Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370

[Airplanedoc]

This is interesting.

http://keithledgerwood.tumblr.com/p...ysian-airlines-370-disappear-using-sia68-sq68


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That is a very interesting theory



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[kombat]

A major hole is how/why the flight data recorder and transponder were shut off at different times.

Where did you hear that the flight data recorder was shut off? It's located in the tail of the airplane and can only be turned off by pulling the circuit breaker. And it doesn't broadcast, so how would anyone on the ground even know it had been turned off? It just records data until the plane crashes.

The transponder could easily have been shut off by a confused flight crew suffering from hypoxia.

Though, 45,000 may kill everyone who doesn't have a oxygen mask on.

The atmosphere (or lack thereof) at 45,000 ft will most definitely kill everyone within seconds/minutes without supplemental oxygen.

Can a pilot prevent oxygen masks from deploying?

No, they deploy automatically upon sensing the pressure dropping too low. However, they do not have an indefinitely supply of oxygen. Each mask has its own oxygen supply. The tank attached to each mask does not actually contain oxygen, but rather a set of chemicals that when mixed together catalyze to produce oxygen. But once the chemical reaction is exhausted, no more oxygen is produced. It will last long enough to get the plane down to an altitude where the air is breathable (around 10,000 ft).

The pilots, on the other hand, have actual oxygen tanks that will supply oxygen for much longer.

 

[kombat]

My guess is that it lost cabin pressure, drifted for a while with everyone asleep, and finally went into the water 500 miles south of India. If it crashed nose down, the debris field could be isolated to a small area, and mostly underwater.

This seems to be the most plausible explanation, in my opinion. There's even precedent. This is exactly what happened to Helios flight 522 in 2005. The cabin slowly lost pressure and the pilots didn't notice. Hypoxia set in and they couldn't think clearly. The masks in back dropped down and the passengers put them on, thinking the pilots were fixing things. But the masks in the cockpit don't drop automatically - the pilots have to retrieve them and put them on deliberately. So they didn't notice they were hypoxic. They passed out, the passengers in back eventually ran out of oxygen and also passed out. The plane continued to its next waypoint where, in the absence of further instructions, it went into an automatic holding pattern until it ran out of fuel and crashed into a mountain.

 

[kombat]

If it wasn't for the course change and transponder disconnect, explosive decompression would be more plausible.

You're right, for explosive decompression. But gradual decompression is much more insidious and plausible. If you're losing cabin pressure and unaware it's happening, you just get tired and confused (hypoxic). You could mistakenly turn off the wrong radio (transponder) and mix up a course change (turning the plane the completely wrong direction) before eventually succumbing completely to hypoxia and passing out.

There's precedent. This has happened before. Helios flight 522. Also a Japan Airlines 747 (flight 123) lost pressure (tail bulkhead blew out due to botched repair from a tail strike years earlier) and lost hydraulics. The plane porpoised wildly, and when it was at the apex of its flight path, where the air was thin, the pilots were very disoriented and confused. Their ATC calls were nonsensical, and they made bizarre decisions until the plane dove back down to thicker air and they regained their senses. It eventually crashed into a mountain, killing 520 people, making it the worse single-aircraft disaster in history.

 

[LovesIPA]

The mechanical failure doesn't really hold much water because the 777 has a lot of redundant systems including navigation and communication. For example, there are actually three independent auto-pilot systems. If one doesn't agree with the other two, it gets ignored. It's incredibly unlikely that they all failed at the same time and the plane was still able to fly for 7 hours. It doesn't seem any more likely that the pilots would shut off the two systems that allow the plane to be tracked and never utter a single word on any of the communication systems.

The shadow theory fits the data better IMO (not that it's worth much...) It explains why we haven't found a single piece of the plane anywhere, it explains why the transponder was shut off, it explains how the aircraft would be able to penetrate ground radar (assuming that it's plausible), and it explains why there was no radio communication.

I doubt it was the pilots. Neither one of them strike me as the type. Now two young Iranian men traveling with stolen passports? Yes, that's pretty darn suspicious.

 

[LovesIPA]

No evidence points to someone knowledgeable at the console (other than the pilots of the flight) after the transponder was shut off.

I gladly take you up on the bet. You are on. $100 bucks to you if the two men are shown to have been involved in causing this. $100 bucks to me they are not. If nothing gets resolved in a year the bet's off.

(Shaking on it)

You're on. I take paypal.

 

[Hello]

This is interesting.

http://keithledgerwood.tumblr.com/p...ysian-airlines-370-disappear-using-sia68-sq68


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Amazing. Even if he is not right in the sense that it locates the flight or even tells what happened, the idea that he has revealed that one 777 can fly in the shadow of another 777 is terrifying. This is one smart guy though and he should be acknowledged for his theory, right or wrong.

 

[kombat]

Now two young Iranian men traveling with stolen passports? Yes, that's pretty darn suspicious.

Really?

2 young, untrained Iranian men overpowered the flight crew and 250 passengers, and skillfully piloted a 777 for several hours while flawlessly avoiding multiple ground-based radar systems, then successfully landed at some secret unknown airfield with a runway long enough to land a widebody jet airliner? And nobody noticed?

THAT seems like the most likely explanation to you?

 

[kombat]

My money is on a gradual, undetected loss of cabin pressure that incapacitated the crew via hypoxia, causing them to become confused, alter their course, accidentally turn off their transponder, and aim the plane out over the Indian ocean before eventually losing consciousness. The plane cruised on a heading-and-altitude hold autopilot setting until it ran out of fuel and crashed in the ocean. It wasn't seen on any radar because a) they turned off their transponder, and b) it was way out over the ocean where there are no radar stations to pick it up.

 

[LovesIPA]

Really?

2 young, untrained Iranian men overpowered the flight crew and 250 passengers, and skillfully piloted a 777 for several hours while flawlessly avoiding multiple ground-based radar systems, then successfully landed at some secret unknown airfield with a runway long enough to land a widebody jet airliner? And nobody noticed?

THAT seems like the most likely explanation to you?

This is so full of conjecture it's silly. I'll just start at the top.

Who said they were untrained? One of them was 29 years old. How do you know what he's been doing the last 10 years? Did you look into his background?

Skillfully piloted? I wouldn't consider altitude changes between 4000 and 45000 feet "skillful". Taking off and landing a plane is absolutely the hardest part. Flying it around is not that difficult, especially if someone has had a little training. Hell, *I* could probably pilot a 777 from point A to point B if it was already in the air.

However, I agree that landing the plane seems a little implausible.

"Flawlessly" avoiding multiple ground based radar? It was picked up by Malaysian military radar after the plane turned west and crossed the peninsula. Can you detail the other radar systems that it "flawlessly" avoided? Or can you admit that you're just making **** up now?

And finally... who said the plane landed successfully? For all we know it crashed into the ocean or the jungle.

Edit: Here's another radar system they "flawlessly" avoided: http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/18/world/asia/malaysia-airlines-plane/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

 

[LovesIPA]

My money is on a gradual, undetected loss of cabin pressure that incapacitated the crew via hypoxia, causing them to become confused, alter their course, accidentally turn off their transponder, and aim the plane out over the Indian ocean before eventually losing consciousness. The plane cruised on a heading-and-altitude hold autopilot setting until it ran out of fuel and crashed in the ocean. It wasn't seen on any radar because a) they turned off their transponder, and b) it was way out over the ocean where there are no radar stations to pick it up.

The timeline simply doesn't support something gradual. At 1:19am the co-pilot said "all right, good night." The transponder was shut off at 1:21am - just TWO MINUTES later. The next ACARS report was supposed to get sent out at 1:37am and that system was shut off as well, sometime between 1:07am (its last successful report) and 1:37 am.

Nothing about that timeline says "gradual".

edit: from the link above, the plane disappeared from Thai military radar at 1:22 when the transponder was shut off. They picked it up again just six minutes later - heading in nearly the opposite direction. I think we can throw "gradual" out the window now.

 

[LovesIPA]

Amazing. Even if he is not right in the sense that it locates the flight or even tells what happened, the idea that he has revealed that one 777 can fly in the shadow of another 777 is terrifying. This is one smart guy though and he should be acknowledged for his theory, right or wrong.

It's certainly an interesting theory. I don't know all that much about aviation and radar, but he certainly presents a coherent case that lines up with what little we know.

 

[kombat]

The timeline simply doesn't support something gradual. At 1:19am the co-pilot said "all right, good night." The transponder was shut off at 1:21am - just TWO MINUTES later. The next ACARS report was supposed to get sent out at 1:37am and that system was shut off as well, sometime between 1:07am (its last successful report) and 1:37 am.

Nothing about that timeline says "gradual".

I disagree.

The timeframe you just gave me is 30 minutes wide. And just because someone is suffering from hypoxia doesn't mean they can't send short, simple radio messages like "All right, good night." That's the insidious nature of hypoxia. It impedes your mental capacity to the extent that you don't even know it's happening, but meanwhile your reasoning and problem-solving skills are gradually degrading. You're still conscious and have control over your muscles, so you can still *do* stuff - you're just not certain what you're doing or why you're doing it. It's like being really, really tired, but not wanting to admit it.

edit: from the link above, the plane disappeared from Thai military radar at 1:22 when the transponder was shut off. They picked it up again just six minutes later - heading in nearly the opposite direction. I think we can throw "gradual" out the window now.

No, not at all! This is exactly what I'm talking about. If they were experiencing a gradual loss of cabin pressure and were slowly succumbing to hypoxia, the entire flight crew would have been finding it harder and harder to stay focused and follow procedures.

They could still make radio calls and adjust their instruments, but it would be like doing it drunk. They'd be confused, they'd make adjustments and decisions they thought seemed right at the time, but would be nonsensical to a clear-headed observer, like turning off the transponder instead of adjusting the radio to the frequency of the next ATC, which is exactly what they WOULD have been doing as they were being handed off from one zone to another. Hence the "All right, good night" message they sent to the controller handing them off.

Under normal circumstances, they'd have keyed in the frequency of the next ATC center and made another radio call, something like "BlahBlah ATC this is Malaysia 370 at 450 for Beijing, good morning." Instead, they apparently turned off their transponder and changed course. Maybe they turned the heading knob of the autopilot thinking they were changing their radio frequency. That's they thing about hypoxia. You're impaired, but you don't know it.

 

[bob1852]

Where did you hear that the flight data recorder was shut off?

Early on media mis-information. Shocking, I know.

 

[kombat]

Who said they were untrained? One of them was 29 years old. How do you know what he's been doing the last 10 years? Did you look into his background?

Have I, personally, run a full background check on these guys? No, of course not, but obviously numerous other police agencies have by now and I don't recall hearing anything about either of them having any level of flight training.

However, I agree that landing the plane seems a little implausible.

"Flawlessly" avoiding multiple ground based radar? It was picked up by Malaysian military radar after the plane turned west and crossed the peninsula. Can you detail the other radar systems that it "flawlessly" avoided? Or can you admit that you're just making **** up now?

I'm a big believer in Occam's Razor. It's certainly possible that two Iranian nationals were secretly trained to fly a 777 and somehow, in this post-9-11 world, managed to penetrate the cockpit and seize control of the airplane, then knew which instrument to turn off to disappear off radar, and knew enough about navigation to weave between other radar stations for the next several hours until crashing, undetected, in the ocean. But that does not seem like the most likely explanation to me.

Let's look at what we know.

We know the plane never broadcast any kind of distress signals to ATC. The last communication was a perfectly normal one. No one declared Mayday or indicated any kind of distress at any time. So whatever happened, we know that either the pilots were in on it, or it happened too quickly for them to make a radio call, or the radios malfunctioned. Law enforcement agencies are scouring the histories of both pilots, and so far haven't come up with anything particularly damning, so I think it's unlikely that this was a deliberate action by one or more of the pilots. We also know that the mechanics and electronics on modern airliners are both extremely reliable, and backed up with multiple redundancies, particularly the radios. So that leaves something happening too quickly for them to declare an emergency and ask for help.

We know that the plane continued flying for several hours after losing contact with ATC. We know this because the engine manufacturer continued receiving electronic "pings" from the engines, indicating they were running normally.

We know that the plane did not appear on any other radar screens, except possibly one militar radar, even on "passive" radar (which would easily pick up something the size of a 777 even without an operating transponder). This tells us that the plane was either too low to be picked up by radar (which is impossibly low in the mountainous terrain of the region in question), or was out over the ocean where there are no radar stations to pick it up. The latter seems the most likely scenario. The "low altitude" theory is a red herring in my opinion. Passive radar has no problem picking up a little Cessna flying at 3,000 ft - why would it not be able to detect a massive 777 at the same altitude?

So we have pilots that didn't call for help, an airplane that continued flying for several hours, most likely over the ocean. To me, that says the pilots were medically incapacitated by hypoxia, and the plane flew out over the ocean until it ran out of fuel and crashed. It's happened before.

 

[bob1852]

Law enforcement agencies are scouring the histories of both pilots, and so far haven't come up with anything particularly damning, so I think it's unlikely that this was a deliberate action by one or more of the pilots.

I agree with everything you've said, except for this.

Hours before flying, the senior pilot had attended the prison sentencing of a Malaysian political opposition leader who some have described as an extremist.

And, the day before the flight, the pilot's wife and three kids moved out of their house.

But of course, with a co-pilot and engineer in the cockpit, it does seem unlikely that pilot suicide could occur without him taking out the co-pilot and engineer quickly; which IMO is just stuff out of the movies...

Your theory seems the most plausible given all of the facts.

 

[illinoisbrassman]

. At 1:19am the co-pilot said "all right, good night."

I think people are reading more into the last voice communication between ATC and the plane. I have had numerous conversations with Air Traffic Controllers that ended in a similar fashion. When in busy airspace conversation is generally strictly business, short and to the point. Sometimes to the point of acknowledging instructions with nothing more than microphone clicks. However, when flying in a not busy time or place, conversion is much more relaxed. I used to fly the same route quite a bit under control of KC Center, After getting instruction to contact Memphis approach control..... I would frequently sign off with have a "good night", "thanks for everything" "have a good evening" or something similar, just to be polite to a guy with a thankless, stressful job in a dark room somewhere.

 

[Airplanedoc]

But of course, with a co-pilot and engineer in the cockpit, it does seem unlikely that pilot suicide could occur without him taking out the co-pilot and engineer quickly; which IMO is just stuff out of the movies...

A 777ER has a 2 person flight crew. On many planes the Flight Engineer is now a computer.

 

[jcoxen]

Here's a Pilot's guess/opinion on what happened.

http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/03/mh370-electrical-fire/

 

[eyeimbibe]

The interesting thing is the lack of cellular information. I think that lends credibility to the mechanical fire and the attempt to turn west.

 

[syntrikz]

I'll bet it was an electrical issue. They can be quite nasty. I don't know what pieces of equipment are on which busses in the 777, but its incredibly possible that a bus fault was created by a problem with the transponder or ACARS that killed the other.

 

[SharonaZamboni]

Here's a Pilot's guess/opinion on what happened.



http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/03/mh370-electrical-fire/

I read this theory earlier today, and it seems plausible to me.

 

[PackerfaninSanDiego]

when the plane is found, I wonder who will be the first to say. " I told you so"

 

[jpwic]

I really like the pilot's opinion on Wired, Occam Razor after all, usually the easiest most likely answer is the right one.

 

[Bigscience]

I think the thing that's irritating me the most is how every time the media talks about the copilot, that show his mosque or make a reference to his religion. Not all Muslims crash planes, not all Christians bomb abortion clinics.

They better find something soon before the black box pinger battery dies. 30 days? You'd think they could put a better battery on that thing unless it's an iBlackBox.


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[Homercidal]

I don't know. I think that in case of fire someone would have been able to send a radio distress. It would take like 5 seconds.

 

[LovesIPA]

I don't know. I think that in case of fire someone would have been able to send a radio distress. It would take like 5 seconds.

It doesn't quite make sense to me either. It's not completely plausible to me that the fire takes out all the comm systems, two systems that allow the plane to be found, but it's still able to fly for 7 more hours.

 

[srice]

Here's a Pilot's guess/opinion on what happened.

http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/03/mh370-electrical-fire/

That is a very interesting theory, but the latest information I have been hearing is that the plane had already made the turn before the last ACARS transmission at 1:07 and the last voice transmission 12 minutes later. It seems that if they had turned towards the nearest runway due to fire, the voice transmission might have included something about that.

 

[LovesIPA]

That is a very interesting theory, but the latest information I have been hearing is that the plane had already made the turn before the last ACARS transmission at 1:07 and the last voice transmission 12 minutes later. It seems that if they had turned towards the nearest runway due to fire, the voice transmission might have included something about that.

If that's true, it throws a lot of theories out the window.

 

[bob1852]

That is a very interesting theory, but the latest information I have been hearing is that the plane had already made the turn before the last ACARS transmission at 1:07 and the last voice transmission 12 minutes later.

I've seen conflicting reports about whether the plane had actually turned before the voice transmission or if the course adjust was programmed before the voice transmission...