A crew member looks out a window aboard a Japan Coast guard aircraft as it flies over the southern Indian Ocean on April 1, 2014
Paul Kane—Reuters
Investigators are contemplating defeat in the search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, with no plane debris found, ocean currents buffeting the search area and the black box’s battery close to running out of power
Officials raised the possibilityon Wednesday that the fate of the Malaysia Airlines plane missing for almost a month may never be determined, even as they said its disappearance is now being treated as a criminal investigation.
“Investigations may go on and on and on. We have to clear every little thing,” Malaysia police chief Khalid Abu Bakar said, the Associated Press reports. “At the end of the investigations, we may not even know the real cause. We may not even know the reason for this incident.”
