CSIRO engineer Rob Gregor and oceanographer Emlyn Jones deploy the cut-down flaperon used for drift modelling in the search for MH370. Photograph: Supplied by CSIRO

Australia’s chief science agency says it is more confident than ever that it knows the location of the missing flight MH370, as authorities in charge of the search are accused of withholding information.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau’s search for MH370 was suspended indefinitely in January after a deep-sea sonar scan in the southern Indian Ocean failed to find any trace of the plane that vanished in 2014.



New findings now appear to reaffirm the ATSB’s conclusion that the plane most likely crashed north of the area it spent more than two and a half years searching.



On Friday the CSIRO, Australia’s chief science agency, released a report it had prepared for the ATSB, modelling the drift of a genuine Boeing 777 flaperon in the ocean – previous testing had used inexact replicas.

For this analysis, scientists modified a genuine flaperon to mirror the damage that had occurred to the one from MH370 when it was found washed up on Réunion Island in July 2015.

David Griffin, who led the CSIRO research team, said testing an almost identical flaperon “added an extra level of assurance to the findings from our earlier drift modelling work”.



“It indicates that the most likely location of MH370 is in the new search area.

“We cannot be absolutely certain, but that is where all the evidence we have points us, and this new work leaves us more confident in our findings.”

The findings puts the crash site between latitudes 40°S and 30.5°S, reaffirming the ATSB’s conclusion in December that the airliner’s wreck was likely to be in a 25,000 sq km area north of the search area.

Flaperon used for drift modelling in the search for MH370. Photograph: Supplied by CSIRO

However, the transport ministers of Malaysia, China and Australia decided to suspend the search for MH370 until “credible new evidence” pointing to its precise location was found.

In a statement on Friday, Australia’s transport minister, Darren Chester, said he welcomed the CSIRO report.

“But it is important to note that it does not provide new evidence leading to a specific location of MH370.

“This body of ‘drift modelling’ work, along with review of satellite imagery, forms part of the ongoing activities being undertaken by the ATSB in the search for MH370.”

The CSIRO report had been provided to Malaysian authorities, which, Chester reiterated, held overall responsibility for the investigation of MH370’s disappearance.

On Monday the Australian reported that the ATSB had refused to release material about its search for MH370 in response to a freedom of information request, claiming that to do so could “cause damage to the international relations of the commonwealth”.

The ATSB’s chief commissioner, Greg Hood, reviewed and upheld the initial decision to refuse the request in February, stating that its investigation came under the Transport Safety Investigation Act.

He warned that serving or former ATSB employees or consultants risked two years’ imprisonment for disclosing restricted information.

Earlier this week Malaysia Airlines announced that it would become the first airline in the world to monitor all its aircraft with space-based satellites, delivering “minute-by-minute, 100% global, flight-tracking data”.

Daniel Baker, the chief executive and founder of FlightAware, one of the three companies partnering to provide the service to the carrier, described the technology as “the biggest improvement in flight tracking since radar” in a promotional video in September.

“It doesn’t matter if they’re flying over the ocean, if it’s over the desert, if it’s over the North Pole: we’ll know where the plane is.”