Survey conducted by @Jay (Joel Kaye) via the comments section of “Guest Post: Northern Routes and Burst Frequency Offset for MH370.”
635 thoughts on “Where Do We Think MH370 Went?”
@Victor
I know you are playing the devil’s advocate here, and that is fine. I actualyl welcome it. Lord knows I have rained on your (and your IG colleagues) parade enough times that it is expected. Human error in a stressful situation such as a cockpit emergency or a diversion is what it is i.e. not unusual by crash investigative historical norms. Human error at the keyboard is not so easily forgiven i.e. SIO scenarios lacking any plausible motive and using Occam’s razor as the justification.
StevanG
Your assertion that he pulled a slow turn and pax wouldn’t notice is highly, highly implausible.
Have you seen the report, times and flight speeds. Have you seen Orion’s interpretations of the graphs?
This was no ho hum flight back across the peninsula, and furthermore the idea that Zaharie would risk Fariq willfully complying with him seems to me beyond far-fetched.
No one knows what was going on in Z’s personal life for many months leading up to the event. Was he being persecuted? Was he betrayed by someone he had grown close to? Was the Anwar appeal the last straw? Did he act simultaneously in haste and with great deliberateness?
StevanG – the term daylight robbery needs no embellishment. If you are going to steal technology/personnel you can’t do it on the tarmac. I don’t blame you for wanting to critique but if China really wanted the plane we are limited to speculating as to why. Saying that you can see no reason means nothing more than what you say.
Spencer – I haven’t closed the door on Shah’s innocence that’s all. And you have no good reason to either.
@spencer why implausible? If passengers didn’t use their GPS at the time – tough chance they would notice the turn. It was the middle of the night flight, almost everybody asleep.
Fariq would have to comply, it’s his duty to listen to the Captain, if Captain says we are diverting to airport XYZ then they are diverting to airport XYZ without asking further questions. Captain would then have to offer explanation to the company after landing.
I don’t know what happened with Z but judging by his Internet posts he was mad at malaysian government, Anwar’s appeal could be the turning point that made Z bring the decision.
@Matty
it’s their territory, state of China can suspect anyone and everyone they want and confiscate from them whatever they wanted if they were suspicious
actually they could do it after the landing, they would certainly know to whom the suspicious equipment is belonging and arrest him after exiting the airport without any fuss
StevanG
Why no phone calls in your scenario? By order of captain?
And, once more, are you aware of the flight speeds recorded in the report? This is anything but conducive to a leisurely diversion? And what about Fariq’s phone?
This scenario is predicated on the fallacy that Z was somehow incapable of murder and suicide. And that the SIO terminus lacks a sensible rationale. I strongly dissent on both these matters.
The possible reasons for an SIO terminus are so myriad that I have not bothered to furnish them here (sorry Dennis). That said, and to illustrate my point, something so simple as Z always having a fascination with flying and dying there could suffice. Literally, there are tens of reasons why I could see him potentially heading for the SIO.
@Spencer
I am not surprised by your lack of furnishing them ((SIO terminus reasons). They simply do not exist. You are blowing smoke out your ass. As usual.
@Dennis
I’ve given you one. Tell me the problem with this one, other than you not caring for it?
And then address my issues with your theory?
Do you care to address the phone calls, flight speeds etc.
THIS is the important part of the flight, as it establishes the MO.
@Dennis,
And if it’s all smoke coming out of my ass as you unflatteringly suggest, how about you putting your money where your mouth is?
LMAO.
@Spencer
As much as I read your posts carefully, I do not recall your good reason for the SIO terminus much less the “myriad” reasons.
Some possible reasons for SIO terminus.
1) We have NO idea what was in his head. Deal with it.
2) Remote enough to ditch sans debris. Wasn’t aware of SAT tracking. In this scenario, from his perspective, plane completely vanishes. This also protects family from a potentially PROVEN guilt.
3) He flew over the mainland FOR A REASON, then preferred the SIO to the Pacific. whatever, he was IMO satisfied with his route.
4) Depth of the ocean, diamantina deep, ninety east ridge, etc…This would also serve him well. NB we still don’t know where the plane is exactly in the SIO.
5)Knew he would be tracked via SAT and SOMEHOW knew Malaysia would initially lie. This is complicated and I won’t get into it further here unless asked (which I surely won’t be).
6) Didn’t pick the PERFECT spot in regard to making searching optimally punitive. His bad. Oh well.
These are just a few, none of which will be satisfactory to the many who just don’t care for the scenario.
There are many more.
StevanG – China are unlikely to so brazenly “steal” items or people off a plane that does not belong to them in broad daylight. There would be howls. Would you divert it first? Technology theft needs to be discreet.
Debris – Some IG members say it hit with such speed the plane was obliterated and therefore no substantial debris. I’ve raised this before and will do it again now – even explosive ordinance travelling at higher speeds leaves evidence like fins/tails/casings sections etc. If it went in with such kinetic force to utterly demlolish the structure would it also not make an acoustic impression on the Rottnest/Leeuwin hydraphones? Alternately there are pilots out there saying it would be at risk of break up falling at that speed out of control. This would leave big chunks of debris. I think there is no good explanation for it apart from dispersal and even then we hit it with everything and to this day nothing. We had no trouble identifying debris fields in that area.
Would the simulations accommodate the issue of shifting cargo in a dive/phugoid etc??
@Matty,
I agree with everything you say.
@Stevan G,
your explanations you gave in your last comment demonstrate exactly what I meant with having to work through a scenario meticulously. The runway on Christmas Island isn’t that short with 2100 meters. After a few hours flying it shouldn’t have been a problem at all to land the plane. Not necessary to fly extra miles for fuel burn. It’s sensible to assume that the pilot wanted to land the plane in daylight if Christmas Island was the destination. But daylight arived shortly before 6:000 am local time on March 8 2014. That would be shortly before 11:000 UTC (Christmas Island local time = UTC plus 7 hours). But the plane supposedly crashed around 00:19 UTC, almost one hour and 20 minutes after daylight arrived in this area. So, your idea doesn’t jibe with the time table. With decent flying a half way experienced pilot should have been able to make it. Blaming an unspecified pressure or hassle is just not a very plausible assumption in order to save a not very logical theory. And if the pilot was forced to ditch the plane for some reason he probably would have done that near the island in order to get swift help. In this case it’s not logical at all, why no scrap of the plane ever surfaced. So, if the plane was hijacked with the intention to take it to Xmas Island then we must come up with another reason why it crashed.
That’s what I mean with going down to the nuts and bolts of a scenario. You have to be as careful as with any calculations concerning the satellite data. Unfortunately a lot less time and care is invested by many to sift through the details and kinks and pitfalls of potential scenarios. But that is absolutely necessary. I eliminated many promising ideas because some simple facts just wouldn’t fit.
Victor, interesting.
I can understand auto start of the APU with the aircraft in the air, possibly using power from RAT deployment to operate necessary systems.
But would the APU automatically start if the engines were manually shut down on the ground? I know nothing about 777 systems, but that seems a bit unlikely? There must be many situations where that is not desired? And where would the necessary power come from?
@M Pat, the APU starts when the engines stop running – either because you shut them off or because the engines have no more fuel. The APU has it’s own fuel. When the plane normally lands the pilots start the APU before they shut off the engines. This way the electric power supply is not interrupted and the SDU therefore would not start a log-on request.
The final log-on request around 00:19 can mean several different things: the plane ran out of fuel and therefore the APU kicked in. The plane landed and whoever piloted the plane made a mistake and forgot to start the APU first before shutting off the engine and killed the APU then as well. Or the pilots shut down the engines intentionally in the air for a moment (not a really dangerous maneuver) in order to simulate a plane running out of fuel. Then they restart the engines after having disconnected the SDU for good,
I had the idea that the final log-on request might simply have been generated without cutiing off the engines and the involvement of the APU simply by cutting off the SDU – as it might have been done the first time after IGARI – and then restoring the power. But apparently the sat data from 00:19 are more consistent with a plane whose engines don’t get any more fuel for whatever reason.
First item in normal after landing procedure:
“After Landing Procedure
Accomplished when clear of the active runway.
Captain: Position speedbrake lever DOWN.
First Officer: Start APU.”
Personally I have a hard time to believe that the pilots made such a grave mistake and forgot to start the APU before they shut down the engines after a successful landing in a Northern scenario, thus enabling us to know exactly when the plane’s journey ended and how far from the satellite the plane was at that time – which means we can start looking for airports/airstrips exactly or at least very near the 7th arc.
But who knows..the cleverest perps might screw up somewhere
The APU doesn’t have its own fuel. It feeds from the same main fuel tank as the engines. However, the fuel tank is in the wings and the APU is in the tail. I wonder if it has been verified experimentally that the APU can in fact start with fuel remaining in the fuel line when the main tanks are dry.
Hi Littlefoot, fantastic answer, thanks very much.
Having just done a little bit of reading (eg http://www.smartcockpit.com/docs/B777-Engines_and_APU.pdf) I am not yet convinced that the APU would auto-start on the ground, but it does appear that it uses its own battery for start-up, and there are clearly scenarios in which the pilots might shut down the engines (and therefore electrical power) and then manually start the APU for some reason, perhaps even with assistance from an external power source. This would have to be accomplished between the last normal handshake at 0010.58 and the log on attempt at 0019.29. It would have to be off again by 0115.56 of course when the aircraft did not respond to a ground initiated handshake.
@M Pat, yes, let’s continue to look into this.
In a SIO scenario the final log-on request can be explained satisfactorily with a plane running out of fuel.
In a Northern scenario it’s more complicated. Obviously I would exclude the possibility that the plane ran out of fuel and crashed on land. That would have been very difficult to hide and there should have probably been registrations of seismic movements by some stations as well as ELT signals.
But I have also difficulties to accept that perps who must have been so well organized and knowledgeable would have made such a grave blunder as to trigger the final log-on request unintentionally, thus giving away that the plane’s strange journey ended exactly somewhere on the Northern 7th arc at precisely 00:19.
But, as I said before, stranger things happen.
@Gysbreght, without being able to quote someone right now, I think it has been established that the APU does kick in, when the engines run out of fuel – or the fuel has been cut off. If the APU doesn’t have a separate fuel tank I don’t have the technical knowledge for explaining how exactly that is supposed to work if the fuel tanks have run dry completely. Maybe it’s the remaining fuel in the line as you say.
I’m a little surprised, though because I clearly remember it was discussed that the kicking in of the APU might cause dark contrails like a bad exhaust. That’s why I assumed the APU was run separately.
But I’m sure someone can clear that up satisfactorily.
@littlefoot: @gysbreght is correct. There is no separate fuel tank for the APU. The restart of the APU in a fuel exhaustion scenario is assumed to be from the fuel in the line between the left tank and the APU, and would be “unreliable and of short duration”, as per the ATSB report from June 2014 (p33).
The dark smoke from the APU that you are referring to was an explanation that I (and probably others) proposed way back on Duncan’s site to explain Kate Tee’s observation of a dark smoke trail from the plane. It has nothing to do with fuel exhaustion.
@Victor, how long would the APU run before the fuel is completely gone from the line?
I remember that the dark contrails were discussed in connection with Kate Tee’s observation. And someone who believed that Kate saw mh370 attributed the dark contrail to the APU having kicked in by then and causing a bad exhaust phenomenon. But that was probably mere speculation.
Since I introduced the idea of an automatic start of the APU after a potential landing in the north, I will be the one to kill this idea. The minimum (radial) distance between the 6 and 7th ping arcs is about 37 nm and the time distance is about 8 minutes. After the engines shutdown, the time to spool up the APU and power up the SATCOM is about 3 min 40 sec, leaving only about 5 min to traverse 37 nm and land the plane. There is simply not enough time.
If the log-on at 00:19 was deliberate, it was likely initiated by a forced re-boot of the SDU, which could take a fraction of the time of starting the APU and powering up the SATCOM.
@littlefoot – This is from the first ATSB report:
Following the loss of AC power on both buses19, the SDU would have experienced a power interruption sufficiently long to force a shut-down, the aircraft’s ram air turbine20 (RAT) would deploy from the fuselage into the aircraft’s slipstream and the APU would auto-start.
Re: Altitudes – 35,000 ft is plenty high to incapacitate PAX. No need to go to 43,500 for that reason.
Bojinka – A small bomb could make a hole large enough to depressurize the cabin but I wonder if a B777 could continue to fly for 7 hours with a hole in its fuselage? Perhaps that was part of the test?
Post divergence speed was, as Jeff put it, “pedal-to-metal.” Could that be a response to an emergency or just to minimize time spent while being tracked by radar?
I believe a 777 can auto-land but only at airports with the proper equipment. Could the cabin crew (without Cap & FO) be attempting to find such an airport waiting (their track brought them close to 3 or 4 airports) for a “push here to land” button to light? (They avoided KL due to air traffic and tall buildings.)
The APU starts automatically when left and right main transfer busses both lose electrical power. The left engine and the APU receive fuel from the left fuel tank. The ATSB end-of-flight scenario reqires the APU to run for about three minutes.
It is possible that the first engine flame-out resulted in a combination of sideslip and bank angles that maintained a selected track on autopilot. In that case bank angle may have caused fuel in the tank still containing fuel to move to one side, thereby increasing the quantity of unuseable fuel. The second engine flame-out would have removed the thrust asymmetry, thrust asymmetry compensation and bank angle, so that some ‘unuseable’ fuel became available again.
P.S.
The ATSB simulations assume the right engine to fail first, followed by the left engine.
@Victor, thanks.
When contemplating a Northern scenario I feel more comfortable with eliminating the idea that the perps triggered the last log-on by mistake. That would just not fit into the concept of a meticulously executed plan.
But the idea of a deliberately forced log-on request followed by going completely dark again is equally challenging in a Northern scenario. I have to follow through with a few earlier discarded ideas…
Mar 25, 2014
Dutch PM gets world leaders to play nuclear wargame at summit
“Why no phone calls in your scenario? By order of captain?”
Bad signal at cruising altitude? If they didn’t directly overfly base stations it’s quite possible there was no signal.
And yes if he told him to sit there and watch he would likely sit there and watch, as long as the captain didn’t show any suicidal moves and was just cruising at altitude.
“And, once more, are you aware of the flight speeds recorded in the report? This is anything but conducive to a leisurely diversion?”
what about flight speeds? the ACARS was turned off at the point of turn and we don’t know what was the speed of the plane at that moment, and there was no reason for the captain to rush it anyway, slow or fast turn it didn’t make lot of difference time-wise so he likely pulled a slow turn
“This scenario is predicated on the fallacy that Z was somehow incapable of murder and suicide.”
Everybody is capable of murder and suicide, accusing someone of doing so without hard evidence is very rude, especially towards his family.
Again..there is a possibility he did so but you cannot be sure about that, the same way I cannot be sure the plane is south of Christmas Island, I just assign some probability to it.
“Some possible reasons for SIO terminus.
1) We have NO idea what was in his head. Deal with it.”
That is not a reason.
“2) Remote enough to ditch sans debris. Wasn’t aware of SAT tracking. In this scenario, from his perspective, plane completely vanishes. This also protects family from a potentially PROVEN guilt.”
Remoteness has nothing to do with possibility of ditching without debris. High waves have though, and they are usually very high down there, he would choose much calmer areas in the middle of SIO, not any reason to go to the south if it was his goal. Also he would actively look for calmer sea patch while flying low, he wouldn’t wait for fuel exhaustion and risk stumbling upon a very high waves.
Ask any engineer who knows something about aircraft materials, it’s almost impossible to ditch the plane in waves higher than ~1m or so, even 0.5m. At those speeds it’s like hitting concrete… there is a literature all over the Internet, maybe even some free basic Testing and Material Modeling Software for Crash & Safety Simulation 😉
“3) He flew over the mainland FOR A REASON, then preferred the SIO to the Pacific. whatever, he was IMO satisfied with his route.”
That doesn’t add up, if he wanted to hide the plane he would go straight to the Pacific, why would he risk fighter planes getting scrambled? There was always a chance they would notice him and scramble jets(as asleep as RMAF were), then alert Indonesia which would alert India and they would possibly both alert US because of Diego Garcia base (which could be a possible target for terrorist hijacker). Then US would redirect satellites to follow him and that would be it.
“4) Depth of the ocean, diamantina deep, ninety east ridge, etc…This would also serve him well. NB we still don’t know where the plane is exactly in the SIO.”
he overshoot diamantina deep (it’s behind 7th arc), again doesn’t add up
also he had deep trenches just south of Sumatra with much calmer sea and higher chance to ditch it without debris
“5)Knew he would be tracked via SAT and SOMEHOW knew Malaysia would initially lie. This is complicated and I won’t get into it further here unless asked (which I surely won’t be).”
I don’t think he cared a lot about sat tracking, if he wanted to hide it he could turn satellite pinging completely, it’s the info that was publically available and still is. IMO he just wanted to go over Malaysia without being noticed from civilian ATCs.
“6) Didn’t pick the PERFECT spot in regard to making searching optimally punitive. His bad. Oh well.”
so is this reason for or against the theory? 😉
@Matty what howls exactly? And if foreign countries knew there was some technological marvel on board they would suspect China anyway, at the end the plane was full of Chinese nationals 😉
” Some IG members say it hit with such speed the plane was obliterated and therefore no substantial debris. ”
umm, that’s physically impossible under any circumstances
@littlefoot
“The runway on Christmas Island isn’t that short with 2100 meters.”
I know, which would make that goal even more desirable for him 😉
anyway he wasn’t used to landing there(has he ever flown there?) and possibly wanted to land light
“After a few hours flying it shouldn’t have been a problem at all to land the plane. ”
not if you are flying regular way, but if you are under stress and pressure everything could pose the problem
“And if the pilot was forced to ditch the plane for some reason he probably would have done that near the island in order to get swift help.”
That’s right but he might have missed the approach for some reason, it doesn’t have to be stress it could be some electric failure or whatever reason.
At the end if he did all of this on a whim there is a possibility he went first to Cocos Islands(for whatever reason) decided it was dark and changed his goal to Christmas Island and went there instead, that would fit BFO&BTO values even for cruising speed.
All in all there are many things that could happen south of Sumatra that could take them anywhere on the 7th arc, conflict between him and copilot, zig-zag flying…who knows what else.
Remember this scenarios relies heavily on motivation, if someone was motivated to do something then all sort of strange things could happen.
Which was brought back into attention through a tweet by Nihonmama some time ago.
So given the date of the report and assuming the BTO analysis was established but the BFO analysis not yet (it would take Inmarsat another 10 days or so), what could have been the indication that the ac crashed in the IO?
I would like to hear opinions of preferably more than one or two people, rather than stirring a whole discussion. Of course you can also react on my assumption.
Thanks,
Niels.
@Niels
The US has been using Doppler shifted telemetry data to track foreign missal launches for at least three decades. The Inmarsat claim of novel and groundbreaking probably caused more than a few laughs at Langley.
@DennisW
Ok thanks Dennis, I might react later, but I invite others first to give their opinion.
Niels,
It is still unclear (at least to me) exactly what was known when. I found one article claiming that the rescue center was informed of a possible turnback from radar as early as the evening of March 8 – just 13 hours after the plane was declared missing. It was certainly the radar data that first pushed the search into the Indian Ocean, although it probabaly took time to collate (since there were 2 military and multiple civilian radars involved.) In the article you linked, even though the satellite data are described, there is no mention of the Southern Indian Ocean, so it is possible that the BTO analysis was still in progress, and that the “two corridors” had not yet been defined. Others may have kept better track of news stories at the time.
@sk999
Ok clear, so you suggest that it could be based on an “extrapolation” of the radar data.
The first clearly reported BTO result I can remember, including a plot of the 7th arc (N and S), was on 15th March in WP.
@sk999, @Niels:
“It is still unclear (at least to me) exactly what was known when”
Thanks for filling in part of the timeline! Is it clear with which partner company Inmarsat shared the first BTO derived results on March 11th?
@Niels:
You’re welcome.
And as you’ll note, the WSJ writers did not identify the partner company Inmarsat shared “its data analysis and other documents” with on March 11th.
Niels,
I have a note to myself saying that Inmarsat first sent its data to the AAIB on Mar 13.
Here’s a link to a WSJ article last updated 5 am, Mar 14, which show an artist’s conception of a ring, centered on IGARI, not the 18:22 radar point, but leaking into the SIO, even though SIO is, once again, not mentioned in the article.
The focus of the Western search zone is still on the Andaman Sea, but it is clear that the Malaysians and other investigators were puzzling over the data (e.g., “U.S. aviation investigators said they were analyzing the satellite transmissions to determine whether they can glean information about the plane’s ultimate location or status.”)
Mar 15 is also the first date I have found for first publication of the final arc (which I think was actually the 6th arc) and the two corridors.
Nihonmama wrote:
“And as you’ll note, the WSJ writers did not identify the partner company Inmarsat shared ‘its data analysis and other documents’ with on March 11th.”
“This information was provided to our partner SITA, which in turn has shared it with Malaysia Airlines.”
StevanG – if China was to detain and ransack commercial aircraft at their airports there would be a major stink. If you don’t see that we better disagree, finish the debate and move on.
The “absolute demolition” of the aircraft precluding the discovery of debris is indeed being put forward by some very distinguished people.
But back on debris – would a cargo shift put an end to any orderly phugoid spiral? What does the cargo do in a dive? If these planes get badly out of shape in a fast dive do they break up? That could explain no acoustic detection?
@SK999
SITA is not well-known for analytical prowess. If you want an iPad based ticket kiosk they are up for that. Doubt SITA did any heavy lifting relative to the MH370 analytics.
@DennisW:
Overheard:
@GerryS: “and we don’t have any confirmation that #MH370 did actually fly for hours after it disappeared. Not even from Inmarsat.”
@RunwayGirl: “Inmarsat would not be the party to tell you, Gerry. SITA would.”
@GerryS: “SITA gateway receives the data xmission from the Inmarsat Ground Earth Station. So BOTH Inmarsat & SITA would know about it.”
@RunwayGirl: “Gee, Gerry. I’m sure you’ll agree that one has far more info than the other. I’m tempted to stop talking to you about nonsense.”
@Matty.
Lack of debris and lack of acoustic detection taken together are a worry, especially when the Curtin scientists have the technology to detect something so far away (the so-called Curtin boom). Let’s assume for a minute that there is more information/data (e.g. from JORN) that led the US to announce that the plane was in the SIO… given PM Abbott’s current policy of declining to comment on “operational matters” (particularly in relation to asylum seeker boat turn backs etc.) do you think that the ATSB is in possession of classified radar/satellite data which has helped them come up with their current search area? And could anything be gleaned through FOI?
@Stevan G, I never said the runway of Christmas Island was in any way not “desirable” for mh370. I was countering your argument that mh370 could only land on it after having burnt more fuel than it already had by flying extra miles which could then have to lead to the plane running out of fuel. That chain of events is simply not plausible. While I can see several possible motives for hijackers to divert the plane to Christmas Island (and therefore think it’s more plausible as a destination than the SIO) I can’t see a reason why the plane shouldn’t have reached the place in one piece. Or, if it broke up, why it should subsequently make a complete vanishing act. The complete absence of any debris can be better explained with a SIO crash.
@Matty, I agree with you, Chinese authorities searching and confiscating cargo from a foreign plane and/or taking passengers into custody -or making them disappear on Chinese premises – would cause a major stink and draw attention to something China might prefer very much to achieve quietly. Even taking Chinese passengers into custody openly or quietly might alert of human rights organizations. But if the plane is simply considered lost, they can proceed as they please without anyone being able to guess what they’re even up to or what goods they’re interested in.
@AM2, @Matty:
This will interest.
NPR: Analysis Reveals Record Number Of FOIA Requests Filed Last Year
March 19, 2015
“GONYEA: Can you cite any examples of a request that took longer or was rejected when you thought it shouldn’t have been?
BRIDIS: Almost immediately after Malaysian Airlines 370 went down, we asked the Pentagon’s spy satellite agency about the request for assistance that they might have received either internationally or from within the U.S. government. And a year later, we are still waiting for anything. Zero pages have been produced.”
Here’s an observation – can anyone else confirm or refute? The earliest picture I have found that shows the two “arcs” (the North and South “Corridors”) also includes a point labeled “Last Radar Contact with MH370”. Are there any figures with arcs but not a radar position that predate?
We know from the BBC Horizon documentary that Alan Schuster Bruce originally intended to use the BTO only to obtain a final “fix” on the aircraft position, but later he realized that the BTOs could also be used to reconstruct the actual track of the aircraft. In order to do so, he needed a starting point, and thus had to wean the information about the last radar location from Malaysia Airlines (or at least, that is how he remembered it), which he finally did. But when did that occur?
The following is a link to another WSJ article from March 20 (indirectly linked to by Nihonmama) which recounts the events of the prior week+. Lots of good information, but all to be taken with a grain of salt – plenty of misinformation as well.
@Victor
I know you are playing the devil’s advocate here, and that is fine. I actualyl welcome it. Lord knows I have rained on your (and your IG colleagues) parade enough times that it is expected. Human error in a stressful situation such as a cockpit emergency or a diversion is what it is i.e. not unusual by crash investigative historical norms. Human error at the keyboard is not so easily forgiven i.e. SIO scenarios lacking any plausible motive and using Occam’s razor as the justification.
StevanG
Your assertion that he pulled a slow turn and pax wouldn’t notice is highly, highly implausible.
Have you seen the report, times and flight speeds. Have you seen Orion’s interpretations of the graphs?
This was no ho hum flight back across the peninsula, and furthermore the idea that Zaharie would risk Fariq willfully complying with him seems to me beyond far-fetched.
No one knows what was going on in Z’s personal life for many months leading up to the event. Was he being persecuted? Was he betrayed by someone he had grown close to? Was the Anwar appeal the last straw? Did he act simultaneously in haste and with great deliberateness?
Here are some interesting typologies.
https://leb.fbi.gov/2011/july/perspective-violent-true-believers
StevanG – the term daylight robbery needs no embellishment. If you are going to steal technology/personnel you can’t do it on the tarmac. I don’t blame you for wanting to critique but if China really wanted the plane we are limited to speculating as to why. Saying that you can see no reason means nothing more than what you say.
Spencer – I haven’t closed the door on Shah’s innocence that’s all. And you have no good reason to either.
@spencer why implausible? If passengers didn’t use their GPS at the time – tough chance they would notice the turn. It was the middle of the night flight, almost everybody asleep.
Fariq would have to comply, it’s his duty to listen to the Captain, if Captain says we are diverting to airport XYZ then they are diverting to airport XYZ without asking further questions. Captain would then have to offer explanation to the company after landing.
I don’t know what happened with Z but judging by his Internet posts he was mad at malaysian government, Anwar’s appeal could be the turning point that made Z bring the decision.
@Matty
it’s their territory, state of China can suspect anyone and everyone they want and confiscate from them whatever they wanted if they were suspicious
actually they could do it after the landing, they would certainly know to whom the suspicious equipment is belonging and arrest him after exiting the airport without any fuss
StevanG
Why no phone calls in your scenario? By order of captain?
And, once more, are you aware of the flight speeds recorded in the report? This is anything but conducive to a leisurely diversion? And what about Fariq’s phone?
This scenario is predicated on the fallacy that Z was somehow incapable of murder and suicide. And that the SIO terminus lacks a sensible rationale. I strongly dissent on both these matters.
The possible reasons for an SIO terminus are so myriad that I have not bothered to furnish them here (sorry Dennis). That said, and to illustrate my point, something so simple as Z always having a fascination with flying and dying there could suffice. Literally, there are tens of reasons why I could see him potentially heading for the SIO.
@Spencer
I am not surprised by your lack of furnishing them ((SIO terminus reasons). They simply do not exist. You are blowing smoke out your ass. As usual.
@Dennis
I’ve given you one. Tell me the problem with this one, other than you not caring for it?
And then address my issues with your theory?
Do you care to address the phone calls, flight speeds etc.
THIS is the important part of the flight, as it establishes the MO.
@Dennis,
And if it’s all smoke coming out of my ass as you unflatteringly suggest, how about you putting your money where your mouth is?
LMAO.
@Spencer
As much as I read your posts carefully, I do not recall your good reason for the SIO terminus much less the “myriad” reasons.
Some possible reasons for SIO terminus.
1) We have NO idea what was in his head. Deal with it.
2) Remote enough to ditch sans debris. Wasn’t aware of SAT tracking. In this scenario, from his perspective, plane completely vanishes. This also protects family from a potentially PROVEN guilt.
3) He flew over the mainland FOR A REASON, then preferred the SIO to the Pacific. whatever, he was IMO satisfied with his route.
4) Depth of the ocean, diamantina deep, ninety east ridge, etc…This would also serve him well. NB we still don’t know where the plane is exactly in the SIO.
5)Knew he would be tracked via SAT and SOMEHOW knew Malaysia would initially lie. This is complicated and I won’t get into it further here unless asked (which I surely won’t be).
6) Didn’t pick the PERFECT spot in regard to making searching optimally punitive. His bad. Oh well.
These are just a few, none of which will be satisfactory to the many who just don’t care for the scenario.
There are many more.
StevanG – China are unlikely to so brazenly “steal” items or people off a plane that does not belong to them in broad daylight. There would be howls. Would you divert it first? Technology theft needs to be discreet.
Debris – Some IG members say it hit with such speed the plane was obliterated and therefore no substantial debris. I’ve raised this before and will do it again now – even explosive ordinance travelling at higher speeds leaves evidence like fins/tails/casings sections etc. If it went in with such kinetic force to utterly demlolish the structure would it also not make an acoustic impression on the Rottnest/Leeuwin hydraphones? Alternately there are pilots out there saying it would be at risk of break up falling at that speed out of control. This would leave big chunks of debris. I think there is no good explanation for it apart from dispersal and even then we hit it with everything and to this day nothing. We had no trouble identifying debris fields in that area.
Would the simulations accommodate the issue of shifting cargo in a dive/phugoid etc??
@Matty,
I agree with everything you say.
@Stevan G,
your explanations you gave in your last comment demonstrate exactly what I meant with having to work through a scenario meticulously. The runway on Christmas Island isn’t that short with 2100 meters. After a few hours flying it shouldn’t have been a problem at all to land the plane. Not necessary to fly extra miles for fuel burn. It’s sensible to assume that the pilot wanted to land the plane in daylight if Christmas Island was the destination. But daylight arived shortly before 6:000 am local time on March 8 2014. That would be shortly before 11:000 UTC (Christmas Island local time = UTC plus 7 hours). But the plane supposedly crashed around 00:19 UTC, almost one hour and 20 minutes after daylight arrived in this area. So, your idea doesn’t jibe with the time table. With decent flying a half way experienced pilot should have been able to make it. Blaming an unspecified pressure or hassle is just not a very plausible assumption in order to save a not very logical theory. And if the pilot was forced to ditch the plane for some reason he probably would have done that near the island in order to get swift help. In this case it’s not logical at all, why no scrap of the plane ever surfaced. So, if the plane was hijacked with the intention to take it to Xmas Island then we must come up with another reason why it crashed.
That’s what I mean with going down to the nuts and bolts of a scenario. You have to be as careful as with any calculations concerning the satellite data. Unfortunately a lot less time and care is invested by many to sift through the details and kinks and pitfalls of potential scenarios. But that is absolutely necessary. I eliminated many promising ideas because some simple facts just wouldn’t fit.
Victor, interesting.
I can understand auto start of the APU with the aircraft in the air, possibly using power from RAT deployment to operate necessary systems.
But would the APU automatically start if the engines were manually shut down on the ground? I know nothing about 777 systems, but that seems a bit unlikely? There must be many situations where that is not desired? And where would the necessary power come from?
@M Pat, the APU starts when the engines stop running – either because you shut them off or because the engines have no more fuel. The APU has it’s own fuel. When the plane normally lands the pilots start the APU before they shut off the engines. This way the electric power supply is not interrupted and the SDU therefore would not start a log-on request.
The final log-on request around 00:19 can mean several different things: the plane ran out of fuel and therefore the APU kicked in. The plane landed and whoever piloted the plane made a mistake and forgot to start the APU first before shutting off the engine and killed the APU then as well. Or the pilots shut down the engines intentionally in the air for a moment (not a really dangerous maneuver) in order to simulate a plane running out of fuel. Then they restart the engines after having disconnected the SDU for good,
I had the idea that the final log-on request might simply have been generated without cutiing off the engines and the involvement of the APU simply by cutting off the SDU – as it might have been done the first time after IGARI – and then restoring the power. But apparently the sat data from 00:19 are more consistent with a plane whose engines don’t get any more fuel for whatever reason.
First item in normal after landing procedure:
Personally I have a hard time to believe that the pilots made such a grave mistake and forgot to start the APU before they shut down the engines after a successful landing in a Northern scenario, thus enabling us to know exactly when the plane’s journey ended and how far from the satellite the plane was at that time – which means we can start looking for airports/airstrips exactly or at least very near the 7th arc.
But who knows..the cleverest perps might screw up somewhere
The APU doesn’t have its own fuel. It feeds from the same main fuel tank as the engines. However, the fuel tank is in the wings and the APU is in the tail. I wonder if it has been verified experimentally that the APU can in fact start with fuel remaining in the fuel line when the main tanks are dry.
Hi Littlefoot, fantastic answer, thanks very much.
Having just done a little bit of reading (eg http://www.smartcockpit.com/docs/B777-Engines_and_APU.pdf) I am not yet convinced that the APU would auto-start on the ground, but it does appear that it uses its own battery for start-up, and there are clearly scenarios in which the pilots might shut down the engines (and therefore electrical power) and then manually start the APU for some reason, perhaps even with assistance from an external power source. This would have to be accomplished between the last normal handshake at 0010.58 and the log on attempt at 0019.29. It would have to be off again by 0115.56 of course when the aircraft did not respond to a ground initiated handshake.
@M Pat, yes, let’s continue to look into this.
In a SIO scenario the final log-on request can be explained satisfactorily with a plane running out of fuel.
In a Northern scenario it’s more complicated. Obviously I would exclude the possibility that the plane ran out of fuel and crashed on land. That would have been very difficult to hide and there should have probably been registrations of seismic movements by some stations as well as ELT signals.
But I have also difficulties to accept that perps who must have been so well organized and knowledgeable would have made such a grave blunder as to trigger the final log-on request unintentionally, thus giving away that the plane’s strange journey ended exactly somewhere on the Northern 7th arc at precisely 00:19.
But, as I said before, stranger things happen.
@Gysbreght, without being able to quote someone right now, I think it has been established that the APU does kick in, when the engines run out of fuel – or the fuel has been cut off. If the APU doesn’t have a separate fuel tank I don’t have the technical knowledge for explaining how exactly that is supposed to work if the fuel tanks have run dry completely. Maybe it’s the remaining fuel in the line as you say.
I’m a little surprised, though because I clearly remember it was discussed that the kicking in of the APU might cause dark contrails like a bad exhaust. That’s why I assumed the APU was run separately.
But I’m sure someone can clear that up satisfactorily.
@littlefoot: @gysbreght is correct. There is no separate fuel tank for the APU. The restart of the APU in a fuel exhaustion scenario is assumed to be from the fuel in the line between the left tank and the APU, and would be “unreliable and of short duration”, as per the ATSB report from June 2014 (p33).
The dark smoke from the APU that you are referring to was an explanation that I (and probably others) proposed way back on Duncan’s site to explain Kate Tee’s observation of a dark smoke trail from the plane. It has nothing to do with fuel exhaustion.
@Victor, how long would the APU run before the fuel is completely gone from the line?
I remember that the dark contrails were discussed in connection with Kate Tee’s observation. And someone who believed that Kate saw mh370 attributed the dark contrail to the APU having kicked in by then and causing a bad exhaust phenomenon. But that was probably mere speculation.
Since I introduced the idea of an automatic start of the APU after a potential landing in the north, I will be the one to kill this idea. The minimum (radial) distance between the 6 and 7th ping arcs is about 37 nm and the time distance is about 8 minutes. After the engines shutdown, the time to spool up the APU and power up the SATCOM is about 3 min 40 sec, leaving only about 5 min to traverse 37 nm and land the plane. There is simply not enough time.
If the log-on at 00:19 was deliberate, it was likely initiated by a forced re-boot of the SDU, which could take a fraction of the time of starting the APU and powering up the SATCOM.
@littlefoot – This is from the first ATSB report:
Following the loss of AC power on both buses19, the SDU would have experienced a power interruption sufficiently long to force a shut-down, the aircraft’s ram air turbine20 (RAT) would deploy from the fuselage into the aircraft’s slipstream and the APU would auto-start.
Re: Altitudes – 35,000 ft is plenty high to incapacitate PAX. No need to go to 43,500 for that reason.
Bojinka – A small bomb could make a hole large enough to depressurize the cabin but I wonder if a B777 could continue to fly for 7 hours with a hole in its fuselage? Perhaps that was part of the test?
Post divergence speed was, as Jeff put it, “pedal-to-metal.” Could that be a response to an emergency or just to minimize time spent while being tracked by radar?
I believe a 777 can auto-land but only at airports with the proper equipment. Could the cabin crew (without Cap & FO) be attempting to find such an airport waiting (their track brought them close to 3 or 4 airports) for a “push here to land” button to light? (They avoided KL due to air traffic and tall buildings.)
The APU starts automatically when left and right main transfer busses both lose electrical power. The left engine and the APU receive fuel from the left fuel tank. The ATSB end-of-flight scenario reqires the APU to run for about three minutes.
It is possible that the first engine flame-out resulted in a combination of sideslip and bank angles that maintained a selected track on autopilot. In that case bank angle may have caused fuel in the tank still containing fuel to move to one side, thereby increasing the quantity of unuseable fuel. The second engine flame-out would have removed the thrust asymmetry, thrust asymmetry compensation and bank angle, so that some ‘unuseable’ fuel became available again.
P.S.
The ATSB simulations assume the right engine to fail first, followed by the left engine.
@Victor, thanks.
When contemplating a Northern scenario I feel more comfortable with eliminating the idea that the perps triggered the last log-on by mistake. That would just not fit into the concept of a meticulously executed plan.
But the idea of a deliberately forced log-on request followed by going completely dark again is equally challenging in a Northern scenario. I have to follow through with a few earlier discarded ideas…
Mar 25, 2014
Dutch PM gets world leaders to play nuclear wargame at summit
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/25/us-nuclear-security-wargame-idUSBREA2O1QC20140325?feedType=RSS&feedName=worldNews
June 11, 2015
Kazakhstan to Host International Uranium Fuel Bank
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2015/06/11/world/middleeast/11reuters-kazakhstan-nuclear-iaea.html?_r=0
http://www.nucleartippingpoint.org/
@spencer
“Why no phone calls in your scenario? By order of captain?”
Bad signal at cruising altitude? If they didn’t directly overfly base stations it’s quite possible there was no signal.
And yes if he told him to sit there and watch he would likely sit there and watch, as long as the captain didn’t show any suicidal moves and was just cruising at altitude.
“And, once more, are you aware of the flight speeds recorded in the report? This is anything but conducive to a leisurely diversion?”
what about flight speeds? the ACARS was turned off at the point of turn and we don’t know what was the speed of the plane at that moment, and there was no reason for the captain to rush it anyway, slow or fast turn it didn’t make lot of difference time-wise so he likely pulled a slow turn
“This scenario is predicated on the fallacy that Z was somehow incapable of murder and suicide.”
Everybody is capable of murder and suicide, accusing someone of doing so without hard evidence is very rude, especially towards his family.
Again..there is a possibility he did so but you cannot be sure about that, the same way I cannot be sure the plane is south of Christmas Island, I just assign some probability to it.
“Some possible reasons for SIO terminus.
1) We have NO idea what was in his head. Deal with it.”
That is not a reason.
“2) Remote enough to ditch sans debris. Wasn’t aware of SAT tracking. In this scenario, from his perspective, plane completely vanishes. This also protects family from a potentially PROVEN guilt.”
Remoteness has nothing to do with possibility of ditching without debris. High waves have though, and they are usually very high down there, he would choose much calmer areas in the middle of SIO, not any reason to go to the south if it was his goal. Also he would actively look for calmer sea patch while flying low, he wouldn’t wait for fuel exhaustion and risk stumbling upon a very high waves.
Ask any engineer who knows something about aircraft materials, it’s almost impossible to ditch the plane in waves higher than ~1m or so, even 0.5m. At those speeds it’s like hitting concrete… there is a literature all over the Internet, maybe even some free basic Testing and Material Modeling Software for Crash & Safety Simulation 😉
“3) He flew over the mainland FOR A REASON, then preferred the SIO to the Pacific. whatever, he was IMO satisfied with his route.”
That doesn’t add up, if he wanted to hide the plane he would go straight to the Pacific, why would he risk fighter planes getting scrambled? There was always a chance they would notice him and scramble jets(as asleep as RMAF were), then alert Indonesia which would alert India and they would possibly both alert US because of Diego Garcia base (which could be a possible target for terrorist hijacker). Then US would redirect satellites to follow him and that would be it.
“4) Depth of the ocean, diamantina deep, ninety east ridge, etc…This would also serve him well. NB we still don’t know where the plane is exactly in the SIO.”
he overshoot diamantina deep (it’s behind 7th arc), again doesn’t add up
also he had deep trenches just south of Sumatra with much calmer sea and higher chance to ditch it without debris
“5)Knew he would be tracked via SAT and SOMEHOW knew Malaysia would initially lie. This is complicated and I won’t get into it further here unless asked (which I surely won’t be).”
I don’t think he cared a lot about sat tracking, if he wanted to hide it he could turn satellite pinging completely, it’s the info that was publically available and still is. IMO he just wanted to go over Malaysia without being noticed from civilian ATCs.
“6) Didn’t pick the PERFECT spot in regard to making searching optimally punitive. His bad. Oh well.”
so is this reason for or against the theory? 😉
@Matty what howls exactly? And if foreign countries knew there was some technological marvel on board they would suspect China anyway, at the end the plane was full of Chinese nationals 😉
” Some IG members say it hit with such speed the plane was obliterated and therefore no substantial debris. ”
umm, that’s physically impossible under any circumstances
@littlefoot
“The runway on Christmas Island isn’t that short with 2100 meters.”
I know, which would make that goal even more desirable for him 😉
anyway he wasn’t used to landing there(has he ever flown there?) and possibly wanted to land light
“After a few hours flying it shouldn’t have been a problem at all to land the plane. ”
not if you are flying regular way, but if you are under stress and pressure everything could pose the problem
“And if the pilot was forced to ditch the plane for some reason he probably would have done that near the island in order to get swift help.”
That’s right but he might have missed the approach for some reason, it doesn’t have to be stress it could be some electric failure or whatever reason.
At the end if he did all of this on a whim there is a possibility he went first to Cocos Islands(for whatever reason) decided it was dark and changed his goal to Christmas Island and went there instead, that would fit BFO&BTO values even for cruising speed.
All in all there are many things that could happen south of Sumatra that could take them anywhere on the 7th arc, conflict between him and copilot, zig-zag flying…who knows what else.
Remember this scenarios relies heavily on motivation, if someone was motivated to do something then all sort of strange things could happen.
@falken
why is this connected to MH370?!
@All
I’m a bit puzzled by this report:
http://abcnews.go.com/International/malaysia-airliner-pinging-indication-crashed-indian-ocean/story?id=22894802
Which was brought back into attention through a tweet by Nihonmama some time ago.
So given the date of the report and assuming the BTO analysis was established but the BFO analysis not yet (it would take Inmarsat another 10 days or so), what could have been the indication that the ac crashed in the IO?
I would like to hear opinions of preferably more than one or two people, rather than stirring a whole discussion. Of course you can also react on my assumption.
Thanks,
Niels.
@Niels
The US has been using Doppler shifted telemetry data to track foreign missal launches for at least three decades. The Inmarsat claim of novel and groundbreaking probably caused more than a few laughs at Langley.
@DennisW
Ok thanks Dennis, I might react later, but I invite others first to give their opinion.
Niels,
It is still unclear (at least to me) exactly what was known when. I found one article claiming that the rescue center was informed of a possible turnback from radar as early as the evening of March 8 – just 13 hours after the plane was declared missing. It was certainly the radar data that first pushed the search into the Indian Ocean, although it probabaly took time to collate (since there were 2 military and multiple civilian radars involved.) In the article you linked, even though the satellite data are described, there is no mention of the Southern Indian Ocean, so it is possible that the BTO analysis was still in progress, and that the “two corridors” had not yet been defined. Others may have kept better track of news stories at the time.
@sk999
Ok clear, so you suggest that it could be based on an “extrapolation” of the radar data.
The first clearly reported BTO result I can remember, including a plot of the 7th arc (N and S), was on 15th March in WP.
@sk999, @Niels:
“It is still unclear (at least to me) exactly what was known when”
This may help.
https://twitter.com/nihonmama/status/546770849039400960
@Nihonmama
Thanks for filling in part of the timeline! Is it clear with which partner company Inmarsat shared the first BTO derived results on March 11th?
@Niels:
You’re welcome.
And as you’ll note, the WSJ writers did not identify the partner company Inmarsat shared “its data analysis and other documents” with on March 11th.
Niels,
I have a note to myself saying that Inmarsat first sent its data to the AAIB on Mar 13.
Here’s a link to a WSJ article last updated 5 am, Mar 14, which show an artist’s conception of a ring, centered on IGARI, not the 18:22 radar point, but leaking into the SIO, even though SIO is, once again, not mentioned in the article.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304185104579437573396580350
The focus of the Western search zone is still on the Andaman Sea, but it is clear that the Malaysians and other investigators were puzzling over the data (e.g., “U.S. aviation investigators said they were analyzing the satellite transmissions to determine whether they can glean information about the plane’s ultimate location or status.”)
Mar 15 is also the first date I have found for first publication of the final arc (which I think was actually the 6th arc) and the two corridors.
Nihonmama wrote:
“And as you’ll note, the WSJ writers did not identify the partner company Inmarsat shared ‘its data analysis and other documents’ with on March 11th.”
Not to worry – Inmarsat itself told us:
http://www.inmarsat.com/news/inmarsat-statement-malaysia-airlines-flight-mh370/
“This information was provided to our partner SITA, which in turn has shared it with Malaysia Airlines.”
StevanG – if China was to detain and ransack commercial aircraft at their airports there would be a major stink. If you don’t see that we better disagree, finish the debate and move on.
The “absolute demolition” of the aircraft precluding the discovery of debris is indeed being put forward by some very distinguished people.
@sk999:
Re SITA, you are correct.
https://twitter.com/nihonmama/status/555636833783382018
But back on debris – would a cargo shift put an end to any orderly phugoid spiral? What does the cargo do in a dive? If these planes get badly out of shape in a fast dive do they break up? That could explain no acoustic detection?
@SK999
SITA is not well-known for analytical prowess. If you want an iPad based ticket kiosk they are up for that. Doubt SITA did any heavy lifting relative to the MH370 analytics.
@DennisW:
Overheard:
@GerryS: “and we don’t have any confirmation that #MH370 did actually fly for hours after it disappeared. Not even from Inmarsat.”
@RunwayGirl: “Inmarsat would not be the party to tell you, Gerry. SITA would.”
@GerryS: “SITA gateway receives the data xmission from the Inmarsat Ground Earth Station. So BOTH Inmarsat & SITA would know about it.”
@RunwayGirl: “Gee, Gerry. I’m sure you’ll agree that one has far more info than the other. I’m tempted to stop talking to you about nonsense.”
https://twitter.com/RunwayGirl/status/444665681532157952
#godhowIloveTwitter
@Matty.
Lack of debris and lack of acoustic detection taken together are a worry, especially when the Curtin scientists have the technology to detect something so far away (the so-called Curtin boom). Let’s assume for a minute that there is more information/data (e.g. from JORN) that led the US to announce that the plane was in the SIO… given PM Abbott’s current policy of declining to comment on “operational matters” (particularly in relation to asylum seeker boat turn backs etc.) do you think that the ATSB is in possession of classified radar/satellite data which has helped them come up with their current search area? And could anything be gleaned through FOI?
@Stevan G, I never said the runway of Christmas Island was in any way not “desirable” for mh370. I was countering your argument that mh370 could only land on it after having burnt more fuel than it already had by flying extra miles which could then have to lead to the plane running out of fuel. That chain of events is simply not plausible. While I can see several possible motives for hijackers to divert the plane to Christmas Island (and therefore think it’s more plausible as a destination than the SIO) I can’t see a reason why the plane shouldn’t have reached the place in one piece. Or, if it broke up, why it should subsequently make a complete vanishing act. The complete absence of any debris can be better explained with a SIO crash.
@Matty, I agree with you, Chinese authorities searching and confiscating cargo from a foreign plane and/or taking passengers into custody -or making them disappear on Chinese premises – would cause a major stink and draw attention to something China might prefer very much to achieve quietly. Even taking Chinese passengers into custody openly or quietly might alert of human rights organizations. But if the plane is simply considered lost, they can proceed as they please without anyone being able to guess what they’re even up to or what goods they’re interested in.
@AM2, @Matty:
This will interest.
NPR: Analysis Reveals Record Number Of FOIA Requests Filed Last Year
March 19, 2015
“GONYEA: Can you cite any examples of a request that took longer or was rejected when you thought it shouldn’t have been?
BRIDIS: Almost immediately after Malaysian Airlines 370 went down, we asked the Pentagon’s spy satellite agency about the request for assistance that they might have received either internationally or from within the U.S. government. And a year later, we are still waiting for anything. Zero pages have been produced.”
https://twitter.com/nihonmama/status/578954102358433792
Here’s an observation – can anyone else confirm or refute? The earliest picture I have found that shows the two “arcs” (the North and South “Corridors”) also includes a point labeled “Last Radar Contact with MH370”. Are there any figures with arcs but not a radar position that predate?
We know from the BBC Horizon documentary that Alan Schuster Bruce originally intended to use the BTO only to obtain a final “fix” on the aircraft position, but later he realized that the BTOs could also be used to reconstruct the actual track of the aircraft. In order to do so, he needed a starting point, and thus had to wean the information about the last radar location from Malaysia Airlines (or at least, that is how he remembered it), which he finally did. But when did that occur?
The following is a link to another WSJ article from March 20 (indirectly linked to by Nihonmama) which recounts the events of the prior week+. Lots of good information, but all to be taken with a grain of salt – plenty of misinformation as well.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304026304579449680167673144
DennisW – ??? I never attributed any analytical prowess to SITA.