Bluefin 21 Completes Two-Thirds of Flight 370 Sea Floor Search

Search area for Monday and Tuesday

As the 45-day mark in the search for the missing Malaysia Airlines jet struck, a Malaysian government met with relatives of the passengers who were on the ill-fated flight to discuss possible compensation, while an autonomous underwater vehicle continued to scour the ocean floor looking for signs of wreckage.

Malaysia’s deputy foreign affairs minister, Hamzah Zainuddin, who heads a government committee overseeing the needs of the next of kin, held meetings with passengers’ relatives in Kuala Lumpur Sunday to look at next steps including financial assistance.  He told reporters that family members were invited to submit a plan for compensation and that the government or Malaysia Airlines could possibly set up a fund for this purpose.

Meanwhile, family members were visibly unhappy with the results of the meeting and issued a statement that talk of a settlement was premature, saying nothing should be discussed until “at least a tiny bit of concrete evidence” relating to Flight 370 is found.

“No meaningful report on the progress of the investigation was given,” the statement said, and “not a single” question from the relatives was addressed.

In the search zone, the autonomous underwater vehicle tasked with the search of the sea floor for the missing Malaysia Airlines jetliner completed its ninth mission Monday with “no contacts of interest” found, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre said.

The Bluefin 21 has completed a scan of roughly two-thirds of the ocean floor within the search zone at this point.

The air-and-sea search continued Monday as well, with up to ten military aircraft and 11 ships participating.