The Australian Prime Minister has been guarded in his comments. From the Sydney Morning Herald:
"The Australian maritime safety authority has received information based on satellite imagery of objects possibly related to the search," Mr Abbott said.
"Following specialist analysis of this satellite imagery, two possible objects related to the search have been identified."
"I should tell the House - and we must keep this in mind - the task of locating these objects will be extremely difficult and it may turn out that they are not related to the search for flight MH370," Mr Abbott said.
Several objects - the largest 24m - have been located on satellite and aircraft despatched to see if they can find them and identify them. Abbott is making an announcement to satisfy intense media interest but is certainly not going to have egg on his face if they turn out to be something quite different.
I doubt, however, that such an announcement would have been made if the objects looked like shipping containers. Australia has been conducting maritime search and rescues in high southern latitudes for many years and have a good record. These people know what they are about, but obviously until someone has a close look at the objects, we won't know more.
Interesting that the objects were described as "awash" or under the surface. To be able to determine that from satellite imagery says a lot about the quality of the images.