Australian officials have released a topographic visualization of what lies at the bottom of the Indian Ocean, which was made in the search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.
The Australian Transport Safety Bureau released a video of the seafloor, located hundreds of miles west of Western Australia. The images are made from what the search vessels are recording during the search for the plane, as seen in this video below:
The video was created after data was gathered via a multibeam sonar that provided high resolution data.
“The image is a synthetic aperture sonar acoustic image of the seafloor gathered by GO Phoenix,” reads a statement from the agency, according to News.com.au. “This is indicative of the resolution and quality of the data and that it is revealing important detail of the seafloor.”
The GO Phoenix and Furgo Discovery ships are working to scan the ocean floor, which is about 6,000 meters (3.7 miles) beneath the ocean’s surface. There’s a lack of data about the southern Indian Ocean’s floor.
More than 9,000 square kilometers has been searched so far, which is about 16 percent of the overall search area.
“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,” said a statement.
“The equipment used on the vessels is providing extraordinary data.”
