There has been a lot of speculation about Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. Terrorism, hijacking, meteors. I cannot believe the analysis on CNN; itâs almost disturbing. I tend to look for a simpler explanation, and I find it with the 13,000-foot runway at Pulau Langkawi. We know the story of MH370: A loaded Boeing 777 departs at midnight from Kuala Lampur, headed to Beijing. A hot night. A heavy aircraft. About an hour out, across the gulf toward Vietnam, the plane goes dark, meaning the transponder and secondary radar tracking go off. Two days later we hear reports that Malaysian military radar (which is a primary radar, meaning the plane is tracked by reflection rather than by transponder interrogation response) has tracked the plane on a southwesterly course back across the Malay Peninsula into the Strait of Malacca. The loss of transponders and communications makes perfect sense in a fire. When I heard this I immediately brought up Google Earth and searched for airports in proximity to the track toward the southwest. The left turn is the key here. Zaharie Ahmad Shah1 was a very experienced senior captain with 18,000 hours of flight time. We old pilots were drilled to know what is the closest airport of safe harbor while in cruise. Airports behind us, airports abeam us, and airports ahead of us. Theyâre always in our head. Always. If something happens, you donât want to be thinking about what are you going to doâyou already know what you are going to do. When I saw that left turn with a direct heading, I instinctively knew he was heading for an airport. He was taking a direct route to Palau Langkawi, a 13,000-foot airstrip with an approach over water and no obstacles. The captain did not turn back to Kuala Lampur because he knew he had 8,000-foot ridges to cross. He knew the terrain was friendlier toward Langkawi, which also was closer. Take a look at this airport on Google Earth. The pilot did all the right things. He was confronted by some major event onboard that made him make an immediate turn to the closest, safest airport. For me, the loss of transponders and communications makes perfect sense in a fire. And there most likely was an electrical fire. In the case of a fire, the first response is to pull the main busses and restore circuits one by one until you have isolated the bad one. If they pulled the busses, the plane would go silent. It probably was a serious event and the flight crew was occupied with controlling the plane and trying to fight the fire. Aviate, navigate, and lastly, communicate is the mantra in such situations. There are two types of fires. An electrical fire might not be as fast and furious, and there may or may not be incapacitating smoke. However there is the possibility, given the timeline, that there was an overheat on one of the front landing gear tires, it blew on takeoff and started slowly burning. Yes, this happens with underinflated tires. Remember: Heavy plane, hot night, sea level, long-run takeoff. There was a well known accident in Nigeria of a DC8 that had a landing gear fire on takeoff. Once going, a tire fire would produce horrific, incapacitating smoke. Yes, pilots have access to oxygen masks, but this is a no-no with fire. Most have access to a smoke hood with a filter, but this will last only a few minutes depending on the smoke level. (I used to carry one in my flight bag, and I still carry one in my briefcase when I fly.) What I think happened is the flight crew was overcome by smoke and the plane continued on the heading, probably on George (autopilot), until it ran out of fuel or the fire destroyed the control surfaces and it crashed. You will find it along that routeâlooking elsewhere is pointless. lang-660 Ongoing speculation of a hijacking and/or murder-suicide and that there was a flight engineer on board does not sway me in favor of foul play until I am presented with evidence of foul play. We know there was a last voice transmission that, from a pilotâs point of view, was entirely normal. âGood nightâ is customary on a hand-off to a new air traffic control. The âgood nightâ also strongly indicates to me that all was OK on the flight deck. Remember, there are many ways a pilot can communicate distress. A hijack code or even transponder code off by one digit would alert ATC that something was wrong. Every good pilot knows keying an SOS over the mike always is an option. Even three short clicks would raise an alert. So I conclude that at the point of voice transmission all was perceived as well on the flight deck by the pilots. But things could have been in the process of going wrong, unknown to the pilots. Evidently the ACARS went inoperative some time before. Disabling the ACARS is not easy, as pointed out. This leads me to believe more in an electrical problem or an electrical fire than a manual shutdown. I suggest the pilots probably were not aware ACARS was not transmitting. As for the reports of altitude fluctuations, given that this was not transponder-generated data but primary radar at maybe 200 miles, the azimuth readings can be affected by a lot of atmospherics and I would not have high confidence in this being totally reliable. But letâs accept for a minute that the pilot may have ascended to 45,000 feet in a last-ditch effort to quell a fire by seeking the lowest level of oxygen. That is an acceptable scenario. At 45,000 feet, it would be tough to keep this aircraft stable, as the flight envelope is very narrow and loss of control in a stall is entirely possible. The aircraft is at the top of its operational ceiling. The reported rapid rates of descent could have been generated by a stall, followed by a recovery at 25,000 feet. The pilot may even have been diving to extinguish flames. But going to 45,000 feet in a hijack scenario doesnât make any good sense to me. Regarding the additional flying time: On departing Kuala Lampur, Flight 370 would have had fuel for Beijing and an alternate destination, probably Shanghai, plus 45 minutesâsay, 8 hours. Maybe more. He burned 20-25 percent in the first hour with takeoff and the climb to cruise. So when the turn was made toward Langkawi, he would have had six hours or more hours worth of fuel. This correlates nicely with the Inmarsat data pings being received until fuel exhaustion. Fire in an aircraft demands one thing: Get the machine on the ground as soon as possible. The now known continued flight until time to fuel exhaustion only confirms to me that the crew was incapacitated and the flight continued on deep into the south Indian ocean. There is no point speculating further until more evidence surfaces, but in the meantime it serves no purpose to malign pilots who well may have been in a struggle to save this aircraft from a fire or other serious mechanical issue. Capt. Zaharie Ahmad Shah was a hero struggling with an impossible situation trying to get that plane to Langkawi. There is no doubt in my mind. Thatâs the reason for the turn and direct route. A hijacking would not have made that deliberate left turn with a direct heading for Langkawi. It probably would have weaved around a bit until the hijackers decided where they were taking it. Surprisingly, none of the reporters, officials, or other pilots interviewed have looked at this from the pilotâs viewpoint: If something went wrong, where would he go? Thanks to Google Earth I spotted Langkawi in about 30 seconds, zoomed in and saw how long the runway was and I just instinctively knew this pilot knew this airport. He had probably flown there many times. Fire in an aircraft demands one thing: Get the machine on the ground as soon as possible. There are two well-remembered experiences in my memory. The AirCanada DC9 which landed, I believe, in Columbus, Ohio in the 1980s. That pilot delayed descent and bypassed several airports. He didnât instinctively know the closest airports. He got it on the ground eventually, but lost 30-odd souls. The 1998 crash of Swissair DC-10 off Nova Scotia was another example of heroic pilots. They were 15 minutes out of Halifax but the fire overcame them and they had to ditch in the ocean. They simply ran out of time. That fire incidentally started when the aircraft was about an hour out of Kennedy. Guess what? The transponders and communications were shut off as they pulled the busses. Get on Google Earth and type in Pulau Langkawi and then look at it in relation to the radar track heading. Two plus two equals four. For me, that is the simple explanation why it turned and headed in that direction. Smart pilot. He just didnât have the time all well and good but i still say what about all the mobile phones on board
The mobiles are a quandry as are reports that the plane descended below radar level (5000ft) Wont be long now before its all out imo Still might have something do do with aliens like
its not my words they are from a pilot called chris goodfellow . i happen to think this aircraft has been completly destroyed very suddenly,but then again what were the chances that somebody was making a mobile call at the time that ended as quick ?
TRY THIS ONE Did Malaysian Airlines 370 disappear using SIA68/SQ68 (another 777)? NOTE!!! - Many mistakenly believed I have meant specifically that MH370 flew BEHIND SQ68. When I say shadow, I mean that it may have flown above or below SQ68 slightly. Listening to ATC instructions would have allowed MH370 to stay current on SQ68’s next move. Monday, March 17, 2014 - 12:01 AM EST UPDATED: Monday, March 17, 2014 - 9:00 AM EST Typo was made during the conversion of UTC times. Meeting of SIA68 and MH320 occurred at 18:00UTC - 18:15UTC. MH320 dropped off of civilian radar at 17:22UTC. UPDATE - Monday, March 17, 2014 - 12:15 PM EST Some have raised the statement that TCAS doesn’t work if the transponder is disabled… this is only partially correct. Other planes TCAS would NOT see MH370 at all. MH370 would not actively query other planes as it’s transponder is off HOWEVER it could still listen to any transponder output from other planes that are actively transmitting. SQ68 would have been actively transmitting while in-range of Subang ATC center. Even if TCAS on MH370 wasn’t working for some reason, an in-expensive portable ADS-B receiver paired with an iPad and Foreflight app would allow a pilot to receive the ADS-B output being transmitted by SQ68 at that time. ———————————————————————————————————— By: Keith Ledgerwood As the search for missing flight Malaysian Airlines flight 370 drags on into the 10th day, so many questions continue to remain unanswered about how and why the airliner could have disappeared while seemingly under the control of a skilled pilot intent on making it invisible. With satellite pings showing where the plane could be after more than seven hours of flight, speculation has arisen that the plane could be on the ground anywhere along a path from northern Thailand to the border of Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. The major roadblock to this theory has been the insistence from India and Pakistan that their radar network showed no such unidentified aircraft entering or traversing their airspace. It would seem highly unlikely given such information that a Boeing 777 could indeed slip through undetected. As a hobby pilot and aviation enthusiast, a theory began to form in my own mind on this 10th day as all of the latest information began to trickle in slowly through media outlets globally. After being unable to escape the idea that it may have happened, I began to do some analysis and research and what I discovered was very troubling to me! Starting with a set of facts that have been made available publically and verified over the past few days, I first plotted MH370’s course onto an aviation IFR map which shows the airways and waypoints used to navigate the skies. I plotted the point where it stopped transmitting ADS-B information at 1721UTC. I then plotted the Malaysian military radar track from that point towards “VAMPI”, “GIVAL”, and then onward toward “IGREX” on P628 ending with where the plane should be at 1815UTC when military radar lost contact. That chart looks like this: Source: SkyVector.com Nothing profound there… but then I looked to see what other planes were in the air at 1815UTC and I looked to see exactly where they were positioned in the sky and where they were flying. The picture started to develop when I discovered that another Boeing 777 was en-route from Singapore over the Andaman Sea. Source: FlightRadar24.com I investigated further and plotted the exact coordinates of Singapore Airlines flight number 68’s location at 1815UTC onto the aviation map. I quickly realized that SIA68 was in the immediate vicinity as the missing MH370 flight at precisely the same time. Moreover, SIA68 was en-route on a heading towards the same IGREX waypoint on airway P628 that the Malaysian military radar had shown MH370 headed towards at precisely the same time. Source: SkyVector.com It became apparent as I inspected SIA68’s flight path history that MH370 had maneuvered itself directly behind SIA68 at approximately 18:00UTC and over the next 15 minutes had been following SIA68. All the pieces of my theory had been fitting together with the facts that have been publically released and I began to feel a little uneasy. Singapore Airlines Flight 68 proceeded across the Andaman Sea into the Bay of Bengal and finally into India’s airspace. From there it appears to have proceeded across India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and finally Turkmenistan before proceeding onward across Europe to its final destination of Barcelona, Spain. This map depicts the approximate flight path of SIA flight 68 on that particular day. Additional detail will be required from each countries aviation authorities to establish exact particulars of the route. Source: SkyVector.com So by now, you may have caught on or you may be scratching your head and wondering if I’ve gone insane! How does SIA68 have anything to do with MH370 disappearing? Remember the one challenge that is currently making everyone doubt that MH370 actually flew to Turkmenistan, Iran, China, or Kyrgyzstan? That challenge is the thought that MH370 couldn’t make it through several key airspaces such as India or Afghanistan without being detected by the military. It is my belief that MH370 likely flew in the shadow of SIA68 through India and Afghanistan airspace. As MH370 was flying “dark” without transponder / ADS-B output, SIA68 would have had no knowledge that MH370 was anywhere around and as it entered Indian airspace, it would have shown up as one single blip on the radar with only the transponder information of SIA68 lighting up ATC and military radar screens. Wouldn’t the SIA68 flight have detected MH370? NO! The Boeing 777 utilizes a TCAS system for traffic avoidance; the system would ordinarily provide alerts and visualization to pilots if another airplane was too close. However that system only operates by receiving the transponder information from other planes and displaying it for the pilot. If MH370 was flying without the transponder, it would have been invisible to SIA68. In addition, the TCAS system onboard MH370 would have enabled the pilot(s) to easily locate and approach SIA68 over the Straits of Malacca as they appeared to have done. The system would have shown them the flight’s direction of travel and the altitude it was traveling which would have enabled them to perfectly time an intercept right behind the other Boeing 777. Here is a picture of a TCAS system onboard a 777. How does this solve the mystery??? We know MH370 didn’t fly to Spain! Once MH370 had cleared the volatile airspaces and was safe from being detected by military radar sites in India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan it would have been free to break off from the shadow of SIA68 and could have then flown a path to it’s final landing site. There are several locations along the flight path of SIA68 where it could have easily broken contact and flown and landed in Xingjian province, Kyrgyzstan, or Turkmenistan. Each of these final locations would match up almost perfectly with the 7.5 hours of total flight time and trailing SIA68. In addition, these locations are all possibilities that are on the “ARC” and fit with the data provided by Inmarsat from the SATCOM’s last known ping at 01:11UTC. There are too many oddities in this whole story that don’t make sense if this theory isn’t the answer in my opinion. Why did MH370 fly a seemingly haphazard route and suddenly start heading northwest towards the Andaman Islands on P628? If not for this reason, it seems like a rather odd maneuver. The timing and evasive actions seem deliberate. Someone went through great lengths to attempt to become stealthy and disable ACARS, transponder/ADS-B (even though SATCOM to Inmarsat was left powered). After looking at all the details, it is my opinion that MH370 snuck out of the Bay of Bengal using SIA68 as the perfect cover. It entered radar coverage already in the radar shadow of the other 777, stayed there throughout coverage, and then exited SIA68’s shadow and then most likely landed in one of several land locations north of India and Afghanistan
the pilots/crew could have worn gas masks whilst a poisonous gas was sent through the air-con to all passengers dont think this has happened but plausible still think the worlds biggest ever ransom note is involved (like a roll of wallpaper) could be mourihnio trying to get drogba back off the turks
never considered it, but hell yeah, **** off big snake on that mutha ****in plane actually ate the plane from the inside out case solved
The US Military has cancelled its multi billion dollar research and development program into the next generation of stealth aircraft as they discover simply turning off the transponder has the same effect. Say what you will about Ryanair, but their tight fuel reserve policy guarantees a search radius of not more than 50 miles if one of their planes went missing
I have a sneaky suspicion that the pilot has links with an Islamic terrorist group in Pakistan or somewhere close by, and that is where it has landed...All subjective thought of course..
Woah- that comment was my 3,777 comment. Minus 3,000 and ad Boeing and you get the same plane!!! Coincidence? I think not.
