PERTH Authentic Brendan Langley Jersey , Australia, April 14 (Xinhua) -- The Australian and U.S. searchers hunting for the missing Malaysian flight MH370 on Monday confirmed the underwater autonomous vehicle would be deployed " very soon".
They also said the task would be difficult since the submarine will have to operate at its depth limit of 4,500 meters and countries involved in the search would consult later this week to discuss future operations since value of the visual search by aircraft and ships is "diminishing".
According to U.S. Navy Captain Mark Matthews, the Bluefin-21 was scheduled for its first underwater mission at 5 p.m. local time (0900 GMT).
But no confirmation of its deployment is available now since equipment delay is very common due to technical reasons.
Matthews said the Bluefin-21 underwater vehicle works in a 24- hour cycle Authentic Carlos Henderson Jersey , with two hours going down, 16 hours of searching underwater, two hours coming up to the surface and four hours for data downloading, analysis and re-programming.
"Once it is deployed Authentic Demarcus Walker Jersey , it will operate 35-50 meters above the sea bed and is able to look 300-400 meters each side of its track, which should provide us a very detailed map of the ocean floor which will be analyzed by experts on the (Australian navy ship) Ocean Shield, " Australian Navy Commodore Peter Leavy told Xinhua.
Chief Coordinator of the multinational search operation Angus Houston has disclosed potential thick silt is expected on the ocean floor where the Bluefin-21 would work, which may cause barriers for the vehicle to scan for possible debris.
"Depends on how thick it is Authentic Garett Bolles Jersey , the site scan sonar of Bluefin-21 is able to penetrate the silt, from no penetration at all to 4-5 meters, but we really don't know the silt until the sonar gets down there, so there's a lot to be discovered from the first mission Authentic Derek Wolfe Jersey ," said Leavy.