While the Australian military continue to search the southern Indian Ocean for the wreckage of the missing Malaysia Airlines plane, producers in Hollywood are already working on a possible movie adaptation of the tra

gic crash. 

Although no studio has been pitched about a Flight 370 project, one movie-industry producer told the Hollywood Reporter that he doesn’t doubt at least 50 projects are being developed.

‘It’s a shocking tragedy, but even so, I guarantee there are 50 different people working on 50 different projects that are neither inspired by it or based directly on it right now,’ said J.C. Sping, the executive who produced airline thriller Red Eye.

Tragic: The scant news on the missing flight has caused heartache for the families of the 239 on board. Above, a family member breaks down as she is removed from a press conference on March 19

While Hollywood may be starting the gears on an adaptation, it’s still unlikely that a film about the disaster will be in theaters anytime soon.

It took five years for any major motion picture to be released following 9/11, with Oliver Stone’s World Trade Center and Paul Greengrass’ United 93.

There is a project in development about the Boston Marathon bombings, but Boston Strong wasn’t pitched until three months after the deadly explosions.

Emotions surrounding the missing flight are so high that a movie that was in production before 370 disappeared has been postponed because the plot closely mirrors the news story.

Australian production ‘Deep Water’ follows the surviving crew and passengers of a plane that crashes in the ocean on a flight from Sydney to Beijing.

Time: Hollywood usually waits to release films based on real-life tragedies, as evidenced by the five years it took to produce Oliver Stone’s World Trade Center and Paul Greengrass’ United 93 after 9/11

But the biggest impediment to any project is that details are still scant about what caused the plane to go off course and crash into the sea.

Until those details emerge, a true-life script will have to wait.

‘I think people will wait to see how [the investigation] turns out,’ said says Alex Heineman, who produced this year’s airline thriller Non-Stop starring Liam Neeson. ‘They say truth is stranger than fiction, and this story is so bizarre. No one knows what happened — or maybe people do, and they’re not saying what happened.’

But even Heineman admits that a story like this is off-limits to a lot of producers in Hollywood.

‘I wouldn’t chase a story like this — a true-life disaster story — because it’s sad, and I don’t want to be exploiting that kind of situation,’ he said.

Producers will also have to wait for more details to emerge on what caused the flight to crash. It’s still uncertain whether the flight was an accident or a possible hijacking or pilot suicide. Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah (pictured) has been the source of much scrutiny by investigators.

Source Daily Mail