The nine-year-old investigation into the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, which claimed the lives of all 239 passengers and crew onboard, got a recent boost with the help of geoscientists studying the isotopic composition of the oxygen in barnacle shells attached to a flaperon recovered from the aircraft, which drifted for months through the Indian Ocean.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidb...resting-place-of-malaysia-airlines-mh370/amp/
It is hoped that the data could be applied to the largest, oldest barnacles on the debris, the ones that may have attached themselves very soon after the crash, and allow the water temperature close to the time and location of the crash to be calculated.
Since water temperature tracks strongly with latitude in this part of the world, a successful application of the study may produce a smaller probable area to conduct a more focused search in the coming years.
There’s a lot of “hope” and “maybe” in there, but for the families in desperate need of answers for those more generally invested in aviation safety and security, that’s about the best they’ve been getting since the jet vanished in 2014.
Fingers crossed.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidb...resting-place-of-malaysia-airlines-mh370/amp/
It is hoped that the data could be applied to the largest, oldest barnacles on the debris, the ones that may have attached themselves very soon after the crash, and allow the water temperature close to the time and location of the crash to be calculated.
Since water temperature tracks strongly with latitude in this part of the world, a successful application of the study may produce a smaller probable area to conduct a more focused search in the coming years.
There’s a lot of “hope” and “maybe” in there, but for the families in desperate need of answers for those more generally invested in aviation safety and security, that’s about the best they’ve been getting since the jet vanished in 2014.
Fingers crossed.