Frankly a politician saying we need to regroup, reconsider or whatever is a pre warning that they have run out of reasonable options and a withdrawal is likely
i,m unfortunetly with pace here. we have to remember the ships cannot stay at the search area forever - they need fuel, supllies and a change in the crews which work 24/7 and surely start to get fatigued. so when they find nothing in the next days i guess all ships will return to harbour and then it will be a political decision what to do next.
i do not think they will officially stop "searching" , but this search may be reduced to satellite tracking, further calculations on the handshakes and waiting if somebody finds somekind of debris somewhere. i guess the enormous effort in keeping ships at sea and conducting a 24/7 underwater search as well sending aircraft every day will stop .
we have to rember that the australians have a life beyond this aircraft and somebody might ask if its not better in long term to spend this amount of tax money in schools than in keeping up the search when its obvious no lifes can be saved anymore.
whatever happens - i have deepest respect for this just 23millions citizens country since it prooved it is willing and able to conduct and lead an extremly difficult task no man performed ever before , and everything which can be done was and is done .