Dar es Salaam has been the scene of a frenetic property boom with buildings shooting up at speed, often with scant regard for regulations.
In 2013, a 16-story building collapsed in Dar es Salaam, killing 34 people.
Indian police battle Maoist rebels, five killed
- More than 10,000 people have died in the insurgency against the Maoists
- The clash took place in regions bordering Kanker and Narayanpur
RAIPUR, India: Indian security forces have killed five Maoist rebels in jungle clashes, an officer said Sunday, as security forces seek to quash the decades-long insurgency in the resource-rich central regions.
Gun battles took place in the Abujhmad forests of Chhattisgarh state on Saturday, taking the toll of the conflict in 2024 to around 200, one of the highest in years.
More than 10,000 people have died in the insurgency against the Maoists — known as the Naxalite movement, who say they are fighting for the rights of marginalized indigenous people.
“In the gunbattle five Maoists have been killed,” senior police officer P. Sunderraj said, adding that two of the rebels were women.
The clash took place in regions bordering Kanker and Narayanpur, with police seizing rifles and ammunition from the corpses.
Two officers were wounded in the clash.
India’s government has warned the insurgents to surrender, with Amit Shah, the interior minister, saying in September that he expected the rebellion to be defeated by early 2026.
The Naxalites, named for the district where their armed campaign began in 1967, were inspired by the Chinese revolutionary leader Mao Zedong.
They demanded land, jobs and a share of the region’s immense natural resources for the local people, and made inroads in a number of remote communities.
India claimed to have confined the insurgency to about 45 districts in 2023, down from 96 in 2010.
Authorities have pumped in millions of dollars for new investments in local infrastructure projects and social spending.
India’s successful test of hypersonic missile puts it among elite group
- Missile is designed to carry payloads for ranges exceeding 1,500 km for armed forces
- India is striving to develop long-range missiles along with China, Russia and United States
NEW DELHI: India has successfully tested a domestically developed long-range hypersonic missile, it said on Sunday, attaining a key milestone in military development that puts it in a small group of nations possessing the advanced technology.
The global push for hypersonic weapons figures in the efforts of some countries, such as India, which is striving to develop advanced long-range missiles, along with China, Russia and the United States.
The Indian missile, developed by the state-run Defense Research and Development Organization and industry partners, is designed to carry payloads for ranges exceeding 1,500 km (930 miles) for the armed forces, the government said in a statement.
“The flight data ... confirmed the successful terminal maneuvers and impact with high degree of accuracy,” it added.
The test-firing took place from Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam island off the eastern coast of Odisha state on Saturday, it said.
Defense Minister Rajnath Singh called the test a “historic achievement” in a post on X, adding that it placed India among a select group of nations possessing such critical and advanced technologies.
Russia targets Ukraine’s power grid in ‘massive’ missile strike, officials say
- Ukrainians have been bracing for a major attack on the hobbled power system for weeks
- A crippling damage to the grid that would cause long blackouts and build psychological pressure
KYIV: Blasts rang out across Ukraine’s capital Kyiv and other cities early on Sunday, as Russia staged its biggest missile attack since August and targeted power facilities with the winter setting in, officials said.
Ukrainians have been bracing for a major attack on the hobbled power system for weeks, fearing crippling damage to the grid that would cause long blackouts and build psychological pressure at a critical moment in the war Russia launched in February 2022.
“Another massive attack on the power system is under way. The enemy is attacking electricity generation and transmission facilities throughout Ukraine,” Ukrainian Energy Minister German Galushchenko wrote on Facebook.
Air defenses could be heard engaging drones over the capital in the night, and a series of powerful blasts rang out across the city center as the missile attack was under way in the morning.
The scale of the damage was not immediately clear. Officials cut power supply to numerous city districts, including in Kyiv, the surrounding region and Dnipropetrovsk region, in what they said was a precaution to prevent a surge in case of damage.
Authorities in the Volyn region in northwestern Ukraine said energy infrastructure had sustained damage but did not elaborate. Officials often withhold information on the state of the power system because of the war.
In Mykolaiv in the south, two people were killed in the overnight drone attack, the regional governor said. Blasts shook the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia and the Black Sea port of Odesa, Reuters witnesses said. More blasts were reported in the regions of Kryvyi Rih in the south and Rivne in the west.
“Russia launched one of the largest air attacks: drones and missiles against peaceful cities, sleeping civilians, critical infrastructure,” said Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha.
He described the strike as Moscow’s “true response” to leaders who had interacted with President Vladimir Putin, an apparent swipe at German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who placed a phone call to the Russian leader on Friday for the first time since late 2022.
NATO member Poland, which borders Ukraine to the west, said it had scrambled its air force within its airspace as a security precaution due to the Russian attack, which it said used cruise missiles, ballistic missiles and drones.
Poland “activated all available forces and resources at his disposal, the on-duty fighter pairs were scrambled, and the ground-based air defense and radar reconnaissance systems reached the highest state of readiness,” the operational command of its armed forces posted on X.
Ukraine’s air force urged residents to take cover, providing regular updates on the progress of Russian cruise, ballistic and hypersonic missiles it said were hurtling through Ukrainian air space.
In Kyiv, the roof of a residential building caught fire due to falling debris and at least two people were hurt, city officials said on the Telegram messaging app.
“Emergency services were dispatched to the scene,” Kyiv’s Mayor Vitali Klitschko said.
Russia last conducted a major missile strike on Kyiv on Aug. 26, when officials said it fired a salvo of more than 200 drones and missiles across the country in an attack that attack killed seven people.
Trump and team get warm welcome at UFC fight night
- US President-elect enters arena shortly before the start of the main card accompanied by UFC chief executive Dana White
- Trump frequently attends UFC events and attended three fights during his campaign for the White House
NEW YORK: US President-elect Donald Trump was greeted by chanting fans as he attended the Ultimate Fighting Championship heavyweight bout at New York’s Madison Square Garden on Saturday.
Trump entered the arena shortly before the start of the main card accompanied by UFC chief executive Dana White, who was a prominent backer during his election campaign.
Several political allies of Trump were also in attendance for the mixed-martial arts fights, including entrepreneurs Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, who have been asked by Trump to lead efforts to cut government inefficiency.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who Trump has nominated to be health secretary, was also at the fight and a photo posted on X showed the pair flying to the event together on Trump’s private plane.
The night had the feel of a post-election night out for the Republicans.
Tulsi Gabbard, the former Democratic congresswoman tapped for the role of director of national intelligence, was also in the crowd along with Trump’s sons Eric and Don Jr and musician Kid Rock — a regular at Trump rallies.
After waving to the chanting crowd, Trump warmly greeted UFC broadcast analyst Joe Rogan, the popular podcast host who also endorsed Trump after he appeared as a guest on his show.
The venue’s “jumbotron” giant screen above the cage where fighters did battle then showed a video featuring highlights of the election campaign with soundbites from Trump.
The film ended with the numbers 45 and 47 on the screen, representing the Republican’s previous and upcoming presidency.
Fans chanted “USA, USA,” a refrain frequently heard at Trump rallies, including one he held at Madison Square Garden last month.
Trump watched the fights alongside Musk from front row seats next to the caged octagon.
After Jon Jones defended his heavyweight title with a third-round technical knockout against fellow American Stipe Miocic in the main event, the fighter celebrated with Trump’s trademark ‘YMCA’ dance.
“I want to say a big thank you to President Donald Trump for being here tonight,” said Jones, receiving a huge roar of approval from the crowd.
After leading the crowd in another round of “USA, USA” chant, Jones then passed his heavyweight championship belt to Trump and spent some time in conversation with the President-elect.
Trump frequently attends UFC events and attended three fights during his campaign for the White House.
His ties to the fight world run deep. He featured retired WrestleMania star Hulk Hogan at the Republican convention in August and hosted UFC bouts at his casinos in the early days, when the series struggled to gain traction and well before it became today’s multi-billion success.
