Malaysian Airlines MH370 contact lost

[onetrack]

DocRohan - The CSIRO animated graphic is neat - but it's simplistic. The currents only play a major part in the movement of floating wreckage when the current is the primary controlling input.
For that to happen, the wreckage would have to be almost totally submerged for the prevailing winds to have little effect on its movement.
Light floating wreckage would be affected more by wind direction and strength, than by prevailing currents.

The prevailing winds in the South part of the Eastern Indian Ocean, during the Southern Hemisphere Spring & Summer (September to February by calculation, but more like late October to late March due to the heat latency of the Earth), are weakly Westerly, swinging from NW through West to SW - and occasionally, South for short periods.
In Winter, the prevailing winds are strongly Westerly, with strong swings to the NW and SW.

As we are in the early stages of Autumn (Fall), the prevailing winds have been relatively weak, due to the transition through the Summer equinox.

Therefore, the movement of light floating wreckage (seat cushions, light plastics and resins) will still be largely Easterly in the lower latitudes (30 deg and further South), but somewhat Westerly to stationary in the Northern latitudes above 30 deg, due to the still-strong Easterly surface movement of air from the Northern parts of Australia, out into the Indian Ocean.

The heavier, largely-submerged wreckage would be mostly travelling in the prevailing current direction, unless a strong storm pushed it Eastwards.
We have had no particularly strong storms in the Southern Indian Ocean search region since the search commenced there, so the heaviest portions of wreckage will be following the currents and eddies in the search region - whilst the lightest portions would almost certainly be nearing, or on, the West Australian coast somewhere.

Despite the strong Leeuwin Current (3kts) running North to South down the West Australian coast, it doesn't stop vast amounts of flotsam and jetsam being washed ashore regularly from the Easternmost section of the Indian Ocean.