Images and video show MH370 underwater search area

The organisation mapping the seafloor in the search for the wreckage of MH370, has released a video and images showing the underwater area it is exploring.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) is leading the search in the southern Indian Ocean for the Boeing-777 aircraft that disappeared on Mar. 8 while flying from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to Beijing, China, with 239 people on board.

ATSB with Geoscience Australia used bathymetry, the study and mapping of the seafloor by obtaining measurements of the depth of the ocean, before the search for MH370 began. The survey vessels spent months at sea with multibeam sonar, gathering high-resolution data so the search could be undertaken in a safe and effective manner.

It is the first time some of the seabed features in the Indian Ocean have been viewed, as certain areas were more than six kilometres in depth and had never before been explored.

The computer-animated "flythrough," captured by search vessel GO Phoenix, shows parts of the seafloor terrain in the search area. The ATSB also released a "synthetic aperture sonar acoustic image" of the seafloor gathered by GO Phoenix.

“This is indicative of the resolution and quality of the data and that it is revealing important detail of the seafloor,” according to ATSB.

The search area being covered is focussed on the 7th arc, after ATSB research determined this was the likely crash zone.

"The latest information and analysis confirms that MH370 will be found in close proximity to the arc set out in the map and labelled as the 7th arc," ATSB wrote in an update on Dec. 10. "At the time MH370 reached this arc, the aircraft is considered to have exhausted its fuel and to have been descending."

So far, an area of roughly 200,000 square kilometres has been surveyed in the search for the wreckage, while 9,000 square kilometres of the seafloor has been searched. The vessels used for the search include Fugro Equator, for bathymetric survey operations, while Fugro Discovery and GO Phoenix arrived back in the area at the beginning of December to continue underwater search operations.

"In addition to locating the aircraft, the underwater search aims to map the MH370 debris field in order to identify and prioritise the recovery of specific aircraft components, including flight recorders, which will assist with the Malaysian investigation," ATSB said in the latest report.