Australia narrows plane search area

Australia's drastically pared down the southern search area for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370.

It's shrunk the area to 600, 000 square kilometres using satellite tracking data.

It's still a huge expanse to cover but more manageable than the estimated 19 million square kilometres of Indian Ocean it was feared the plane could be.

Australia's Maritime Safety Authority admits it's still not an exact science.

(SOUNDBITE)(English) JOHN YOUNG, GENERAL MANAGER, EMERGENCY RESPONSE DIVISION OF AUSTRALIAN MARITIME SAFETY AUTHORITY, SAYING:

"The result that you get from the analysis depends on assumptions about the speed the aircraft was flying and the two arrows you see there represent two different speeds for the aircraft. So what we're doing is producing our best estimate of the most likely place to search but I would hasten to add, it's far from very precise."

China's drafted in more than 20 satellites to help search the northern sector it's believ