I'm not sure if has been mentioned somewhere (I have read a lot of posts, but not them all) but with regards to the conversation about where the plane might have gone/might be
It most likely went South, not North
Reasoning:
The plane made what is seemingly extremely calculated moves to avoid radar (cutting communication at handover, flying under radar over land, picking path between radar, etc)
The plane was still in the air (0811) when the search was already underway. Everyone in the surrounding area would have been alerted at that time
There is no possible way the US hasn't requested the data for any unidentified planes being picked up on the surrounding countries radar systems
There are enough satellite pings to determine likely locations where the plane would have been pinged but stayed off radar the entire time it was in flight.
The US has to know that the likelihood is it is South, where this 'non-radar contact, but pinged' flight is much more possible than it would have been over land with everyone searching. That doesn't mean it couldn't have, but likelihood...