Malaysia airlines plane may have crashed 239 people on board #1

[Leilei]

Okay, finally found the breakdown of passenger nationalities. We know that the Italian and Austrian passports were stolen, and now two more are in question, supposedly from European nations.

UPDATE [12:01]: Altogether, 239 passengers & crew, from 14 different nationalities, including two infants. Passengers were from:
1. China - 152 plus 1 infant
2. Malaysia - 38
3. Indonesia - 12
4. Australia - 7
5. France - 3
6. United States of America - 3 plus 1 infant
7. New Zealand - 2
8. Ukraine - 2
9. Canada - 2
10. Russia - 1
11. Italy - 1
12. Taiwan - 1
13. Netherlands - 1
14. Austria - 1

This is making my head spin, but it's so intriguing...

 

[Trino]

UPDATE [11.37am]: Malaysian authorities are working with international intelligence and counter-terrorism units. Minister Hishammuddin Hussein says he has met with officers from the FBI and confirmed that an oil slick was indeed found in Vietnam waters but no debris has been detected.

“We know that, as of now, Vietnam aircraft are on site to verify (the source of the substances on) the surface of the water,” Hishammuddin said.

Singapore has deployed three vessels to aid in search and rescue. Hishammuddin says MH370 may have made an 'air turnback'.

http://my.news.yahoo.com/mas-aircraft-goes-missing--says-airline-023820132.html

An air turn back is an aviation term for the return of an aircraft to the airport of origin as a result of a malfunction or suspected malfunction of any item on the aircraft.

http://www.thestar.com.my/News/Nati...tigating-the-possibility-of-an-air-turn-back/

There is another airport just before they headed over water...
If they were going to turn back that would be the place to go.
Though I'm still not sure why they wouldn't call it in if they were turning back. :twocents:

I've been reading a lot of sites with pilot comments (not able to post sites here), but the "turn" was typical of flights. If you check online, you can actually find the plane's exact flight (moving plane, not just a photo).

 

[belimom]

No working link yet but this is up on CNN's front page:

(ETA - I thought this was breaking news, but here's a snippet from the article on the same page) -

Malaysian authorities have been in contact with counterterrorism organizations about possible passport issues, Malaysia's transportation minister Hishamuddin Hussein said. He did not state how many passport issues there are, saying authorities are looking at the whole manifest.

http://www.websleuths.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=41674&stc=1&d=1394340468

 

[HMSHood]

Only thing is, why waste 4 operatives when one would do.

9/11 had five operatives in three of the four airplanes. One or two would pilot the airplane into their target.

I am thinking if there are four, one or two may have had a bomb with them to detonate.

All speculation.

 

[PHB]

Sorry to quote myself, but duh.
It is entirely possible that the potential terrorists did not understand that this was a Malaysian airline, as they purchased the tix from the Chinese share airline. You can purchase a ticket from American Airlines and fly in a different country on a different airline which "partners" with AA, and if you aren't very savvy, you believe you are buying a ticket to fly on an AA flight. So maybe they thought they were flying on a Chinese airline after all.

I'm a limo driver, and I know when I'm picking up off a code-share, b/c it may come into a different terminal than you'd think it would.

I would guess a terrorist on a suicide mission would have at least as much attention to detail.

 

[panthera]

Only thing is, why waste 4 operatives when one would do.

There was more than one terrorist aboard each of the planes on 9/11 also. Perhaps back-up in the event one of them doesn't follow "the plan"? It's difficult to speculate at this point as we do not know if the aircraft was hijacked and ultimately in the control of someone other than the flight crew, or what happened, however, that would be one reason to have two (possibly four) aboard.

MOO

 

[Steely Dan]

Only thing is, why waste 4 operatives when one would do.

Good question.

I think it would depend on *what* they did, really. There were multiple terrorists on each 9/11 flight, so...

All speculation, of course, but it I think there are a LOT of hinky meters going off.

They needed four to overpower the crew. In the new planes doors to the cockpit are almost impenetrable. I suppose they could have attacked while the flight attendant was entering or exiting.

 

[watcher9]

If there were two more stolen passports used on this flight and they were all purchased through the Chinese site at the same time, would all four tickets have consecutive numbers?
If we could find the numbers, could we then match them to the passenger and country?

 

[K_Z]

http://www.straitstimes.com/breakin...work-locate-missing-malaysia-airlines-plane-2

Good timeline in this article.

Malaysia Airlines (MAS) flight MH370 carrying 239 people lost contact with air traffic control some two hours after leaving Kuala Lumpur. It is still missing hours after it had been scheduled to land in Beijing early Saturday morning. Based on current information, here is a timeline.

12.40 am - Flight MH370, a Boeing 777-200 carrying 227 passengers from 14 nationalities along with 12 crew members, took off from the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur.

1.22 am - The plane was meant to transfer to Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh air traffic control but never appeared.

2.41 am - Malaysian air traffic control in Subang lost contact with the plane, some two hours after it left Kuala Lumpur.

6.30 am - The flight did not land in Beijing as scheduled.

7.24 am - MAS announced it had lost contact with the flight.

11.14 am - MAS held a news conference confirming the loss of contact with its aircraft. MAS CEO Ahmad Jauhari Yahya said the last point of contact was about 120 nautical miles east of Kota Baru, in the South China Sea area in airspace bordering Vietnam.

1pm - Second MAS conference scheduled but was delayed. Malaysia, Vietnam and China are working to locate missing plane.

1.41pm - State media reported Vietnam navy said plane crashed into sea near Vietnam's Tho Chu island.

2.33pm - At press conference held in Kuala Lumpur International Airport, Malaysia's transport minister said report on MH370 crash in Vietnam was 'not true'.

 

[Derryn Hunch]

Derryn Hench, thanks for joining in and lending your expertise in the field.

I bolded the two above points in order to ask what your take is on these two specific points you brought up.

1) In your opinion, why do you think they are withholding knowledge of the location of the (downed) aircraft? What would be the reasoning behind taking such an approach, knowing there are hundreds of family members in agony, and millions of people (the court of public opinion) all asking the same questions? I am truly curious to hear your analysis.

I am totally unable to say what that reason is. I, like all the general public at the moment, have no idea what the state of the aircraft is, what caused it to come down or indeed where it actually is. I can't speculate on any causes and it would be wrong of me to do so.

All I can say is, they without question know where the plane went down and is now located - and its really poor form on behalf of Malaysian Airlines that they haven't at least just done the justice to the families of victims by confirming that there were no survivors and that they are in the process of recovering and investigating.

By doing that, they would then be able to buy themselves whatever time they require to work out whatever is going on behind the scenes here... that would answer the immediate question for families right now and then allow them a few days to gather whatever it is they are stalling on here. Its weird.

Again, I can't even begin to guess why.. but it is.


2) I understand you pointed out the logging of the structural failure to support the point that MA is aware of the location of airliner. My question is technical. The situation you described (of the logs being able to describe data in the event of a system after system failure in the event of a complete destruction mid-air), would this be telemetry already received by the airline or retrieved via the FDR?

The data is sent via a direct link to Malaysian Airlines (and I think possibly Boeing) maint.

The system sends this data almost instantaniously... as the fault appears on the FMC or other instrument as appropriate, the fault log is sent to HQ at almost the same time that they crew see it... that is how the Air France flight data was received in such a rapid and then flood manner when the aircraft began to suffer multiple sensor contradictions followed by a rapid set of fail notices as the aircraft left its designed flight envelope and began to exceed structural limitations and break up. The final messages came through thick and fast, until finally the aircraft impacted and the system that does this was completely destroyed beyond any functioning capability.

So that in mind - it depends entirely on the state of the aircraft. If it litterally exploded into a million pieces in mid air, then suffice to say, its unlikely that the required power and sensors that feed this data and transmit it would have been intact and capable of doing this.

However, there are unconfirmed reports that the aircraft was recorded as entering a 200ft nose down attitude and departure from direction of the planned flight path immediately prior to its loss of radar contact.

I again can only speculate as to what the Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777-200 systems are capable of reporting in what time frames and how regularly... they are an older type that was in the process of being retired from service so I dare say things would have been a bit behind the times...

I am able to say though with almost 100% certainty that when the record logs are sent, they will come with a flight profile, location of event and time of event.

 

[ilovepierre]

Dear Jesus, where is the Malaysian Airlines plane that went missing? Only you know that. Comfort those who had family and friends on the flight. Give the air control and search and rescue teams the knowledge to look in the right places. Give them the strength and energy to keep looking until that plane is found. And Jesus, if there are any survivors, please keep them safe until they are rescued. In Your Name I pray, Amen

 

[MsFacetious]

I've been reading a lot of sites with pilot comments (not able to post sites here), but the "turn" was typical of flights. If you check online, you can actually find the plane's exact flight (moving plane, not just a photo).

They are not basing that on the turns the plane did or did not make.
They are considering it as an option for why the plane disappeared.
Such as something went wrong which caused them to lose the transponder and they turned around.

So they would have made the turn AFTER dropping off of radar.
I have posted the planes exact flight several times. :seeya:

http://www.flightradar24.com/2014-03-07/16:50/24x/6.18,102.93/6

I am glad they appear to be keeping most options open.
If they DID turn back they would be in a total different area.
It's important to keep options open in these situations. :twocents:

 

[Leilei]

Good question.



They needed four to overpower the crew. In the new planes doors to the cockpit are almost impenetrable. I suppose they could have attacked while the flight attendant was entering or exiting.

This is what I've been thinking:

Four people, all seated far enough away from each other to cover the plane from front to back. Each with explosives of some kind, as soon as they hit cruising altitude and the fasten seat belt light dinged off, they did what they came to do.

Idk, far-fetched and probably nuts on my part, but crazier things have happened. Until they find that plane (or admit they have found it), there's nothing to do but come up with theories and speculate. My theory has a major flaw being that there has been no reports of burning debris, so...

*sigh* Just wanting answers. Like everyone else :blushing:

 

[Starry Night]

live updates (in case not yet posted)

http://stream.wsj.com/story/malaysia-airlines-flight-370/SS-2-475558/

 

[panthera]

Prayers tonight for the families of those on board....that tomorrow will bring some answers for them.

raying:


:seeya:

 

[watcher9]

Interesting that another airplane had contact with Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 prior to the crash.

Here is a video of Malaysia Airline Flight 370 on radar.
Malaysian Airlines Flight MH 370 on Flight Radar Playback. - YouTube

Around the end of the video, there are two airplanes west and east of Flight 370. I wonder if those pilots picked up any radio signals and possibly saw something.

Thanks for posting this video.
I can't imagine that many planes in the air during the same time.
I saw other planes that dropped off their flight on the radar. Was that when another radar picks them up or is there a dead space between the two radars since they didn't get to the edge of the screen? Can two radars watch the same plane?
It looked to me that the MAS plane dropped off near where the others did, but it happened so fast when it actually happened, I wasn't sure.

 

[kai]

Just thinking out loud... I wonder if this was a type of successful test to serve as a trial run for something more sinister or on a grander scale. I am not implying that this wasn't a disaster in itself. The 777 planes are American made and often flown over American soil as well. I know it isn't "all about us" either, I just take a slight pause to think of the terrorism whispers and the warning on February 21, 2014 about international flights and well...

http://news.airwise.com/story/view/1392989391.html

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...ing-was-routine-advisory-homeland-chief-says/

Prayers for all those lost and their families and friends

 

[alwaysonmymind]

Only thing is, why waste 4 operatives when one would do.

Perhaps 1 couldn't complete the mission successfully?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Derryn Hunch]

Also - as an aircraft enters a fully developed stall situation, it tends to yaw to one side... the angle of attack exceeds that of which the wing can maintain efficiency and the aicraft becomes "sloppy" in the way it will handle... at that point, the aircrew should lower the nose and apply full power. The result of doing this is that the wings angle of attack is reduced (regaining efficiency and therefore lift) and the airspeed is of course increased, allowing a full recovery of the aircraft in a minimum loss of height.

Failure to act on an impending stall in the initial stages will usually result in the yaw of the aircraft to one side... the result of one wing losing its lift before the other.

The recovery of this is to apply opposite rudder during the basic stall recovery actions outlined above, thereby countering and correcting the yaw. Failure to do this will result in a roll to the side of the yaw and then ultimately the aircraft will enter a spin.

Depending on the aircraft type and its structural limitations, a spin is still very recoverable if the correct inputs are applied. Spinning can actually be great fun once you understand them and know what is actually happening aerodynamically... and always a good thing to be well practiced in (in a capable aircraft type of course... not a cessna would be my advice...) A 777 is not going to be an easy one to recover and well... lets just say if you haven't recovered the stall prior to that, its not looking good.

Here is a video of a spin and how it is recovered.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qw75rNaTNT0

I mention this, because it might possibly fit the reported departure from flight profile of -200ft with a change of direction...

 

[Steely Dan]

live updates (in case not yet posted)

http://stream.wsj.com/story/malaysia-airlines-flight-370/SS-2-475558/

This was just added to that link.

*Malaysia Aviation Regulator: Has Video Recording of Two Passengers With Stolen Passports

*Malaysia Aviation Regulator: Video Records Show Passengers With Stolen Passport From Check-in to Departure

*Malaysia Aviation Regulator: Video Recording Being Investigated