How barnacles could solve the mystery of the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight

Barnacles could hold the key to answers about what happened to the missing MH370 plane, an expert has claimed.

The Malaysia Airways flight MH370 went missing on 8 March 2014. Aside from some pieces of debris that have washed ashore, the aircraft has yet to be located.

However, one scientist has claimed that the mystery could be solved as they begin tracing the ocean temperature through barcanales.

It is thought that charting the rapidly changing temperature of the ocean and analysing barnacles on debris could help reconstruct the drift path and lead to the crash site of the aircraft.

The unusual theory and method come after a 6-month long private search in 2018 failed to find any trace of where the aircraft could have come down in the Indian Ocean.

Associate Professor Gregory Herbert from the University of South Florida, hopes the new plan may provide more answers, having got the idea from analysing plane debris that had washed ashore on Reunion Island.

From the debris, researchers have been able to trace partial drift paths from the shells of barnacles and it is hoped the positive results mean it will be able to be applied fully.

Herbert said: “The flaperon was covered in barnacles and as soon as I saw that, I immediately began sending emails to the search investigators because I knew the geochemistry of their shells could provide clues to the crash location.”

While the technique may take some time to complete, it is hoped it might finally provide families and experts with the answers they have been seeking for almost a decade.

Herbert argued that his work so far has “proven this method can be applied to a barnacle that colonised on the debris shortly after the crash to reconstruct a complete drift path back to the crash origin”.

The plane is believed to have glided after running out of fuel and searches have focused their operations on an area known as the “Seventh Arc” corridor.

Herbert said: “Even if the plane is not on the arc, studying the oldest and largest barnacles can still narrow down the areas to search in the Indian Ocean.”

Researchers working alongside Herbert hope their new method may help provide answers.

Dr Nassar Al-Qattan said: “Knowing the tragic story behind the mystery motivated everyone involved in this project to get the data and have this work published.

“The plane disappeared more than nine years ago, and we all worked aiming to introduce a new approach to help resume the search, suspended in January 2017, which might help bring some closure to the tens of families of those on the missing plane.”

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