Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has been on the minds of many over the past two weeks; as we enter day 13 in the search for the missing plane, the families and friends of those on board have been given new hope in the form of two pieces of debris floating in the south Indian Ocean.

Rough weather is making the search tough going, but authorities have sent out merchant vessels and search planes to the area, which is about 1500 miles southwest of Australia. Officials are calling the debris, which was spotted by a satellite, their best lead yet after long days of speculation and theories with no definitive answers.

The jet lost contact with ground control during its departure from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, but pings from the plane’s check-in system showed that it took a sharp detour, from a northeastward path across the Gulf of Thailand to the west, across the Malaysian Peninsula. Authorities have been working on the assumption that someone intentionally changed the plane’s course, and that someone must have been very familiar with the aircraft’s controls and flight plan. The FBI has reportedly been investigating one of the pilot’s home flight simulator, because he reportedly deleted data from it not long before the flight.

The news of possible debris has given hope to those waiting to hear what happened to their loved ones. Sarah Bajc’s boyfriend, Philip Wood, was a passenger on the flight and says that the not-knowing is the worst part.

“I’m desperate to hear it is an airplane wing and there are survivors clinging to it, and one of them is Philip,” she said. “I’m apprehensive it will be unrelated and the wait will just continue after many more hours of misery. I am prepared for dead bodies, but I am not prepared for never knowing.”

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