'A shot in the dark': How a UK firm and a team of scientists used a nineteenth century mathematical model to track missing flight MH370 - and confirmed the worst fears of the families of all passengers and crew



Private satellite company Inmarsat used radar pings and mathematical model to determine MH370 crashed in southern Indian Ocean

Malaysian PM Najib Razak delivered findings and concluded all aboard Boeing 777 had been killed



Inmarsat used nineteenth century model known as 'Doppler effect' to interpret data

'This really was a bit of a shot in the dark... it's to the credit of our scientific team that they managed to model this'

Britain's Air Accidents Investigation Branch also involved in the analysis

Investigators convinced that MH370 was put on a suicide mission



Search delayed by adverse weather conditions

Operation now focussed on 469,407 square miles of southern Indian Ocean



A private British satellite company used a wave phenomenon discovered in the nineteenth century to analyse the seven pings its satellite picked up from Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 and determine its tragic final destination.

The new findings led Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak to conclude that the Boeing 777, which disappeared more than two weeks ago, crashed thousands of miles away in the southern Indian Ocean, killing everyone on board.

Investigators working on the disappearance of the plane believe that it may have been flown on a suicide mission.



Radar pings from MH370, automatically transmitted every hour from the aircraft after the rest of its communications systems had stopped, indicated it continued flying for hours after it disappeared from its flight path from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

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Solution: Inmarsat's scientists analysed the faint pings from MH370 using a technique based on the Doppler effect, which describes how a wave changes frequency relative to the movement of an observer, in this case the satellite. The changes in ping times indicated that the plane was moving south High school students hold candles during a vigil for passengers of the missing Malaysia Airline flight MH370 in Lianyungang, east China's Jiangsu province, on Tuesday Scores of angry relatives of the Chinese passengers aboard Flight MH370 set out on a protest march to the Malaysian embassy in Beijing on March 25 to demand more answers about the crashed plane's fate Nation in mourning: MH370 disappeared on March 8 with more than 150 Chinese passengers on board

Heartache: Selamat Omar, 60, whose son Khairul Amri was on a missing Malaysia Airlines plane, reacts while watching a live broadcast of a press conference by Malaysian acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein on Tuesday

Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Razak tells the families of passengers of MH370 that the plane crashed into the southern Indian Ocean and all aboard were killed Inmasart's crack team used unprecedented analysis to confirm the worst fears of the families of the passengers on board MH370

HOW INMARSAT USED THE DOPPLER EFFECT TO TRACK DOWN MH370'S LAST KNOWN POSITION

British satellite firm Inmarsat discovered on March 9 that MH370 had continued flying for at least another six hours after its last voice transmission from the cockpit at 1.19am on Saturday March 8. It knew this from an electronic 'handshake' that the plane gave to one of its satellites. This placed it in one of two corridors, running north to kazakhstan, or south to the Indian Ocean. The satellite received several more pings from the aircraft, but Inmarsat weren't immediately able to work out its trajectory because the satellite isn't GPS enabled. However, the pings contained hidden clues in their wave frequencies. Inmarsat, using some very clever mathematical modelling, deduced that the frequency of the waves were changing in a way that gave away the plane's locations. It's called the Doppler effect, named after the Austrian physicist Christian Doppler, who proposed it in 1842. He noticed how wave frequencies changed as an observer moved around the source. In modern life we experience it frequently as the sounds of sirens from emergency service vehicles change as they move away from us. A similar effect was occurring with MH370 that enabled Inmarsat to rule out a northerly trajectory. The frequencies of the pings it was returning meant it was travelling south.

From the time the signals took to reach the satellite, belonging to the UK firm Inmarsat, and the angle of elevation, Inmarsat was able to provide two arcs, one north and one south that the aircraft could have taken.

Inmarsat's scientists then interrogated the faint pings using a technique based on the Doppler effect, which describes how a wave changes frequency relative to the movement of an observer, in this case the satellite, a spokesman said.

Britain's Air Accidents Investigation Branch and experts from the European space industry were also involved in the analysis.

The Doppler effect is why the sound of a police car siren changes as it approaches and then overtakes an observer.

Mr Razak said that British firm Inmarsat had employed 'a type of analysis never before used in an investigation of this sort'.



At a press conference in Kuala Lumpur today, Malaysia's transport minister Hishammuddin Hussein gave more details on how the authorities came to the conclusion that the flight had crashed in the southern Indian Ocean.

He said that the plane last communicated with a ground station at 12.11am, but had disappeared by 1.15am, suggesting that its systems either failed or were disabled at some time between those points.



'There is evidence of a partial handshake between the aircraft and ground station at 0019 UTC (GMT),' he said. 'At this time, this transmission is not understood and is subject to further ongoing work.'



The minister added: 'The new analysis was convincing enough to brief the prime minister that MH370 flew along the south corridor.



'This type of analysis has never been done in an investigation of this type - this is a developing situation, and as soon as we know more we will share it.'



Mr Hussein confirmed that the search had been called off in the 'northern corridor' stretching up to the Caspian Sea, saying that it was now focussed on an area of 469,407 square miles to the south-west of Australia.

How events unfolded: The plane went missing on March 8, with a British satellite firm tracking its last known location to an area in the Indian Ocean that's 622,000 square miles

Chris McLaughlin, Inmarsat's senior vice president, explained how his firm was able to conclude the aircraft definitely flew south, with assistance from Britain's Air Accidents Investigation Branch



Inmarsat's satellite technology was crucial to detecting radar pings, and providing the compelling evidence as to the tragic fate of MH370 TIMELINE OF INMARSAT'S DATA CRUNCHING

Sunday March 9

Inmarsat discovered that the plane had been flying for a further six hours after its last contact with air traffic controllers on March 8.

Sunday March 9 and Monday March 10

Studied data to confirm this was the case

Tuesday March 11

Established that aircraft was moving either north or south towards the Indian Ocean

Between March 11 and 23

Inmarsat crunched the data and looked at ping returns from comparable Boeing flights, eventually ruling out a northerly trajectory.

This data was peer reviewed by colleagues and scientists in Europe's space industry.

Monday March 24

Result - that southern route was the only route - submitted to the UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch.



Chris McLaughlin, Senior Vice President, External Affairs, at Inmarsat, told MailOnline that the data couldn't be released immediately because it 'was being cross-checked by all manner of parties'. Malaysia Airlines chief executive Ahmad Jauhari Yahya said that the plane did not have enough fuel to stay in the air above the Indian Ocean for more than a few hours.

He added that the area where the flight is believed to have come down is so remote that the prospect of anyone on board surviving for more than two weeks is 'extremely remote'.

Speaking to BBC News today, Chris McLaughlin, Inmarsat's senior vice president, explained how his firm was able to conclude the aircraft definitely flew south.

He said: 'We took Malaysian 777 airline data and modeled that against the northern and southern path and what we discovered was that the path to the south is undoubtedly the one taken.'

Asked why it took so long, he said: 'We have been dealing with a totally new area, we have been trying to help an investigation based on a single signal once and hour from an aircraft that didn't include any GPS data or any time and distance information so this really was a bit of a shot in the dark and it is to the credit of our scientific team that they managed to model this.'

The new data revealed that MH370 flew along the southern corridor where investigators had said the plane could have travelled along, based on pings sent several hours after it disappeared on March 8.

Investigators had drawn up two huge search areas in two large arcs - a northern corridor stretching from Malaysia to Central Asia and a southern corridor extending down towards Antartica.

Still searching: Commanding Officer of HMAS Success, Captain Allison Norris, is guiding the mission to recover wreckage - but adverse weather conditions that may take some time