Search area for Malaysia plane narrows

PERTH, Australia – Planes and ships hunting for the missing Malaysian jetliner zeroed in on a targeted patch of the Indian Ocean today after a navy ship picked up underwater signals consistent with a plane’s black box.

Today’s search zone was the smallest yet in the monthlong hunt for Flight 370, and comes a day after the Australian official in charge of the search expressed hope that crews were closing in on the “final resting place” of the vanished jet.

Angus Houston, who is coordinating the search off Australia’s west coast, said Wednesday that equipment on the Australian vessel Ocean Shield had picked up two sounds from deep below the surface Tuesday, and an analysis of two other sounds detected in the same general area on Saturday showed they were consistent with a plane’s flight recorders.

No further sounds had been picked up overnight, Houston’s search coordination center said today. But the Ocean Shield was continuing its hunt, slowly dragging a U.S. navy pinger locator through the ocean’s depths.