Chinese naval vessels find no trace of missing MH370

A second Chinese naval vessel on Tuesday joined the massive international hunt for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, but has so far found no clues.  [Special coverage]

Upon its arrival on Tuesday morning, Jinggangshan teamed with Mianyang, which arrived Monday, and promptly started search operations.

The two naval vessels are providing a non-stop, 24-hour search with all their monitoring systems activated, including radar, infra-red and optoelectronic searching devices. Two shipboard helicopters of Jinggangshan have also carried out an air search.

The weather condition at the target sea area is good, with a wind force 5-6, and wave height of about two meters. The visibility is more than five nautical miles (about 9.26 km).

"The search involves air, sea and underwater forces, and it can increase our chances of finding the missing plane," said Wang Yongxiang, deputy chief of staff of South China Sea Fleet.

"We will carry out immediate rescue or salvage operations once we spot persons in distress, suspicious floating objects or underwater targets," Wang added.

The sea surface is calm, as Xinhua reporters saw from a helicopter that sometimes hovers only 30 meters above the sea surface. No floating objects have been identified except for two wood boards.

The vessel Jinggangshan has twice discovered suspicious objects which turned out to be a life vest and an oil barrel unrelated to the plane.

According to the Chinese navy, another two warships are expected to reach the area on Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning respectively, and a depot ship has been ordered to prepare to move into the Gulf of Thailand to replenish the searching vessels.

Dozens of ships and planes from around 10 countries are scouring the waters around Flight MH370's last known location, but no solid clues have been found so far.

The Boeing 777 aircraft suddenly vanished from radar early Saturday morning while carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew members from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Among the passengers, 154 are Chinese.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has ordered an all-out search and rescue effort. Several Chinese civilian ships have already been sent to assist the mission.