Muffled cries served as a backdrop to the solemn candlelight ceremony held in Beijing to commemorate the one month anniversary of the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines MH370.

With microphone in hand, Steve Wang, whose relative was on the flight along with 238 others, verbalized the depth and range of emotions that everyone had felt through 31 days of waiting for word on the fate of the plane and their loved ones.

Like Us on Facebook

"I don't recall anymore how we've spent the past month." Steve's words mixed with the whimpers that echoed through Tuesday's early morning breeze.

"Don't cry anymore, don't hurt anymore, don't despair. Don't feel lost," he said.

Timeline of a tragedy

On March 8, at 12:41am local time, Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 left Kuala Lumpur en route to Beijing with 239 people on board.  It never arrived.

Fifteen Royal Malaysian Air Force planes and nine ships began scouring the South China for signs of the missing plane. 

On March 9, Vietnam, Singapore, China, Indonesia and the United States joined Malaysia in the search and rescue operation which had widened its scope from the South China Sea to the Malacca Strait, as Malaysian radar showed the plane had turned west two hours into its flight.

Investigators began looking into the backgrounds of two passengers who were reported to have boarded the plane using stolen passports. 

On March 10, oil slicks were spotted off Vietnam's coast, which tests later showed to be negative for jet fuel.

On March 13, satellite images of floating objects earlier monitored by China were found to have no relation to plane debris. 

On March 14, the search operation, which saw more countries joining in with their trained personnel and high-tech equipment, expanded toward the Indian Ocean.

On March 15, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak confirmed that the plane's communication system and transponder were separately switched off, and that there was "deliberate action" to fly the plane off course after it disappeared from radar screens.

The announcement also marked a new phase in the search, now joined by 26 countries, to cover a northern and a southern corridor.

On March 16, investigators turned to the backgrounds and life circumstances of the two pilots, with the police seizing a flight simulator found at the house of pilot Zaharie Ahmad Shah.

From March 20 to 23, search and rescue teams braved harsh weather as they flew back and forth to the southern Indian Ocean to verify satellite sightings of floating objects. 

On March 24, Prime Minister Najib Razak held a live televised press conference to announce that  Flight MH370 had ended its journey in the southern Indian Ocean, a conclusion arrived at after analyzing data released by Britain's Inmarsat satellite. 

On March 28, search teams moved 680 miles north of the previous search area, closer to Perth, after new data suggested that the plane flew faster than originally thought, would have consumed its fuel faster, and could not have reached the remote southern part of the Indian Ocean.

A candle of hope

When the hunt for Flight MH370 entered its fourth week, search and rescue teams were in a race against time to find the black box that would, hopefully, shed light on the mystery of how the world lost one of its most advanced planes, with still no solid answers as to where it had gone, who brought it there, and why.

Friends and families of the passengers, from Beijing to Kuala Lumpur, and other nations that had a loved one aboard the missing jet, lit a candle and uttered a prayer of hope that the answers and the closure they seek may soon come.