The geodiversity of the Indian ocean seafloor revealed by MH370 search data

By: Chad King

Last night, the entire ship’s crew were fortunate enough to listen to a presentation from Kim Picard from Geoscience Australia who was involved with the MH370 search in the Indian Ocean over the past 2 years.

The search was led by a tripartite committee from Malaysia, China and Australia and used multibeam echo sounder equipment to assist in finding the wreckage. During that time, over 700000km² of sea floor was mapped which provided some interesting insights into the geodiversity of the seafloor in that region. Some of the outcomes from the search included that the resolution in this search area was increased from ~15km to 100m, which provided the fine scale geospatial framework that enabled the deep-tow search for debris, as well as providing valuable insights into the geological evolution of the South East Indian Ocean.

Overall the search has contributed to a better understanding of the deep-sea environment and seafloor in this remote region.