What Really Happened to Malaysia’s Missing Airplane

I thought this was an interesting article on what happened to Malaysia's missing airplane, MH370:

What Really Happened to Malaysia’s Missing Airplane

The gist of the article is not really new, that any kind of aircraft malfunction seems incapable of explaining every event that occurred, which leads to the possibility of some kind of intervention by either one of the pilots, or less likely by some kind of unrecorded stowaway who wasn't on the manifest, but the pilot seems to keep rising to the top of the list of suspects for what happened to the aircraft.

The article also discusses some things I haven't seen before, like the story of a man named Blaine Gibson who apparently made it his mission to try to help locate debris washing up on beaches from the crashed plane. You would think people would welcome his assistance which perhaps some people did, but apparently he also received death threats which makes one wonder why someone pursuing only remains of the plane to establish facts would get a death threat.

Blaine Gibson was new to social media when he started his search, and he was in for a surprise. As he recalls, the trolls emerged as soon as he found his first piece—the one labeled no step—and they multiplied afterward, particularly as the beaches of Madagascar began to bear fruit. The internet provokes emotion even in response to unremarkable events. A catastrophe taps into something toxic. Gibson was accused of exploiting the families and of being a fraud, a publicity hound, a drug addict, a Russian agent, an American agent, and at the very least a dupe. He began receiving death threats—messages on social media and phone calls to friends predicting his demise. One message said that either he would stop looking for debris or he would leave Madagascar in a coffin. Another warned that he would die of polonium poisoning. There were more. He was not prepared for this, and was incapable of shrugging it off. During the days I spent with him in Kuala Lumpur, he kept abreast of the latest attacks with the assistance of a friend in London. He said, “I once made the mistake of going on Twitter. Basically, these people are cyberterrorists. And it works. It’s effective.” He has been traumatized.

That leads into one of the themes of the article that Malaysia knows more than it has revealed publicly and controlled the narrative. The article posits a scenario where the cabin was depressurized while the pilot in the cockpit used an ample supply of oxygen there to remain conscious for longer than the approximately 15 minutes which the supply of oxygen for the cabin would have lasted. Then after everyone else was unconscious or dead, he could restore pressure and make whatever course changes he wanted without any interference.

Malaysia probably knows more about the pilot than they have publicly revealed and the article posits he was the most likely suspect:

The truth, as I discovered after speaking in Kuala Lumpur with people who knew him or knew about him, is that Zaharie was often lonely and sad. His wife had moved out, and was living in the family’s second house. By his own admission to friends, he spent a lot of time pacing empty rooms waiting for the days between flights to go by. He was also a romantic. He is known to have established a wistful relationship with a married woman and her three children, one of whom was disabled, and to have obsessed over two young internet models, whom he encountered on social media, and for whom he left Facebook comments that apparently did not elicit responses. Some were shyly sexual. He mentioned in one comment, for example, that one of the girls, who was wearing a robe in a posted photo, looked like she had just emerged from a shower. Zaharie seems to have become somewhat disconnected from his earlier, well-established life. He was in touch with his children, but they were grown and gone. The detachment and solitude that can accompany the use of social media—and Zaharie used social media a lot—probably did not help. There is a strong suspicion among investigators in the aviation and intelligence communities that he was clinically depressed.
...
In Kuala Lumpur, I met with one of Zaharie’s lifelong friends, a fellow 777 captain whose name I have omitted because of possible repercussions for him. He too believed that Zaharie was guilty, a conclusion he had come to reluctantly. He described the mystery as a pyramid that is broad at the base and one man wide at the top, meaning that the inquiry might have begun with many possible explanations but ended up with a single one. He said, “It doesn’t make sense. It’s hard to reconcile with the man I knew. But it’s the necessary conclusion.”

The article also talks about Malaysia's failure to follow protocol, and that if they had scrambled a plane to pace MH370 they could have positively identified the aircraft on radar, and possibly could have at least determined who was at the controls.

For all its expensive equipment, the air force had failed at its job and could not bring itself to admit the fact. In an Australian television interview, the former Malaysian defense minister said, “If you’re not going to shoot it down, what’s the point in sending [an interceptor] up?” Well, for one thing, you could positively identify the airplane, which at this point was just a blip on primary radar. You could also look through the windows into the cockpit and see who was at the controls.

They could have saved a lot of time and effort searching for wreckage in the wrong location if they had identified the airplane earlier and made some effort to track its progress.

“They didn’t follow protocol. They didn’t follow procedure. I think it’s appalling. More could have been done. As a result of the inaction of the air force—of all of the parties involved in the first hour who didn’t follow protocol—we are stuck like this now. Every one of them breached protocol one time, multiple times. Every single person who had some form of responsibility at the time did not do what he was supposed to do. To varying degrees of severity. Maybe in isolation some might not seem so bad, but when you look at it as a whole, every one of them contributed 100 percent to the fact that the airplane has not been found.”

The article also discusses what type of information is and is not likely to be recovered from the "black boxes" if they are ever found, like possibly confirmation of the depressurization, but perhaps no real answers otherwise:

That aside, finding the wreckage and the two black boxes may accomplish little. The cockpit voice recorder is a self-erasing two-hour loop, and is likely to contain only the sounds of the final alarms going off, unless whoever was at the controls was still alive and in a mood to provide explanations for posterity. The other black box, the flight-data recorder, will provide information about the functioning of the airplane throughout the entire flight, but it will not reveal any relevant system failure, because no such failure can explain what occurred. At best it will answer some relatively unimportant questions, such as when exactly the airplane was depressurized and how long it remained so, or how exactly the satellite box was powered down and then powered back up.

Do you think the pilot Zaharie was responsible? Thoughts?

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Thanks for another MH370 thread, and angle.
Have never given too much credence to the: "The pilot did it" theory.
Will read again, and ingest, and perhaps comment later.

Am not convinced of anything, but we can still consider those affected.
RIP for the victims, and peace to all of those whom had a loss from the MH370 disappearance, and follow-up.

I'm a pilot...imo foul play of somekind....not a Pilot....too ...too...standard of an excuse...ya know! the pallet of batteries theory...idk4s

The airline is owned by yep Malaysia so for a variety of reasons I can imagine they would keep anything quiet since it effects their bottom line

a reply to: Arbitrageur

When you as Captain go to Ops and sign the release for the flight upon break release the aircraft and everyone onboard is your responsibility. Whether he was directly responsible, or responsible due to improper actions, he signed for the aircraft and flight. His responsibility. From what I have read (awhile back) he was under a lot of pressure from many things to include a messed up relationship; still no reason to lose the aircraft and everyone onboard due to him being an idiot.

There is no doubt in my mind the plane went down in the water near Australia. I remember hearing about an Australian cell tower that picked up the co-pilots phone or something. They have confirmed pieces of wreckage that have washed up onshore. But we will never find the actual plane.

originally posted by: Nothin
a reply to: Arbitrageur

Thanks for another MH370 thread, and angle.
Have never given too much credence to the: "The pilot did it" theory.
Will read again, and ingest, and perhaps comment later.

Am not convinced of anything, but we can still consider those affected.
RIP for the victims, and peace to all of those whom had a loss from the MH370 disappearance, and follow-up.

I'm still trying to keep an open mind, and would like to believe the pilot was not responsible. But there are problems with just about every other theory trying to explain everything that happened. They did find a flight path on pilot Zaharie's flight simulator similar to the actual flight path deduced from radar and satellite information, which some tried to dismiss as not relevant but how can it not be relevant? Why would you use a simulator to ditch your plane at such an unhospitable spot in the ocean, following such an odd flight path? It seems like more than coincidence so as much as I don't want it to be the pilots doing, I can't rule it out and other theories don't seem to explain things as well.

originally posted by: FredT
The airline is owned by yep Malaysia so for a variety of reasons I can imagine they would keep anything quiet since it effects their bottom line

Very true!

originally posted by: PraetorianAZ
There is no doubt in my mind the plane went down in the water near Australia. I remember hearing about an Australian cell tower that picked up the co-pilots phone or something. They have confirmed pieces of wreckage that have washed up onshore. But we will never find the actual plane.

The plane may have gone down to the west of Australia, but I never heard of the co-pilot's phone connecting with a tower in Australia, so unless you can provide a link about that, I'm going to presume you're mis-remembering where his phone connected, which was in Penang, near the Strait of Malacca according to the article in the opening post. The most likely locations for the plane going down placed it still somewhat far from Australia, perhaps out of range of the cell towers there.

www.theatlantic.com...
"At 1:52 a.m., half an hour into the diversion, MH370 passed just south of Penang Island, made a wide right turn, and headed northwest up the Strait of Malacca. As the airplane turned, the first officer’s cellphone registered with a tower below."

However if you do have a link about a connection with a cell tower in Australia, I'd love to read it, but this only mentions that a report about the cell tower connection appeared in in Australian newspaper, maybe that's what confused you. But the connection wasn't to a tower in Australia despite it being an Australian newspaper:

MH370 co-pilot may have made emergency call, says leaked report

Quoting The Australian newspaper, they said a telecom tower in Bandar Baru Farlim, Penang, detected a mobile number registered to Fariq a few minutes before the plane dropped off the radar on March 8, 2014.

I think it must have been the pilot but then how many suicides take others with them?

I know that jumping from a bridge into traffic is a bit like that in so much as they are involving an innocent person who may suffer from the event.

Perhaps the mass shootings and suicide by cop/self by non terrorists but they seem to want to make a point, he could have just crashed into the ground and let them find the plane if he was protesting.

It certainly is a mystery.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

What about the alleged cyber hijacking and landing at Diego whatever?

a reply to: cfnyaami

Pure BS. There's nowhere on Diego Garcia to hide an aircraft that large. The base is not setup with large aircraft hangars

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I posted this same article a while ago here on ATS.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

The engine makers would know where those things were from the control room in Derby England [ now closed down ] and who were some of the Passengers on the flight and what connection to 5G did they have ? or in computing .

I seem to remember reading about strange fires and scientists throwing themselves of buildings about the same time as the woman from Huawei got arrested maybe another case of TRON and JAL 123

a reply to: stonerwilliam

The engines didn't have GPS installed, and the only way they'd know anything is if the airline had the monitoring package.

the only thing left is Speculation on the Mystery …. being that the sources responsible for the disappearance of the craft - crew- passengers has been 'buttoned-up' completely


being politically incorrect come naturally for me....

the pilot and or plot revolves around the Muslim Zealot factor being the cause for the disappearance...

the hostages, some of them cyber experts, were sold as intellectual slaves to a China General with his own WarLord domain in the Rural area of China... the other passengers were held as non-Muslim slave conscripts

the Ocean debris was deliberately planted by various Parties, the Fanatics, the rogue warlord-General, the investigating Nations like the USA/UK/NATO bloc countries

people trafficking was actively done, false leads was cyber produced... the aircraft will reappear in some future timeline and bring fire-&-brimstone with It's reappearance --> probably in a redux of a 911 attack on an Oriental Target of significance and before 2029 when Apophis is scheduled to strike Earth

If it hasn't been disassembled somewhere and sold for parts (unlikely since none have apparently turned up in the market yet), and it actually crashed in either the ocean or the jungle, it's only a matter of time before it's found with Lidar or satellite X-ray scans or whatever other kind of magical tech somebody comes up with in the future. It might take a while, though. Fifty years?

a reply to: Blue Shift

The wreckage that has turned up shows damage consistent with a high speed impact, as well as long term exposure to salt water.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: Blue Shift

The wreckage that has turned up shows damage consistent with a high speed impact, as well as long term exposure to salt water.

Do you think the spread of debris would be too big for anyone to locate the engines and major structural components? Seems like those would sink fairly fast and remain in place.

a reply to: Blue Shift

They'll be kind of spread out, just due to the depth and current, but if they can find an engine or large piece of fuselage the rest of the heavier pieces should be within a few miles.

originally posted by: St Udio


the only thing left is Speculation on the Mystery …. being that the sources responsible for the disappearance of the craft - crew- passengers has been 'buttoned-up' completely


being politically incorrect come naturally for me....

the pilot and or plot revolves around the Muslim Zealot factor being the cause for the disappearance...

the hostages, some of them cyber experts, were sold as intellectual slaves to a China General with his own WarLord domain in the Rural area of China... the other passengers were held as non-Muslim slave conscripts

the Ocean debris was deliberately planted by various Parties, the Fanatics, the rogue warlord-General, the investigating Nations like the USA/UK/NATO bloc countries

people trafficking was actively done, false leads was cyber produced... the aircraft will reappear in some future timeline and bring fire-&-brimstone with It's reappearance --> probably in a redux of a 911 attack on an Oriental Target of significance and before 2029 when Apophis is scheduled to strike Earth

I've read a lot of theories but your's is the most creative! It would make a great book plot. Sadly, I don't think there's anything this sinister that happened. I had my own crazy theories at the time but I've come to realize the only evidence we have points to the pilot.

This will be remembered as one of the greatest mysteries for generations until technology comes along that can scan entire oceans for metal debris.

Rest in Peace, passengers and crew of flight MH370.

originally posted by: LogicalGraphitti
This will be remembered as one of the greatest mysteries for generations until technology comes along that can scan entire oceans for metal debris.

We probably already have something very secret like that, but it's not like the US military can drop an anonymous tip to pinpoint the location without spilling those beans.

Rest in Peace, passengers and crew of flight MH370.

You'd think that bodies and at least a good part of the luggage would have washed up somewhere, but the oceans are big, and some of the places where it would wash up are still pretty primitive.