Hunt for jet follows ‘best lead’

Search now off Australian coast

A freighter and planes searched the rough seas today of one of the remotest places on Earth for a missing Malaysia plane, following up on what authorities said was the “best lead” so far in the massive hunt for the jet.

Australian satellite images detected large pieces of debris floating about 1,000 miles off the coast of Australia and halfway to the desolate islands of the Antarctic. Planes and ships were in the area by this morning at daybreak.

One of the objects on the satellite image was almost 80 feet long and the other was 15 feet.

There could be other objects in the area, a four-hour flight from Australia, said John Young, manager of the Australian Maritime Safety Authority's emergency response division.

“This is a lead, it’s probably the best lead we have right now,” Young said. He cautioned that the objects could be seaborne debris

“The chances of it being debris from the airplane are probably small.” Jason Middleton, aviation professor at University of New South Wales in Sydney

along a shipping route where containers can fall off cargo vessels, although the larger object is longer than a container.

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared March 8 with 239 people aboard on a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

Another analyst said the debris is most likely not pieces of the missing Boeing 777 jetliner, and that this could be the latest in a string of false leads since the plane disappeared. “The chances of it being debris from the airplane are probably small, and the chances of it being debris from other shipping are probably large,” said Jason Middleton, an aviation professor at University of New South Wales in Sydney.

A Norwegian merchant ship was the first vessel on the scene in a tight, 16-nautical-mile area 1,550 miles southwest of Perth, Australia, where authorities believe the possible debris was floating. Search planes were also sent to the vicinity and other ships were en route.

Australian authorities asked the St. Petersburg merchant ship, which was en route to Perth, to take a more southerly approach two days ago to the search site, officials of the Norwegian shipping company Höegh Autoliners told Norwegian newspaper VG.

“Our mission is to be the eyes and ears in the area and to look for things in the water,” said Olva Sollie, a vice president for the company.