Join the Search for Flight MH370

[rumpole]

From the above link:


Plus indications - now from London - that signals showing the plane was still in the air up to five hours after last contact. So maybe not entirely fanciful to consider hijack after all.

A suicide hijack ? Otherwise where did they land and why haven't they made any demands ?

Perhaps they flew around for a while and just ran out of fuel and crashed, but you would think that hijackers would make some sort of demands over the radio.

 

[drsmith]

Kuala Lumpur: The latest evidence emerging from the United States suggests that missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 was set on a deliberate navigational route in the opposite direction to its scheduled flight path, swinging the focus of police investigations back to the pilots, crew and passengers.

Evidence suggests that somebody with flying experience set the Boeing plane's route manually or programmed its auto-pilot so that it flew hundreds of kilometres off course into the vast expanses of the Indian Ocean.

Key evidence also indicates a gap of some minutes between the time the plane's transponder stopped and a messaging system cut out, lessening the likelihood of a catastrophic mid-air explosion.

http://www.smh.com.au/world/plane-was-piloted-offcourse-in-last-hours-us-20140315-34tdz.html

 

[rumpole]

http://www.smh.com.au/world/plane-was-piloted-offcourse-in-last-hours-us-20140315-34tdz.html

Pilots have deliberately crashed aircraft before, making it look accidental so the family could get insurance.

The route shown makes sense if they didn't want the plane to be found easily.

No doubt the authorities are looking into the pilots background and personal histories.

 

[Julia]

A suicide hijack ? Otherwise where did they land and why haven't they made any demands ?

Perhaps they flew around for a while and just ran out of fuel and crashed, but you would think that hijackers would make some sort of demands over the radio.

Not if they had landed the plane somewhere with the intention of eg filling it with massive amount of explosives and then at some later time using it in a suicide mission like those of September 11.

Before that awful event any suggestion that it could happen would equally have been dismissed as entirely fanciful.

 

[rumpole]

Not if they had landed the plane somewhere with the intention of eg filling it with massive amount of explosives and then at some later time using it in a suicide mission like those of September 11.

Before that awful event any suggestion that it could happen would equally have been dismissed as entirely fanciful.

I suppose that's possible , but there are not many places within the range of the aircraft from where it was last seen that have facilities for landing and refuelling such a large aircraft with secrecy.

Given the latest reports of its course, the only thing that makes sense to me at the moment is that they suffered a total loss of electronic systems, including navigation and radios, got lost and wandered around not knowing where they were until they ran out of fuel and crashed.

As they were flying at night it would be easy to lose their bearings.

 

[drsmith]

It would seem the Malaysian government is about to confirm the aircraft was hijacked.

A Malaysian government official says investigators have concluded the missing Malaysia Airlines plane was hijacked, according press agency Associated Press.

Sky News reports the official said no motive has been established and it is not yet clear where the plane was taken, but he said hijacking was "conclusive".

The Canadian media outlet Global News is reporting the official is involved in the investigation into the crash, but spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to brief the press.

The Malaysian Prime Minister is expected to hold a press conference at 4pm AEDT.

http://www.smh.com.au/world/missing...tors-say-jet-was-hijacked-20140315-34tll.html

INVESTIGATORS have concluded that one or more people with significant flying experience hijacked the missing Malaysia Airlines jet, switched off communication devices and steered it off-course, a Malaysian government official involved in the investigation said this afternoon.

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/...370-was-hijacked/story-fni6um3i-1226855315871

 

[spooly74]

Hard to imagine what the families must be going through.

Did it crash subsequent to the hijacking (why nobody's claimed it), or was the first part of this terror plot successful? (why nobody's claimed it)

Either way, they'll have pissed off the Chinese.

It would seem the Malaysian government is about to confirm the aircraft was hijacked.



http://www.smh.com.au/world/missing...tors-say-jet-was-hijacked-20140315-34tll.html



http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/...370-was-hijacked/story-fni6um3i-1226855315871

 

[Smurf1976]

I think it's plausible that it may have been hijacked by someone who then flew the plane?

To my understanding, simply keeping the plane flying whilst it's already in the air is relatively straightforward. It's takeoff, landing, dealing with anything that goes wrong in the air and ending up at your intended destination in a safe and efficient manner which is the hard part that pilots spend a lot of time learning how to do. But just flying straight ahead is fairly simple to my understanding.

So I'm thinking that it's plausible that the plane was hijacked by someone with enough knowledge to keep it flying but who either couldn't, or didn't want to, land it. Therefore just keep flying until the fuel runs out.

In that case it could have been part of a plot that went wrong. Eg they intended to fly it into something in a 9/11 style attack (building, bridge, whatever) but messed that part up so just kept flying and crashed once the fuel ran out.

 

[Julia]

It would seem the Malaysian government is about to confirm the aircraft was hijacked.

More detail from the latest ABC news:

Someone on board the missing Malaysia Airlines plane deliberately shut off its communications and tracking systems and flew it off course for nearly seven hours after it vanished, Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak said today.

Speaking at a press conference on Saturday, Mr Najib confirmed the plane's systems were gradually switched off and the plane was flown far to the west of its flight path before disappearing.

Shortly after the prime minister finished speaking police arrived at the home of the missing aircraft's pilot, Zaharie Ahmad Shah, to search for evidence, a senior police official told Reuters.

Mr Najib said data from the plane's last known satellite contact meant it could have headed along flight corridors stretching as far north as Kazakhstan or as far south as the southern Indian Ocean.

"These movements are consistent with deliberate action by someone on the plane," he said.

The Boeing 777-200ER disappeared a week ago with 239 people onboard, including six Australians, during a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

Mr Najib said satellite data showed "with a high degree of certainty" that the communication and reporting system on MH370, known as the ACARS, was turned off before the plane reached the Malaysian peninsula.

While the prime minister stopped short of saying the flight was hijacked... it's hard to see what else talk of deliberate tampering of the communications equipment could be leading towards.
ABC correspondent Stephen McDonell in Kuala Lumpur

A short time later the aircraft's transponder was also switched off.

"It then flew in a westerly direction back over Peninsular Malaysia before turning north-west," the PM said.

"Up until the point at which it left military primary radar coverage these movements are consistent with deliberate action by someone on the plane."

But Mr Najib said: "Despite media reports that the plane was hijacked, I wish to be very clear, we are still investigating all possibilities as to what caused MH370 to deviate from its original flight path."

Earlier today an unnamed Malaysian official told Associated Press that hijacking was no longer just a theory, but "conclusive".

The official said no motive had been established and it was not known where the plane had been taken.

 

[sptrawler]

More detail from the latest ABC news:

So it goes back to no distress call.

 

[DB008]

Saw someone post this on Flyertalk (massive airline forum)

I believe the plane was never meant to land. I am theorising that this will reveal itself as a suicide "test" flight for future ill-good. The "pilots" of the commandeered plane were testing its mechanics and abilities and sending this data back to some ground base....hence taking advantage of the full fuel range before finally crashing.

Anyways, where the plan could be;

 

[Smurf1976]

So it could be anywhere in an area that's several times the size of Australia.

If it crashed on land then somebody will stumble across it someday no doubt. But if it's in the ocean then I'm thinking it may never be found, or at least not in a time that's of any real use or interest to anyone.

 

[drsmith]

Saw someone post this on Flyertalk (massive airline forum)

Anyways, where the plan could be;

I can reduce that search area slightly. It's not in my back yard.

Within the circle, there are apparently two flight path options. One northwest from Malaysia towards Turkey and the other southwest over the Indian Ocean.

 

[sptrawler]

I would be absolutely amazed, if it went down unseen in the Andaman sea.

 

[DB008]

Anyways, where the plan could be;

*plane - obvious typo

 

[Calliope]

I can reduce that search area slightly. It's not in my back yard.

Within the circle, there are apparently two flight path options. One northwest from Malaysia towards Turkey and the other southwest over the Indian Ocean.

That certainly narrows it down Doc, but with your experience of "Lost in Space" I expected more.

 

[bellenuit]

Just speculation on my behalf, but the intention may have been to land the plane intact and then refuel. Head towards something of strategic interest to the US say and then announce your intention to make a 9/11 style attack. The US would be forced to chose between letting the attack happen or shooting the plane down with the loss of all passengers, who are mostly Chinese. The latter action could set US - Chinese relations back years.

 

[Smurf1976]

Would I be correct in assuming that Australia has sufficient radar etc to be sure that it hasn't landed / crashed on land in Australia?

Whilst it seems an unlikely scenario, it's within the flight range of it according to the map posted earlier.

 

[cogs]

I would be curious to know what, if any information has been obtained from mobile phone usage, iPhone's 'find my phone feature' and triangulating call out's etc.

It is likely there were over 200 phones on this flight, which most likely should have been turned off, but it could be possible one or more could have been left on.

Surely the authorities (whichever one pulls the most strings) has contacted all relatives to those on board and used the latest tech, to try and locate a phone? Someone knows something more than they will let on.

If this is not possible it leads to only a few conclusions in my mind:

• They were all law abiding citizens on board who all switched their phones off, and something happened faster than it takes to turn on a phone. Explosion or similar, which means the wreckage should be found eventually.
• Hijackers (or similar) gathered up all the phones and made sure they were destroyed, which means it was hijacked. Plane will surface somewhere, sometime, or has crashed into the ocean and will be found eventually.
• Some other means of control of electronic devices was used. Where's the plane and passengers? Should be found eventually.
• The flight is will the other 'unfound' flights from time gone by.

Whatever the case, we will only be fed what 'they' think we should know anyway.

Just my bit.

 

[DB008]

Just speculation on my behalf, but the intention may have been to land the plane intact and then refuel.

I don't know. 777-200 is a big jet.

How to steal a 777

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/brainiac/2014/03/an_mit_expert_o.html

This morning I spoke by telephone with John Hansman, professor of aeronautics at MIT and director of MIT's International Center for Air Transportation.

“The probability that an airplane could be hidden in a random airport is pretty low,” he said, adding that he thinks it's far more likely the plane crashed into the ocean. Then he talked me through how you might try to do it.

To land a 777 you need a runway at least 5,000 feet long. The airplane seems to have diverted 40 minutes north of Kuala Lumpur, with enough fuel to travel 2,500 more miles. Hansman estimates there are around 500 runways within that range long enough to accommodate a plane that size.

Getting to one of those runways without being detected is hard, but not impossible. “We don’t have radar surveillance over most of the central parts of the ocean,” Hansman says, so, with on-board transponders turned off (as seems to be the case here), the plane would have had an easy ride for awhile.

The pilot of the commandeered 777 would have needed to find a long runway close to the coast, in an out-of-the-way place with minimal radar systems. The plan would have had to come in low, to avoid radar, and flying a big plane at low-altitude burns fuel faster. Hansman thinks a small island is the best bet.

“Could you get into an island in Indonesia that might have a 5,000-foot runway? Probably,” Hansman says. Runways in the Malaysian archipelago would also be possible, though the last radar tracks on the Malaysian Airlines flight show the plane diverting in the other direction, west toward India.

If the plane did manage to land secretly, the next challenge would be hiding it from overhead satellites. You’d need a big hangar, and those aren’t easy to come by either, in the kinds of places you can get to without being detected by radar.

“The more I sort of think about it," Hansman says, "the likelihood that an airport would have a hangar that would keep the airplane and not have good enough radar capabilities to detect the airplane, the set of those is probably pretty small, or zero.”

He adds that if you have a cooperating government on your side, “it’s a totally different story.”

And to refuel?

http://www.boeing.com/boeing/commercial/777family/pf/pf_200product.page

45,220 U.S. gal (171,170 L)

Where do you get 171k L of Jet A1 fuel?