VOA慢速英语--马来西亚370航班搜索结束,但是仍旧神秘

 

The search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has officially ended, nearly three years after the plane mysteriously disappeared.

Transport ministers from Malaysia, Australia and China announced Tuesday the search had officially been suspended.

The Boeing 777 plane disappeared March 8, 2014 while carrying 239 people from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to Beijing, China. The plane lost voice contact with officials on the ground less than an hour after takeoff and did not send any emergency messages.

More than half the plane’s passengers were Chinese.

In a statement, the ministers said that even with the best technology and search techniques available, the aircraft had not been found. The underwater search had been focused on a 120,000 square kilometer area in the southern Indian Ocean.

Investigators¹ became hopeful in July 2015, when a piece of the plane’s wing was found in the Indian Ocean east of Madagascar. The Associated Press reported that since then, more than 20 objects - either confirmed or believed to be from the plane - have washed up on beaches throughout the Indian Ocean.

“The decision to suspend the underwater search has not been taken lightly nor without sadness,” the statement said.

The ministers thanked all nations that provided equipment, expertise² and assistance. More than $150 million was spent on the search efforts by Malaysia, Australia and China. The ministers said they “remain hopeful” that new information may be found in the future to help locate the missing wreckage³.

As the search for MH370 ended, new technology has been launched to help prevent planes from ever going missing.

New technology to track airplanes

On Saturday, a group of satellites were successfully deployed⁴ with technology that experts say will be able to track airplanes over the entire earth.

A Falcon⁵ 9 rocket from American aerospace⁶ company SpaceX carried 10 satellites into orbit for telecommunications company Iridium. The launch from California marked a successful return to rocket launches for SpaceX after an explosion on its launch pad last September.

Iridium’s partner Aireon will use the satellites to track aircraft, instead of current methods using ground radar⁷ and other monitoring tools.

“This successful first launch brings us one step closer to changing the way the world flies by enabling the ability to track aircraft anywhere on the planet,” Aireon CEO Don Thoma said.

Currently, about 70 percent of the world's airspace lacks real-time surveillance because of rough terrain⁸, deserts or oceans. The new satellite technology is expected to also make airplanes trackable in those so-called black zones.

Aireon has said its global satellite-based system will be deployed by 2018 to track and monitor aircraft around the world in real-time.

Words in This Story

wing – n. one of usually two long, flat parts of an airplane that extend from the sides, making it possible to fly

enable – v. to make something able to do or accomplish

terrain – n. a particular kind of land

1 investigators   

n.调查者，审查者( investigator的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• This memo could be the smoking gun that investigators have been looking for. 这份备忘录可能是调查人员一直在寻找的证据。
• The team consisted of six investigators and two secretaries. 这个团队由六个调查人员和两个秘书组成。 来自《简明英汉词典》

2 expertise   

n.专门知识(或技能等)，专长

参考例句：

• We were amazed at his expertise on the ski slopes.他斜坡滑雪的技能使我们赞叹不已。
• You really have the technical expertise in a new breakthrough.让你真正在专业技术上有一个全新的突破。

3 wreckage   

n.（失事飞机等的）残骸，破坏，毁坏

参考例句：

• They hauled him clear of the wreckage.他们把他从形骸中拖出来。
• New states were born out of the wreckage of old colonial empires.新生国家从老殖民帝国的废墟中诞生。

4 deployed   

（尤指军事行动）使展开( deploy的过去式和过去分词 )； 施展； 部署； 有效地利用

参考例句：

• Tanks have been deployed all along the front line. 沿整个前线已部署了坦克。
• The artillery was deployed to bear on the fort. 火炮是对着那个碉堡部署的。

5 falcon   

n.隼，猎鹰

参考例句：

• The falcon was twice his size with pouted feathers.鹰张开羽毛比两只鹰还大。
• The boys went hunting with their falcon.男孩子们带着猎鹰出去打猎了。

6 aerospace   

adj.航空的，宇宙航行的

参考例句：

• The world's entire aerospace industry is feeling the chill winds of recession.全世界的航空航天工业都感受到了经济衰退的寒意。
• Edward Murphy was an aerospace engineer for the US Army.爱德华·墨菲是一名美军的航宇工程师。

7 radar   

n.雷达，无线电探测器

参考例句：

• They are following the flight of an aircraft by radar.他们正在用雷达追踪一架飞机的飞行。
• Enemy ships were detected on the radar.敌舰的影像已显现在雷达上。

8 terrain   

n.地面，地形，地图

参考例句：

• He had made a detailed study of the terrain.他对地形作了缜密的研究。
• He knows the terrain of this locality like the back of his hand.他对这一带的地形了如指掌。