Malaysia Airlines MH370 hunt to resume in new 55-day Ocean Infinity mission
December 3, 2025
The ‘needle-in-a-haystack without a magnet’ search for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, which vanished in 2014 in one of aviation’s greatest mysteries, is set to resume this month after a new agreement between Malaysia’s government and US-based seabed exploration firm Ocean Infinity.
Malaysia’s transport ministry has confirmed that search operations will restart intermittently from 30 December and continue for up to 55 days. The ministry said the renewed effort “underscores the government of Malaysia’s commitment in providing closure to the families affected by this tragedy”.
What happened to Malaysia Airlines flight MH370?
MH370, a Boeing 777-200ER carrying 239 people from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, disappeared on 8 March 2014 after its transponder and aircraft communications went offline. Military radar later tracked the aircraft turning back across the Malay Peninsula and towards the Andaman Sea before it disappeared from all surveillance.
Despite the largest and most expensive underwater search in aviation history, involving Australia, Malaysia and China, the wreckage was never found. The original search covered 120,000 square kilometres of the southern Indian Ocean and was suspended in 2017 after two years and 200 million dollars of combined spending.
Only scattered debris confirmed to be from MH370 has ever been recovered, found on islands in the western Indian Ocean after drifting on prevailing currents.
Ocean Infinity returns for ‘no find no fee’ mission
Ocean Infinity, which conducted an unsuccessful search in 2018, will lead the new operation under a “no find, no fee” contract that would pay the company a 70 million dollar reward if it locates the wreck. A search attempt earlier this year began in March but was halted shortly afterwards due to poor weather.
The company has repeatedly expressed confidence that improved robotics and mapping technology, along with lessons from the 2018 mission, give the new effort a stronger chance of success. Ocean Infinity says its current fleet of robotic survey vessels is carbon neutral and significantly more efficient than traditional deep-sea platforms
Why is the MH370 search restarting now?
Ocean Infinity submitted a fresh proposal to Malaysia’s transport minister in 2024, outlining a refined search area. Eleven years have now passed since the initial surveys, giving analysts more time to evaluate ocean drift models, satellite data and past search results. Malaysia has signalled that these new methodologies meet the threshold for restarting the search.
Australia, which previously led the initial search effort, had said it would only rejoin if “credible new evidence” emerged about MH370’s location. The Malaysian government has not indicated whether Australia will be involved at this stage.
3/3 Our search for MH370 in 2018 used 80% less fuel and emitted 72% less CO2 than an average survey vessel. Since then, all our efforts have been focused on creating greener, safer, and smarter operations, leading us to build the first ever carbon neutral fleet of #robotic ships. pic.twitter.com/ziViokINcx
— Ocean Infinity (@Ocean__Infinity) November 2, 2021
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Aviation’s greatest mystery
The disappearance of MH370 remains one of the most perplexing events in modern aviation. Despite extensive international investigation and technical analysis, the aircraft’s final resting place has never been pinpointed.
One company was able to use the Doppler effect using satellite pinging to determine that the final ping was somewhere along a large arch in the southern Indian Ocean. This triggered the largest hunt in aviation history.
The restart of the search offers a renewed chance of finding answers, though the Indian Ocean’s depth, remoteness and vast search area continue to make the mission extraordinarily challenging.
