Finding MH370

Citizen Science [S2 Ep22 audio]

Finding MH370

Show Notes

In today’s episode we discuss a new approach to gathering the Lepas data that could help us finally understand how long MH370’s debris was in the water. By tapping into a worldwide community of oceangoing sailors who convence on the social media site No Foreign Land, it might be possible to retrieve data from barnacles that are just about anywhere in the ocean. I tried out this approach by reaching out to cruisers Leslie Graney and Peter Sheaff after I noticed that there boat “Itchy Feet” was quite close to an interesting Global Drifter buoy near the island of Vava’u in Tonga. With incredible graciousness and pluck Leslie and Peter immediately set out on a quest to intercept the buoy, while I looked on from halfway around the world. While the experiment didn’t succeed in achieving all of its goals, it was a great demonstration of how the idea could work in the future, and gave us important ideas for improvements going forward. Get full access to Finding MH370 at www.deepdivemh370.com/subscribe

More from Finding MH370

Oct 21, 2026

A newly recovered drifter buoy from Mauritius shows for the first time how barnacles like the ones found on MH370's flaperon grow during more than two years at sea. The new data suggests a new methodology for determining how long the debris floated in the sea -- and whether it's plausible that the plane really did crash land in the remote ocean.

Oct 5, 2026

The ocean is vast -- but the range of possible places that MH370 could be is limited, constrained by evidence and the plane's performance. Today's experiment lets us define that area, and thereby determine just how much effort it would take to solve the case once and for all.

Sep 16, 2026

The ocean is huge, but the range of places that MH370 could be is tightly constrained, and recent searches have made it even smaller. Today we discuss where the noose has tightened down to, and where Ocean Infinity will look.

Aug 27, 2026

If you want to find an airliner on the seabed, you could do worse than to talk to someone who's already done. I interview underwater search expert Tony Romeo about how he used a high-tech submersible to locate a long-missing Pan Am airliner in the sea off Puerto Rico, and why he thinks he can do the same for MH370.

Aug 9, 2026

A Pan Am airliner lay on the seabed near Puerto Rico for more than 70 years until Russ Matthews and his team located it. He tells us how they did it.

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