Originally Posted by
BOAC
Surely after all these posts we should look a little at old Lady Logic?
Scenario 1) Drastic emergency on board: As said, who as time to re-programme the FMC to follow a bizarre route? Will the a/c systems then allow this to be 'flown'?
Scenario 2) Suicide/political protest: I'm going to crash this aircraft out of desperation/frustration over something. Why drag it out for 7 or more hours and then crash it? What is wrong with a political/emotional R/T message and a high-speed dive into the nearest water?
BOAC you're conflating two things. Suicide and a polical protest could easily have quite different motivations and end goals.
I agree a pure political protest seems unlikely in this scenario although the possibilty there were other plans which went arwy or even that the intention was to try and demonstrate incompetence by dissappearing for good can't be ruled out. (Note the time is not a factor, it's easily possible dissappearing way off course could be part of the planned protest. But under most scenarios, you would expect an attempt to let the world know at some stage. In fact dissappearing may be seen to add to the message if it's believed no one will notice until you send your message. Since it's easy to see the failure to notice will be criticised regardless of if that's fair or would be the same for most governments.)
In the case of pure suicide, if you don't want anyone to know for sure this makes a lot sense. There's still a fair chance the plane will never be found and it would be far greater were it not for INMARSAT data. It's true that the is some doubt over many previous alleged commercial plane pilot suicides but no where near the level of this.