Malaysian Airlines: First Airline to Use a Satellite Based Tracker

Published: April 19, 2017, 6:50 p.m.

A first for one airline company. FOX's Brett Larson reports: Malaysian Airlines flight 370 and all 239 passengers on board vanished over the Indian Ocean after falling off the radar en route to Beijing and the search for the plane ended after three years of searching, with only pieces of debris showing up in the last few years. Now, Malaysian Airlines will become the world's first to start using a satellite based tracking system that can keep a watchful eye on an airliner in hard to track places like the poles and remote areas of the ocean where flight 370 is thought to have disappeared. In a statement, Malaysian Airlines said this new system will give them the ability to track every aircraft's location, altitude and heading and be alerted should any plane go off course. The service will become operational next year after the final 'Iridium Next Satellites' are launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on Space X Falcon 9 rockets. 66 low-earth orbit satellites will assist in providing that global coverage of future flights. With FOX on Tech, I'm Brett Larson, FOX News. Follow Brett Larson on Twitter: @BrettLarson