Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott expressed hope missing Flight MH370 will be found, but suggested the search may be scaled back as he marked one year since it vanished.
"I do reassure the families of our hope and expectation that the ongoing search will succeed," Abbott told parliament in Canberra. "I can't promise that the search will go on at this intensity forever but we will continue our very best efforts to resolve this mystery and provide some answers."
Australia is leading the hunt in the Indian Ocean about 1,600 kilometres off its west coast, with four ships using sophisticated sonar systems to scour a huge underwater area. The vessels are focusing on a 60,000 square kilometre priority zone, with the search scheduled to end in May. More than 40 percent of the ocean floor has been explored to date. The intensive search - jointly funded by Australia and Malaysia with a budget of $93 million - has so far only turned up a few shipping containers.
"It's a very expensive search. We want to make sure that when we run over (a possible debris field), we know we don't miss it by accident," Fugro's MH370 search head Paul Kennedy said Thursday. "Because we'll never go back there again. It's a one-shot deal."
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