So where is this plane?

There's a lot of unanswered questions. So many scenarios.
I don't believe it was pilot suicide. Why take innocent others?
If they are/were terrorists hell-bent on killing others then why not crash into another building, killing many more?
Why hasn't anyone seen the plane land?
If the passengers are still alive, and not in the middle of nowhere, why hasn't anyone made a cell call or text?
Why haven't they found any floating debris or other evidence of a crash?
This is a very bizarre incident.
 
Could it have crashed in the Himilayas, triggered an avalanche and is now buried?
 
Shadowing another plane is a interesting theory. I'm thinking this is a looks good on paper but might not work out so well in practice. I'm thinking the pilots would have had to have had some intensive training and also be in constant communication with each other.
 
2.4 million square nautical mile search area. A nautical mile is 6,076 feet so they have huge search area. Debris could float for months and not be spotted.
 
If only this guy were around to help, he could find it.

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

A Startlingly Simple Theory About the Missing Malaysia Airlines JetBY CHRIS GOODFELLOW

There has been a lot of speculation about Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. Terrorism, hijacking, meteors. I cannot believe the analysis on CNN; it’s almost disturbing. I tend to look for a simpler explanation, and I find it with the 13,000-foot runway at Pulau Langkawi.

We know the story of MH370: A loaded Boeing 777 departs at midnight from Kuala Lampur, headed to Beijing. A hot night. A heavy aircraft. About an hour out, across the gulf toward Vietnam, the plane goes dark, meaning the transponder and secondary radar tracking go off. Two days later we hear reports that Malaysian military radar (which is a primary radar, meaning the plane is tracked by reflection rather than by transponder interrogation response) has tracked the plane on a southwesterly course back across the Malay Peninsula into the Strait of Malacca.

The left turn is the key here. Zaharie Ahmad Shah1 was a very experienced senior captain with 18,000 hours of flight time. We old pilots were drilled to know what is the closest airport of safe harbor while in cruise. Airports behind us, airports abeam us, and airports ahead of us. They’re always in our head. Always. If something happens, you don’t want to be thinking about what are you going to do–you already know what you are going to do. When I saw that left turn with a direct heading, I instinctively knew he was heading for an airport. He was taking a direct route to Palau Langkawi, a 13,000-foot airstrip with an approach over water and no obstacles. The captain did not turn back to Kuala Lampur because he knew he had 8,000-foot ridges to cross. He knew the terrain was friendlier toward Langkawi, which also was closer.

Take a look at this airport on Google Earth. The pilot did all the right things. He was confronted by some major event onboard that made him make an immediate turn to the closest, safest airport.

When I heard this I immediately brought up Google Earth and searched for airports in proximity to the track toward the southwest.

Stay on Point With This Classic, Dead-Simple Pencil Sharpener

For me, the loss of transponders and communications makes perfect sense in a fire. And there most likely was an electrical fire. In the case of a fire, the first response is to pull the main busses and restore circuits one by one until you have isolated the bad one. If they pulled the busses, the plane would go silent. It probably was a serious event and the flight crew was occupied with controlling the plane and trying to fight the fire. Aviate, navigate, and lastly, communicate is the mantra in such situations.

There are two types of fires. An electrical fire might not be as fast and furious, and there may or may not be incapacitating smoke. However there is the possibility, given the timeline, that there was an overheat on one of the front landing gear tires, it blew on takeoff and started slowly burning. Yes, this happens with underinflated tires. Remember: Heavy plane, hot night, sea level, long-run takeoff. There was awell known accident in Nigeria of a DC8 that had a landing gear fire on takeoff. Once going, a tire fire would produce horrific, incapacitating smoke. Yes, pilots have access to oxygen masks, but this is a no-no with fire. Most have access to a smoke hood with a filter, but this will last only a few minutes depending on the smoke level. (I used to carry one in my flight bag, and I still carry one in my briefcase when I fly.)

What I think happened is the flight crew was overcome by smoke and the plane continued on the heading, probably on George (autopilot), until it ran out of fuel or the fire destroyed the control surfaces and it crashed. You will find it along that route–looking elsewhere is pointless.

Ongoing speculation of a hijacking and/or murder-suicide and that there was a flight engineer on board does not sway me in favor of foul play until I am presented with evidence of foul play.

We know there was a last voice transmission that, from a pilot’s point of view, was entirely normal. “Good night” is customary on a hand-off to a new air traffic control. The “good night” also strongly indicates to me that all was OK on the flight deck. Remember, there are many ways a pilot can communicate distress. A hijack code or even transponder code off by one digit would alert ATC that something was wrong. Every good pilot knows keying an SOS over the mike always is an option. Even three short clicks would raise an alert. So I conclude that at the point of voice transmission all was perceived as well on the flight deck by the pilots.

But things could have been in the process of going wrong, unknown to the pilots.

Evidently theACARS went inoperative some time before. Disabling the ACARS is not easy, as pointed out. This leads me to believe more in an electrical problem or an electrical fire than a manual shutdown. I suggest the pilots probably were not aware ACARS was not transmitting.

As for the reports of altitude fluctuations, given that this was not transponder-generated data but primary radar at maybe 200 miles, the azimuth readings can be affected by a lot of atmospherics and I would not have high confidence in this being totally reliable. But let’s accept for a minute that the pilot may have ascended to 45,000 feet in a last-ditch effort to quell a fire by seeking the lowest level of oxygen. That is an acceptable scenario. At 45,000 feet, it would be tough to keep this aircraft stable, as the flight envelope is very narrow and loss of control in a stall is entirely possible. The aircraft is at the top of its operational ceiling. The reported rapid rates of descent could have been generated by a stall, followed by a recovery at 25,000 feet. The pilot may even have been diving to extinguish flames.

But going to 45,000 feet in a hijack scenario doesn’t make any good sense to me.

Regarding the additional flying time: On departing Kuala Lampur, Flight 370 would have had fuel for Beijing and an alternate destination, probably Shanghai, plus 45 minutes–say, 8 hours. Maybe more. He burned 20-25 percent in the first hour with takeoff and the climb to cruise. So when the turn was made toward Langkawi, he would have had six hours or more hours worth of fuel. This correlates nicely with the Inmarsat data pings being received until fuel exhaustion.

The now known continued flight until time to fuel exhaustion only confirms to me that the crew was incapacitated and the flight continued on deep into the south Indian ocean.

There is no point speculating further until more evidence surfaces, but in the meantime it serves no purpose to malign pilots who well may have been in a struggle to save this aircraft from a fire or other serious mechanical issue. Capt. Zaharie Ahmad Shah was a hero struggling with an impossible situation trying to get that plane to Langkawi. There is no doubt in my mind. That’s the reason for the turn and direct route. A hijacking would not have made that deliberate left turn with a direct heading for Langkawi. It probably would have weaved around a bit until the hijackers decided where they were taking it.

Surprisingly, none of the reporters, officials, or other pilots interviewed have looked at this from the pilot’s viewpoint: If something went wrong, where would he go? Thanks to Google Earth I spotted Langkawi in about 30 seconds, zoomed in and saw how long the runway was and I just instinctively knew this pilot knew this airport. He had probably flown there many times.

Fire in an aircraft demands one thing: Get the machine on the ground as soon as possible. There are two well-remembered experiences in my memory. The AirCanada DC9 which landed, I believe, in Columbus, Ohio in the 1980s. That pilot delayed descent and bypassed several airports. He didn’t instinctively know the closest airports. He got it on the ground eventually, but lost 30-odd souls. The 1998 crash of Swissair DC-10 off Nova Scotia was another example of heroic pilots. They were 15 minutes out of Halifax but the fire overcame them and they had to ditch in the ocean. They simply ran out of time. That fire incidentally started when the aircraft was about an hour out of Kennedy. Guess what? The transponders and communications were shut off as they pulled the busses.

Get on Google Earth and type in Pulau Langkawi and then look at it in relation to the radar track heading. Two plus two equals four. For me, that is the simple explanation why it turned and headed in that direction. Smart pilot. He just didn’t have the time.

Chris Goodfellow has 20 years experience as a Canadian Class-1 instrumented-rated pilot for multi-engine planes. His theory on what happened to MH370 first appeared on Google+. We’ve copyedited it with his permission.

1CORRECTION 9:40 a.m. Eastern 03/18/14:
 
CNN is devoting this morning to some 'possible debris'...Nascar fans are expecting a phantom caution anytime now.

Oddly enough, I believe that I heard one of their crash expert's name was Steven Wallace.
I had to like this twice. Clicked like when I read the first sentence, and then had to unlike it just so I could like the second sentence all over again. :D
 
The experts on Al Jazeera America were saying that the "debris" that was found sounds like it's too big to be from a 777.

CNN and FOX News' coverage should be criminal. At least AJAM and MSNBC have been talking about the real biggest news story in the world: Ukraine.
 
Al Jazeera America's done a great job covering this. I don't know how y'all watch all the unsubstantiated speculation on CNN.

AJAM FACTS: The "debris" was spotted on satellite four days ago, has probably floated hundreds of miles away, the only thing that debris could've been was a wing and the wing probably wouldn't be able to float.

They have actual aviation experts, actual scientists and actual meteorologists explaining this stuff. I turn on CNN and it's new theory one after another after another.
 
Al Jazeera America's done a great job covering this. I don't know how y'all watch all the unsubstantiated speculation on CNN.

AJAM FACTS: The "debris" was spotted on satellite four days ago, has probably floated hundreds of miles away, the only thing that debris could've been was a wing and the wing probably wouldn't be able to float.

They have actual aviation experts, actual scientists and actual meteorologists explaining this stuff. I turn on CNN and it's new theory one after another after another.
I think a wing will float if it's not loaded with fuel.What makes me think it's not a wing is the shape.The piece in the ocean looks rectangular a wing would be tapered on 1 side.
 
Al Jazeera America's done a great job covering this. I don't know how y'all watch all the unsubstantiated speculation on CNN.

AJAM FACTS: The "debris" was spotted on satellite four days ago, has probably floated hundreds of miles away, the only thing that debris could've been was a wing and the wing probably wouldn't be able to float.

They have actual aviation experts, actual scientists and actual meteorologists explaining this stuff. I turn on CNN and it's new theory one after another after another.
If they were real experts they'd know where the plane is. Al Jazeera is speculating, just like every other news source.
Time will tell.
 
If they were real experts they'd know where the plane is. Al Jazeera is speculating, just like every other news source.
Time will tell.

Hundreds of experts don't know where the plane is. Does that discredit their expertise?

CNN's talking about what the debris tells us about where the plane is. Um, if it's actually debris from the plane (which is probably isn't), it tells us nothing. We won't know what happened to the plane until it's found - and it will probably never be found.

Before the "debris" was found, CNN was talking about how a black hole could've made the plane disappear. My journalism credentials weep over CNN's coverage.
 
They're journalists, not super heroes. They're reporting the same story as every other channel. Nobody knows where the plane is (except Courtney Love.)
If and when the plane is found, they'll report it like every other news source will.
 
I think a wing will float if it's not loaded with fuel.What makes me think it's not a wing is the shape.The piece in the ocean looks rectangular a wing would be tapered on 1 side.

Fuel will float on the water, as will a vessel containing fuel
 
Enough time has passed that fuel will have dissipated. It's where TF is Waldo, at this point.
Changes will be implemented because of this lapse in technology. If this is simply a case of fire in the cargo hold from lithium batteries then shame on the aviation industry; this was a known issue.
If this is an act of pilot suicide, hijacking or other intended act, then there will be changes made in terms of alarms or other notifications when changes in programmed navigation occur or when communication devices become disabled or are manually manipulated.
Regardless of what happened, innocent people have been affected by something that should be preventable. This is a tragedy and should serve as an example that changes are necessary.
 
I'm so glad we've got CNN to tell us all about how black holes make zombie planes disappear. They need to get in the business of making movies because their ‪#MH370‬ "theories" would make for one entertaining blockbuster.

Coming soon - a SyFy Original Movie: ZOMBIE PLANE!
 
I guess they still haven't ruled out the aliens theory yet, it is probably as sound as a lot of the theories that are being spewed out by the media. But I guess it gives them a break from Obama Care, IRS, Lybia , and the Economy. I just feel for those who have lost loved ones on this flight, just not knowing has to be very stressful on them.
 
Reports said this latest possible debris is estimated to be 79 feet long --- sounds like a shipping container to me.
I read that shipping containers aren't that long.The longest one they transport by truck is 48 or 53 ft I think?
 
They're journalists, not super heroes. They're reporting the same story as every other channel. Nobody knows where the plane is (except Courtney Love.)
If and when the plane is found, they'll report it like every other news source will.

It is inside Courtney Love in the Black Hole ( indiscret grunge in background).
 
If the plane went into the water you'd think there would be some debris washing up on shore somewhere by now.

Even if it made a soft landing and sank in one piece, there would still be lots of things floating to the surface and eventually washing up on shore somewhere.
 
News channels now reporting that the Chinese might have found something.
 
90 % of the shipping containers that I transported over my career were 40' long, 5% 20' long and 5% 45' long. The 20' ones are actually 19' 10 1/2 " so they have room to secure them to the deck with twist locks and stack 40' ones on top. They make longer ones but they are rare except in Europe.

TEU capacities for common container sizes
LengthWidthHeightVolumeTEU
20 ft (6.1 m)8 ft (2.44 m)8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)1,360 cu ft (38.5 m3)1
40 ft (12.2 m)8 ft (2.44 m)8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)2,720 cu ft (77 m3)2
45 ft (13.7 m)8 ft (2.44 m)8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)3,060 cu ft (86.6 m3)2 or 2.25
48 ft (14.6 m)8 ft (2.44 m)8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)3,264 cu ft (92.4 m3)2.4
53 ft (16.2 m)8 ft (2.44 m)8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)3,604 cu ft (102.1 m3)2.65
High cube
20 ft (6.1 m)8 ft (2.44 m)9 ft 6 in (2.90 m)1,520 cu ft (43 m3)1[2]
Half height
20 ft (6.1 m)8 ft (2.44 m)4 ft 3 in (1.30 m)680 cu ft (19.3 m3)1[2]
 
Shipping containers are made from steel AFAIK. Unless packed full with ping pong balls doubtful they will float.
 
90 % of the shipping containers that I transported over my career were 40' long, 5% 20' long and 5% 45' long. The 20' ones are actually 19' 10 1/2 " so they have room to secure them to the deck with twist locks and stack 40' ones on top. They make longer ones but they are rare except in Europe.

TEU capacities for common container sizes
LengthWidthHeightVolumeTEU
20 ft (6.1 m)8 ft (2.44 m)8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)1,360 cu ft (38.5 m3)1
40 ft (12.2 m)8 ft (2.44 m)8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)2,720 cu ft (77 m3)2
45 ft (13.7 m)8 ft (2.44 m)8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)3,060 cu ft (86.6 m3)2 or 2.25
48 ft (14.6 m)8 ft (2.44 m)8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)3,264 cu ft (92.4 m3)2.4
53 ft (16.2 m)8 ft (2.44 m)8 ft 6 in (2.59 m)3,604 cu ft (102.1 m3)2.65
High cube
20 ft (6.1 m)8 ft (2.44 m)9 ft 6 in (2.90 m)1,520 cu ft (43 m3)1[2]
Half height
20 ft (6.1 m)8 ft (2.44 m)4 ft 3 in (1.30 m)680 cu ft (19.3 m3)1[2]

thanks for the info.
As an aside I watched captain phillips last night.
You had a scary job.
 
Shipping containers are made from steel AFAIK. Unless packed full with ping pong balls doubtful they will float.
If airtight and containing standard cargo shipping containers will float at least for several months. There are several thousand lost overboard every year but very rarely from an American ship. I've ran over a few and the most damage the ship sustained was scratched paint.
 
If airtight and containing standard cargo shipping containers will float at least for several months. There are several thousand lost overboard every year but very rarely from an American ship. I've ran over a few and the most damage the ship sustained was scratched paint.

You ever run into pirates, Johali?
 
This plane is with the bottom feeding fish.
Sad. Many lives have been lost and families of the missing have no answers.
 
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