MH370: Search mission continues for missing plane

Up to eight planes and nine ships will assist in today's search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370.

The Australian Maritime Safety Authority has determined a search area of about 223,000 square kilometres, 1680 kilometres west north-west of Perth.

Eight military planes will assist in the search. One of these planes will be tasked to drop self locating datum marker buoys within the search area. The first aircraft departed for the search area at 6am WST.

Nine ships have been tasked to search.

The weather forecast for today's search is fair, with visibility approximately 10 kilometres, however the southern area may experience some isolated showers.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau continues to refine the area where the aircraft entered the water based on continuing ground-breaking and multi-disciplinary technical analysis of satellite communication and aircraft performance, passed from the international air crash investigative team comprising analysts from Malaysia, the United States, the UK, China and Australia.