With all the myriad possibilities, has anyone considered the recent EY461 incident ? I doubt that would cause a sudden disintegration, but it is a recent event, and originated in that part of the world.

Did 9M-MRO have inflight wifi service ? Another method of getting something out, if there were sufficient time to do so.

From what various posters have said, the aircraft was not under civilian primary radar coverage at the time the various signals were lost. If there had been a naval ship in the area, with an air search radar operating, they may have seen something that could lend a clue. Beyond that, if the aircraft ended up transiting some remote land area, would a military radar automatically scramble jets to see what was up there, or would they note it and ignore it (because it wasn't considered a threat) ?

bedder beleivit


your knowledge of radar is a very welcome addition to the thread. as many of us know radar sep is required to be more conservative the farther from the radar antenna.

it would be odd, but believable if the secondary and primary were confused by someone leading to the idea of a turnback.

anyway, I do wish we would get an actual statement from authorities about the way the radar was being used, but there might be a military secret or something else involved.

all I am suggesting is that the searchers may be looking in the wrong spot.

being a good old rooting tooting American, I'm betting our ships and planes spot it before anyone else.

;-)

Looking at the ever-widening search area, the logical conclusion is no, they don't have any useful primary/military radar plot. It could be that there are some recordings that might produce something when analysed but it's almost past the time frame for that now - I'm sure that was thought of not long after they drew a blank originally.

There is a '10,000 foot checklist'? In my company, the seat-belt signs are in the after take-off checklist, but often that item is deferred until we're clear of weather obviously.

BTW, we do check that pressurization is normal passing 10,000 ft, and I'm sure many other airlines will have the same procedure as well, for obvious reasons. Of the thousands of flights I've done, I've had two instances where pressurization wasn't normal passing 10,000 ft, one resulting in an RTB (return to base) and the other, maintaining altitude until the problem was rectified (as it was a simple fix). In our case, pressurization was a problem; could it have been the same for MH370?

Fingers crossed that the most recent debris search doesn't turn out to be another false lead. Two comments:

Deletion of posts: I would like to buy a bottle and a bucket of ice for the mod or mods who've been monitoring this thread, to be imbibed as soon as the hubbub's died down. You have done a superb job of trying to keep it credible, even if there might have been a few deletions that could have remained.

Malacca Straits: Think pragmatic, not conspiracy. It's not every day that a superpower has the opportunity to explore sensitive areas with some of the most sophisticated kit available. At this time we have no idea whether there was any real indication the aircraft was heading west. But put yourself in superpower shoes and wonder whether it might not be a good idea to get an update on your existing data, with full support from local governments? Of course you'd go for it.

My experience as a pax without any claims to rigour is that things loosen up in the cabin just after reaching cruise. People get to their feet and movement starts.

On another forum I frequent, it's often pointed out that the mods do a fairly thankless job decrufting runaway threads such as this, and as such should be spared from their actions being questioned.

The simple rule: no whining.

Rule 2: if you don't like it, feel free to request a refund of your membership.

:)

Facts and Conclusions
 

If you take the point in time where transponders shut off as t=0, or corresponding location as origin point, a few results can be arrived at:


1. Lack of debris on sea surface in the immediate vicinity of origin point lead us to believe that the aircraft did not structurally disintegrate, either due to aerodynamic forces or through explosives .
2. Lack of IR signature confirmation by US SBIRS (Infra red spotting satellite system) also lends credence to the result that the aircraft did not explode in air at origin point.
3. Suicide theory can also be laid to rest because a pilot intent on committing suicide will not linger around in air and in fact will try to head down right away after turning off transponders leading to debris field around origin point.
4. However, since we know as a fact that the aircraft eventually crashed, it leads us to believe that the aircraft was severely impaired at t=0, even if it was structurally intact. Whatever happened around t=0 was catastrophic enough to eventually bring the aircraft down. It not only took out communication ability of the pilots but a lot more than that.
5. A set of pilots finding themselves in a catastrophic situation are highly likely to look for a landing strip ASAP. Given that they have likely lost their navigational ability as well (most likely), at night, they are going to head for nearest land, wherever they might think it is.
6. If we take it as a fact from Malaysian authorities that the aircraft tried to turn around, it could be an indication that the pilots were in trouble and wanted to find land in haste.
7. Malaysian authorities claimed in the beginning (perhaps even now) that they lost radar contact at 2:40AM, more than an hour after t=0, if that is true then they were tracking an aircraft in huge trouble looking to land somewhere or anywhere. But it provides a radius of around one hour flying time from origin point to search for.
8. Regarding US SBIRS lack of IR signature, it could depend on what their system is optimized to detect. A missile launch is sustained bright fire, an aircraft crashing in a fireball is short term quick burning fire. SBIRS probably accurately confirm that the aircraft did not explode in air, however, will it also accurately confirm that it did not burn under jungle canopy for a short time?.

Bingo. There's sure to be a lot of information being correlated around the world to try to work out where the aircraft is, and there's no need or benefit to putting all that out publicly; just look at the reaction to every new debris report, and then imagine reporting perhaps dozens or hundreds of uncertain radar traces or other possible sightings that are unlikely to be correct, and may well contradict each other.

If nothing else, it would be unfair on the families to raise hopes and dash them when a report turns out to be false.

+1.

Indeed if they had useful Information they would have had ample opportunity of discretely getting it to a Search Ship or plane by now which would have run 'accidentally' across some wreckage even potentially on its way to the search area if it wasn't close to LKP. Would have been a big PR trump for the corresponding Navy.

Occam's Razor says: Even the Military have not much more Information regarding the final whereabouts or what happened after the last transmission. Since that would be a quite embarrassing fact for them they might be tempted to keep rather silent about it.

Realistically, simply no one was expecting anything critical from a Military perspective in these small hours that particular night. Actual everyday surveillance capabilities might not be as good as everyone assumes.

I'm still confident it will be found soon. A 777 is a big aircraft. That doesn't simply disppear. It might however be somewhere else than where it is being looked for atm.
On the other Hand the question might be how systematic the Search is being carried out when considering how many different (and not centrally managed) parties are involved.

There are a few questions here indeed.

The aircraft, if indeed it was in the middle of the Gulf, would have been just outside the Malaysian radar cell and about to enter Vietnam's. Modern birds like the 777 use ADSB (which is what you see in apps like Flight Radar 24, it is NOT a radar feed).

The thought of the aircraft turning back comes not from a radar observation but from ACARS. More investigation is needed. If it was from radar (assuming the return was spotted), means very little. Radar does NOT tell you which direction the aircraft is facing, it simply gives you the next return. For example, you can be going north and move in a sideslip to the right, the radar will show your return to have turned.

If the data came from ACARS it is a different story, but still inconclusive. It could be showing a violent breakup. Without other data such as speed and amount of correlated data showing the "turn", there is not much to go by.

The gulf does not have a lot of strong currents, so any debirs, once found, should be (hopefully) localised.

I am starting to wonder if the initial hunch to look to the north-west and possibly even terrain south west of Ca Mau and around Kota Bharu is correct!

If they don't find anything within 24 more hours, I think it may be time to step back and consider possibilities other than a crash into the ocean. The area of ocean where the 777 is reported to have disappeared is relatively densely traveled, and a 777 would leave a whole lotta floating debris (especially if it broke up in-flight). Add dozens of dedicated search ships and aircraft and it becomes hard to believe we could go 72 hours without finding a trace.

There is an awful lot of the reported 'facts' in this case that are not adding up.

Military radar data
 

It's been years since I've worked in the field, but in the day, the powers-that-be were extremely reluctant to publicly disclose anything that would reveal capabilities of their military radars. Even if it meant helping with a civil matter.

Radar Coverage
 

Once upon a time two commercial aircraft did a mid air over the grand canyon. My source said both were reporting being elsewhere and each was taking passengers for an off track sight see of the canyon.

Results was Congress mandate the US Air Force put in place 100% coverage of the US for ATC.

Take care not to extrapolate the US flight coverage picture to the rest of the world. I get 600+ miles between Kuala Lumpur and Bien Hoa Air Base in Viet Nam. That is a lot of water with no eye's on a scope.

Curious
 

I'm curious as to whether or not an inflight breakup would not cause a fireball or flash of some kind.

I suppose it would possible, but I think not probable.

If NASA is telling the truth about not seeing a flash of any kind, and so far, no reports from the surface, plus the 3 or 4 aircraft in the area on clear night have not reported they saw anything, then it either disintegrated with no flash, or it was flown somewhere else.

However, if it disintegrated with no flash, it should be near where they last saw it on radar...yes?

There are a lot of international implications in the area, and I'm sure all the countries involved in the search want to be very careful about what they release.

Yesterday there was the report of a gentleman who had seen a bright white light descending sharply.

Given his location, the last reported position of the aircraft, etc - would this match the scenario of the flight descending to avoid radar and possibly crossing Malaysia toward the west? Could he have seen either the usual lights, or possibly landing lights? Might the pilot have illuminated the landing lights either in an attempt to attract attention (if he was under duress) or simply to see better if flying at a very low altitude?

Also - Since this transpired in the middle of the night, with it dark outside and many passengers presumably resting - if the pilots were quietly threatened into cooperation and the various coms were shut off, would passengers even have been aware of a hijacking?

We know a 777 disappeared over the ocean and we have not found the crash site. Any reasonable speculation at this point as to why is impossible.

It took two years to get the answers for AF447. The shallow water near their last known position will make this one much easier. The black boxes will tell the story when they are found.

The media wants to keep public interest up with scraps they have like stolen passports but nothing will be known until the FDR and CVR are recovered.

The vast majority of the speculative posts here are all with good intentions. This forum has managed to maintain a good level of respectability compared to everywhere else. I saw a youtube video of a guy suggesting that FR24 had altered the planes flight path. He has merged together a trace of the actual flight in question and the one of the following day. His video has been viewed 60000 times and a lot of people seem to believe the guy...so although you might complain about having non-pilots on here at least you don't have people intentionally spreading lies...

re: Radar Coverage
 

The 1956 Grand Canyon mid-air had nothing to do with "sightseeing". That it occurred over the Grand Canyon was purely coincidence. There were changes in altitude due to weather and other factors. Changes in altitude were granted but not relayed. The crash resulted in the coordination of ATC under the newly created FAA.

1956 Grand Canyon mid-air collision - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Malaysian authorities have released security video of the two men who used stolen passports to board the Malaysia Airlines plane that vanished over the South China Sea to international security agencies and will soon release them publicly."

Source: Missing Malaysia Airlines jet: Security footage of mystery passengers to be released