THE mystery of missing flight MH370 could finally be solved as experts revealed the place where they are "certain" it crashed.
Malaysia Airlines lost contact with the Boeing 777 plane on March 8, 2014, close to Phuket Island in the Strait of Malacca.
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The Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 disappeared just 39 minutes after leaving Kuala Lumpur Airport Credit: Getty 6
The flight, which was carrying 239 passengers, disappeared just 39 minutes after it left Kuala Lumpur Airport for Beijing.
But a new 229-page report could hold an important clue to its current whereabouts.
It suggests the wreckage could be located about 1560km west of Perth, Australia - the revelation the result of "groundbreaking" amateur radio technology known as a Weak Signal Propagation Reporter, or WSPR.
Researchers Richard Godfrey, Dr Hannes Coetzee, and Professor Simon Maskell used WSPR to detect and track the plane's flight path for six hours after one of its last radio contacts, reports the Daily Mail.
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The researchers stated: "This technology has been developed over the past three years and the results represent credible new evidence.
"It aligns with analyses by Boeing ... and drift analyses by University of Western Australia of debris recovered around the Indian Ocean."
WSPR records every interaction between aircraft and signals sent from the ground, with information including a timestamp, location, and drift stored in a database every two minutes.
The researchers were able to use the technology to determine 125 points where the plane flew through a WSPR link.
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They established a path which ended at the same place Boeing data, Inmarsat satellites, and drift analysis suggests is the final resting place of flight MH370.
It also appears to show the plane too a mysterious zig-zag pattern in its final minutes.
This may add weight to claims pilot Zaharie Ahmad Shah may have crashed the plane on purpose or that a hijacking may have taken place - although it is unclear if the pattern is simply a quirk in the way WSPR is measured.
The researchers said: "Together with [the data], a comprehensive picture of the final hours of flight MH370 can be collated.
"Flight MH370 was diverted into the Indian Ocean where it crashed of fuel exhaustion... at some point after the last signal after midnight.
"At the time of writing, MH370 still has not been found despite extensive surface and underwater searches.
"About 10 million commercial passengers fly every day and the safety of the airline industry relies on finding the cause of every accident."
Researcher Richard Godfrey explained the technology to The Times in 2021, saying: "Imagine crossing a prairie with invisible trip wires crossing the whole area and going back and forth across the length and breadth.
"Each step you make you tread on particular trip wires and we can locate you at the intersection of the disturbed trip wires. We can track your path as you move across the prairie."
The new final location of the missing MH370 flight is 4000m deep and slightly north of estimates by other researchers and investigators.
Less than half of the proposed crash site, which spans 130km by 89km, has been searched.
Aviation expert Geoff Thomas told The Today Show on Friday that a scientist and the ocean company who conducted a search in 2018 would use the findings of the new peer-reviewed report as the basis for a new search.
He said: "There is a very high level of confidence. [The report] has been four years in the making, being reviewed over and over again.
"They [the researchers] are certain that they have located where this aircraft is."
Using WSPR to track the missing flight was a concept first proposed by Dr Westphal in July, 2020, following similar submissions relating to other aircraft made in a NATO paper in 2016.
Passengers onboard the missing flight included Chinese calligraphers, a couple on their way home to their young sons after a delayed honeymoon, and a construction worker who hadn't been home in a year.
Before the plane went dark and diverted back over Malaysia, in the opposite direction to where it was intended to fly, authorities believed they heard either the pilot or co-pilot say: "Good night Malaysian three seven zero."
Early radar data found the plane travelled back over the Malacca Strait and into the Indian Ocean.
It is understood it ran out of fuel after about 7.5 hours and crashed into the ocean.
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A landing gear door was found at the home of a Madagascan fisherman in November, 2022 in a discovery some believe suggests the aircraft was crashed deliberately.
Forty-one pieces of the plane have been recovered in total.
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A new report reveals the estimated flight path and final resting place of the missing flight MH370 Credit: NCA NEWSWIRE 6
Researchers have now proposed a new search area Credit: NCA NEWSWIRE 6
Relatives of missing passengers cry before a meeting in Beijing on January 18, 2017 after authorities announced the end of search operations for the aircraft Credit: AFP 6
Debris from the missing flight MH370 Credit: AP:Associated Press