PERTH, australia — A robotic submarine looking for the missing Malaysia Airlines jet is expected to finish searching a patch of the Indian Ocean seabed within a week after so far coming up empty, and the search area might be expanded after that, officials said Saturday.
As the hunt for Flight 370 hit the six-week mark, the Bluefin 21 unmanned sub began its seventh trip into the depths off the coast of western Australia.
Its search area forms a 6.2-mile circle around the location of an underwater signal that was thought to have come from the aircraft’s black boxes before their batteries died. The sonar scan of the seafloor in that area is expected to be completed in five to seven days, the search center said in an e-mail to The Associated Press.
The U.S. Navy sub has covered about 51 square miles since it began diving into the depths Monday. The latest data are being analyzed, but nothing has yet been identified. The Associated Press
