Page 5 - Hms Echo News Today

>> yeah, i think so. its a -- i think its like a maritime order. when you have a ship in trouble you go help it. this is not under that order but i think that this is where the united states is proven to be available for whatever its needed for, even if there were only a few people involved in that plane. >> what joes piece in the story didnt mention is these are mainly military assets being used and as a former military pilot, what do you think of that, mikey? >> i think its the best equipment ...

Yards off the ocean floor and with an expensive and highly sensitive piece of equipment like this, you dont want it colliding with things, getting stuff and losing valuable time. thats whey thooy theyre waiti that and focusing on the work on the surface. the ships like the hms echo. what it can do is give them a better picture before they start, wolf, of what theyre taking pictures of so hopefully when they put the bluefin down there, it can be the most productive. because the big production to ...

20,000 feet. >> yeah. the advantage of these buoys, the sonobuys is they can hang just below the thermolayer. above that you can block the sound because the density of the water is different. these can be very quiet. theres no ship at all. these have no ship attached. they are dropped by an airplane and thats fantastic. just perfect quiet. >> the quiet is an important part of this, mary, because we have the "ocean shield" which obviously has been taking the lead in trying to track the pings and ...

Plane. it landed in the water down here listening for pings, only listening, not pinging itself. these are only the passive, only the listeners back up at the top is the antenna and it sends it back up to where the airplane is. this is marine traffic.com. we have heard all about these ships out there. we can finally show you one. here is is a live picture of what ocean shield has done over the past 12 hours. it is here going back and forth over this. i have measured this square, about 47 square ...

More before they run out. this is day 34 for the batteries on the locaters. they are meant to last 30 days or so. so they are running down. the more pings they can narrow the search down. they have the ship out there towing it around. interestingly we were on a website that tracks ships a few moments ago and saw a british ship the "hms echo," it is a ocean ship that can map the bottom if you like. it is headed in that direction which is interesting. we havent heard anything official on that. the...

Whats the latest. we know that theyve searched that -- theyve narrowed that search area, but it is still slow going as they listen for more sounds, more acoustic events, as they call them, from these black boxes. >> reporter: thats right, christine. a short while ago, i spoke to a spokesperson from the british ministry of defense, who told me that the "hms echo," which is a british vessel, is currently on its way to join the australian vessel, the "ocean shield." she says its making its way ther...

Several hundred miles further west. why? because if there was any debris, theres been a series of storms over the last few weeks, and thats the direction any debris would have gone because of those storms. now, the flight data recorders might be on the bottom where that locater is at the moment but the debris could be much further west and thats why we see ships in that area looking for debris and one ship tows the ping locater looking for the all-important black boxes. as i say, it is interesti...

Was narrowed, shrinking by some 7,000 square miles. cnns erin mclaughlin live in perth, australia. and erin, i understand some new resources heading to that now narrowed region. >> reporter: thats right, john, new resources in the form of the "hms echo," the british vessel. i spoke to the spokesperson from the ministry of defense there in the uk this morning. she told me that it is on route to join the australian vessel, the "ocean shield," to offer its support. she said its been deployed becaus...

Midnight for us here. but whether they detected anything else from the time that they last announced it, we dont know. its quite possible. now you have the pinger locator. you have the sonabuoys in area and also have hms echo. so lots of assets. f they are listening for those pings. will we get good news later on today? im going to bet the search crews are hoping so, wolf. >> are you surprised, miles, 35 days in theyre still hearing pings? >> you know, aviation is the kind of thing where theres ...

Stage in this search. as far as we know right now, the "ocean shield" equipped with that american-operated towed pinger locator is still out there scouring the oceans, trying to pick up more pings. and yesterday, angus houston, the man responsible for coordinating this multinational effort, saying that the more pings they manage to reacquire, the more information they have to be able to narrow down a search and then deploy that underwater autonomous vehicle. he also said that they wanted to be c...