Families make plea as MH370 search nears end

Families make plea as MH370 search nears end

KUALA LUMPUR - Relatives of passengers who were onboard a Malaysia Airlines jet that disappeared more than two years ago have pleaded with the Australian, Chinese and Malaysian governments to keep looking for the missing aircraft.

The relatives' concerns were raised after the head of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, which was leading the underwater search for MH370 in the southern Indian Ocean, said there was no indication that the search would be continued beyond August after the designated 120,000 sq. km of ocean had been combed through.

"We are gravely concerned about the impending completion of the search in the current targeted area," the Voice370 group told Agence France-Presse. Voice370 is made up of the families of the 239 people onboard on the plane, which was en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8 2014 when it disappeared. Voice370 aims "to seek the truth about the incident and find our loved ones onboard MH370," according to the group's Facebook page.

ATSB Chief Executive Martin Dolan said on May 20 that there was a "diminishing level of confidence we will find the aircraft," but added that "the remaining 13,000 sq. km is still a lot of territory and it's still entirely possible the aircraft is there."

The authorities' increasing pessimism marks a change from past statements that the search would be a success. Dolan said in July 2015 that MH370 "will be found within the next year." Malaysia's Minister of Defence Hishammuddin Hussein was similarly confident in October 2014 when he said: "We are looking in the right place, we're talking about 99.9 per cent."

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