Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 disappeared on 8 March 2014 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 passengers and crew on board.

Current Status

On 17 January 2017, the tripartite Ministers of Australia, Malaysia and China announced that consistent with decisions made in their July 2016 Ministerial Tripartite meeting in Putrajaya Malaysia, as the aircraft has not been located in the agreed search area, the search for MH370 has been suspended.

The tripartite Ministers Joint Communique is available on the communique's web page.

Definition of the Search Area

All the evidence, based on independent analysis of satellite, radar and aircraft performance data from many international experts, indicated the aircraft entered the sea close to a long but narrow arc in the southern Indian Ocean. This arc was the focus of the underwater search efforts.

The ATSB was responsible for defining the search area and coordinated a search strategy group beginning in May 2014. The group worked to define the most probable position of the aircraft at the time of the last satellite communications. The group brought together satellite and aircraft specialists from the following organisations:

• Air Accidents Investigation Branch (UK)
• Boeing (US)
• Defence Science and Technology Organisation (Australia)
• Department of Civil Aviation (Malaysia)
• Inmarsat (UK)
• National Transportation Safety Board (US)
• Thales.

The work of the search strategy group continued during the search.  Information on the ATSB’s activities is available at www.atsb.gov.au