The hunt for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has been termed as the most difficult in human history by the man heading the operation, but modern technology greatly increases the chances of finding the missing plane.
According to CNN "Angus Houston said the hunt is even more difficult than that for Air France Flight 447, which disappeared in the Atlantic Ocean in 2009.
"The big difference between Air France 447 and MH370 is that the last known position, in terms of MH370, is at the top of the Malacca Straits, and then the aircraft continued to fly for an extended period after that," Houston told CNN's Anna Coren on Monday.
"Whereas Air France, they had a very good last known position, which then turned out to be very close to where the aircraft was eventually found."
But he said searchers are performing "groundbreaking work" with satellite analysis, which has helped isolate the search area in the Indian Ocean.
"Without that, we would be essentially searching the whole of the Indian Ocean, and I think the chances of finding the aircraft in those circumstances would have been slim," Houston said. "I think by having this defined search area ... I think eventually we will find the aircraft."
Houston is the chief search coordinator for the Joint Agency Coordination Centre, based in Australia. He said his greatest concern throughout the two-month search has been the families of those on board.
"To have a set of circumstances where you don't know what's happened to your loved ones in circumstances such as this, it's just a terrible, terrible emotional trauma of all of those involved," he said.
"And beyond that, the wider public has a great interest in what happened here because we all fly in airplanes, and we all fly long distances over water, and a lot of people want to know what happened and why it happened."
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