The Malaysian government says it has agreed in principle to resume the search for a passenger plane that disappeared a decade ago and is one of the aviation world’s biggest mysteries.

In March 2014, Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 disappeared en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.

The search for the wreckage of the Boeing 777 has been slow for years, and the hundreds of families who died on board are still haunted by the tragedy.

On Friday, Malaysian Transport Minister Anthony Loke said the cabinet had approved in principle a $70m (£56m) deal with US ocean exploration company Ocean Infinity to find the plane.

Under a “not found, no fee” arrangement, Ocean Unlimited is paid only if the wreckage is found.

In 2018, a search by Ocean Infinity on similar terms failed after three months.

The $150 million multinational effort ended in 2017 after an extensive two-year search.

While the government accepted Ocean Infinity’s offer “in principle,” Roque said negotiations on the specific terms of the deal were still ongoing and would be completed early next year.

The new search will cover 15,000 square kilometers of the southern Indian Ocean, The minister said this was based on new data that Kuala Lumpur deemed “credible”.

“We are hopeful that this time there will be a positive outcome,” Locke said, adding that finding the wreckage would bring relief to the families of those on board.

Families of MH370 passengers have welcomed the Malaysian government’s approval of the new search.

Jacquita Gonzales, wife of MH370 on-board supervisor Patrick Gomez, told the New Straits Times: “I’m very happy about this news… It feels like the best Christmas gift ever. “

“This news stirs up mixed emotions – hope, gratitude and sadness. The uncertainty and pain of having no answers almost 11 years later is very difficult for us,” Intan Maizura Othaman also told the newspaper. Her husband, Mohd Hazrin Mohamed Hasnan, is a cabin crew member.

Jiang Hui’s mother, who was also on the plane, told Reuters the Malaysian government must take a “more open approach” to the search to allow more players to participate.

Flight MH370 took off from Kuala Lumpur in the early morning of March 8, 2014. It lost contact with air traffic control less than an hour after takeoff, and radar showed that it deviated from its planned flight route.

Investigators generally believe the plane crashed somewhere in the southern Indian Ocean, although it’s unclear why this happened.

In the years following the disappearance, debris believed to be from the plane washed up on Indian Ocean shores.

A range of conspiracy theories have emerged surrounding the plane’s disappearance, ranging from speculation that the pilot deliberately shot down the plane to claims it was shot down by foreign forces.

An investigation into the plane’s disappearance in 2018 found that the plane’s control systems were likely deliberately manipulated to send it off course, but did not conclude who was behind it.

Investigators said at the time that “no conclusions can be drawn until the wreckage is found.”