The man leading the search for the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 has revealed that experts are looking at 1,000 possible paths the plane could have taken, The Daily Mail reported on Monday.
Martin Dolan of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau said his team was faced with an "intimidating" and "unprecedented" challenge as they prepare to launch a year-long off shore search for the missing craft.
The aircraft vanished on March 8 with 239 passengers and crew members on board after it departed Kuala Lumpar in Malaysia and was headed toward Beijing, China.
International experts searched for the aircraft using a range of data in a bid to narrow down the crash site in the past few months.
Dolan said that a "reasonably clear picture" of the plane's trajectory was emerging, even if there were still approximately 1,000 possible paths it could have taken.
"There is an infinite possible number of tracks that the aircraft could have flown along, but for practical purposes there are about 1,000... from the point of its turning south," he said.
Extensive searches from the air failed to spot any wreckage from the airliner, but experts have studied radar and satellite data in an effort to close in on the crash site.
Dolan said new surveys of ocean floors have also produced interesting findings, including hard objects that appear to be inconsistent with their surroundings, although there is no guarantee that this is the aircraft.
"There is nothing that has screamed out and said 'I look like an aircraft,'" he said.
He added: "It's still a hell of an area. The area is horribly, horribly complicated."
Malaysia and Australia have recently pledged A$60 million (RM180 million) for the new phase of search, which will use cutting-edge technology, according to Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, The Malaysian Insider reported.
Dolan said that this new phase will include the deployment of "Go Phoenix" on September 22, a Malaysian government-hired vessel using "next generation sonar synthetic aperture" that is able to produce a high-resolution image of the sea bed.
Its mission will be joined by the Fugro Discovery survey vessel next month, and later by Fugro Equator in November. Both vessels use underwater "deep tow" instruments to give a view of the ocean floor, according to The Malaysian Insider.