DHAKA: The search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 hit a fresh snag on Thursday after it was found that the underwater drone at the heart of the operation had been damaged, forcing what could be another lengthy delay.

The Australian agency coordinating the search effort, now in its third month, said communications equipment on the sophisticated Bluefin-21 drone was damaged on its first day back after almost two weeks away for maintenance and resupply.

The issue was discovered on Wednesday, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC) said, just two hours into the drone’s first mission since returning to the search area in the Indian Ocean about 1,600 km north-west of the western Australian city of Perth.

‘Examination of the communications problem has established that a hardware defect exists in the transponder mounted on the Ocean Shield and that a defect may also exist in the transponder mounted on the Bluefin-21,’ a JACC statement said, referring to the Australian naval vessel towing the drone.

‘This inhibits the ability of the two devices to communicate with each other,’ it said, The Straits Times publishes this report on Thursday.

BDST: 1740 HRS, MAY 14, 2014