Guest Editorial: Why This Plague of False Information?

By Victor Iannello

Don’t be fooled by claims of the red tape causing the delay in the determination of the provenance of the flaperon.

Boeing and the NTSB were parties to the investigation when the flaperon was first brought to Toulouse. It is very unlikely that the Spanish subcontractor ADS-SAU did not immediately turn over all documentation when requested by Boeing. The investigators had to know soon after the start of the investigation what the provenance of the part is, whether or not that determination was made public.

I have said before and continue to believe that there was an attempt to delay the release of the results of the investigation in parallel with planting a seed of doubt regarding the provenance of the part. Just look at the series of events this week. First the claim that Spanish vacation schedules have delayed the identification of the part. Then the claim that the identification was not possible. This was followed by the claim that the flaperon was certainly from MH370.

The pattern of leaking contradictory or false information to the media from off-the-record sources continued in full force this week. I believe this is a story in its own right that should be getting a lot of attention. Perhaps when enough journalists are made to look foolish by reporting contradicting statements, their “reputation instincts” will kick in and compel them to dig deeper.

We who are following this incident should demand that more facts be fully disclosed. Technical reports should be released so that we are not parsing statements from a judge-prosecutor to understand the true meaning of what was written. And journalists should not blindly report statements without attribution.

872 thoughts on “Guest Editorial: Why This Plague of False Information?”

  1. @Oleksandr

    The hijacking scenario simply makes no sense. There is no one and nothing on the plane that could not be more easily snatched on the ground. The plane itself can be purchased easily from used aircraft brokers. Why hijack the plane? Duh!

    Likewise with mechanical failure. The flight dynamics do not support it. Trying to explain the SDU reboot with either of those scenarios is like saying the reboot was caused by aliens.

  3. @littlefoot

    rarely compared to others, also they didn’t have any bias before the study unlike CSIRO and basically all studies saying current search area was possible

  4. StevanG,

    Sorry, but your your scenario is nearly absurd. As I see, in addition to Shah’s motive and actions, you need to involve:
    – a friend in the cabin;
    – negotiators in Malaysia, who keep the silence;
    – a technical glitch (or human error).

    Specifically:

    2a) “Twin Towers? He wasn’t suicidal.”
    Did I say he was suicidal? He would attract a lot more attention by cycling around Twin Towers, located in the business area of KL, usually full of foreign tourists. I am sure he would attract a lot more attention compared to CI. Malaysian military would not shut it down – too many casualties on the ground. Maybe CI is famous in Australia, but others know almost nothing about it.

    2b) “What international borders? He was already in malaysian airspace when turn around IGARI happened, and he came to Christmas Island without permission from ATC. He probably didn’t touch thai and indonesian airspace, that’s why he went around.”
    Have you ever heard anything about visas, special passports of crew members, etc.? Unauthorized entering Australia would be considered as a crime. Or Australia welcomes illegal immigrants?
    “There are planes all around the world that in case of emergency(or a simple navigating mistake) stray into another country without ATC permisssion, very rarely they end up in jail. “
    I will refrain from commenting this.

    “Stealing property? He was the Captain and it was his way of protest against the company and government who owns the company.”
    You have to decide on the motive: protest against MAS, or political statement? These are two very different things. Please note that in any case, for whatever purpose, he did not have right to steal/borrow MAS property. It would be considered as a crime by any national or international laws regardless his purpose. You can use your own property to protest against something, but you can’t use property of the company you work for.

    2c) “I’m not sure Australians could keep silent and just detain him because whole world would want to hear his version.”
    Really? Perhaps you would like to hear stories of all insane persons in the world? Australians would keep silent if it was in their political/business interests.

    3a) “How? The same way they forced down every jet they intercepted, including US military aircrafts. It wouldn’t be trouble for themselves, it’s their obligation to protect the airspace and force down every intruder. That’s what airforce is for during peacetime.”

    You presented Indonesians as a kind of vampire monsters. Force down every intruder? Really? Indonesians only? Why Europe does not shut down every intruder, why Malaysia and Thailand did not shut down MH370, and why Indonesians actually did not notice it at all? Military obligation is to protect their country, not to shut down every intruder. As long as the aircraft was not considered as hostile, the simplest solution for Indonesians would be escorting it till the border. Then let others deal with it.

    3b) “Why? Because they would fire warning shots in front of him, unless he would want to kill himself and all the passengers he would have to obey them and land somewhere in Indonesia. I haven’t heard of such case where pilot of civilian airliner disobeyed interceptors.”
    If you haven’t heard, then it does not mean these cases did not happen. Read on Korean Air 007. The principal difference, however, was that Korean Air 007 was heading towards military installations and did not respond interceptor’s orders. Even in that case it took about 30 minutes of hesitation…

    4) “I don’t know, mistake on the approach then getting around, or some technical glitch or who knows what.”
    Ok, let it be technical glitch.

    5) “we don’t know if he had deal with someone on the plane, maybe he had a friend who assisted him or maybe it was (de)activated unintentionally from someone else who entered E/E bay”
    Ok, let it be a friend, who assisted him.

    6) “how do we know for sure it was functional? If so, then it would really be mysterious”
    Technically, hardware can test itself, and pass a binary message 1 if ok, or 0 if failed, deciphered by Inmarsat, and provided to us by the means of FI.

    7) “CI doesn’t have active primary radar (Cocos Island as well), nothing of value on the island to justify its operation. 7th arc is some 100-150 miles from the island, in aviation that’s not too far and there is a possibility the PIC (whoever it was at the moment) overshoot the island because of tiredness panic etc.”
    I think I saw radar coverage map that shows both CI and Cocos radars. Just checking if my memory is correct, see, for instance “daronmont.com.au/dartweb/index.php/projects/christmas-island-radar-support”, which says that Australia has surveillance radars there.
    Also 100-150 miles overshot is huge in the modern aviation. It is way too far.

    “again I ask you, what other motive would anyone have to turn east after getting around Indonesia if it wasn’t for CI(considering there wasn’t enough fuel to reach australian mainland)?!
    I already told you. You even admitted it was possible, though unlikely.
    Btw, you are wrong that “there wasn’t enough fuel to reach australian mainland”. The amount of fuel was sufficient to get there.

    Do you see that when you combine all the things your scenario is getting not only bizarre, but also absurd? If you have more plausible explanations, let’s discuss. If no – let it stay with you.

  5. Dennis,

    “The hijacking scenario simply makes no sense. There is no one and nothing on the plane that could not be more easily snatched on the ground. The plane itself can be purchased easily from used aircraft brokers. Why hijack the plane? Duh!”

    Why would a group of terrorists need to purchase an expensive airplane, when it is possible to get it for free? B777 is an expensive machine. Why would pirates purchase an airplane of such a scale instead of getting it for free?

    “Likewise with mechanical failure. The flight dynamics do not support it.”
    Why do you think that flight dynamics does not support it? Rather on contrary, even landing without a pilot appears to be possible (see the link provided by RetiredF4).

    “Trying to explain the SDU reboot with either of those scenarios is like saying the reboot was caused by aliens.”
    Not at all. In case of hijacking it was switched off/on on purpose. Off – to disable ACARS and prevent any communication from the cabin. On – because after the murder, perps needed SATCOM for the communication (that is why ACARS did not return back).
    In case of the technical failure – it was an attempt to restore SATCOM link, partially successful.

  6. airlandseaman posted September 20, 2015 at 7:13 PM: “So forget about the trim setting. It is a waste of time to worry about it. ”

    In the face of all the arguments stating otherwise, that is just an empty claim. You could strengthen that claim by showing the data from the test where you set the fuel imbalance to zero and the manual rudder trim to zero. I wonder why you are keeping those data to yourselves. You told us that an unexplained relight occurred 01:26 minutes after both engines flamed out, but that doesn’t invalidate what happened in those 1:26 minutes. You also wrote that the airplane quickly recovered from that disturbance and continued until 13 minutes after the engines flamed out. That phase would also be very interesting, despite the phugoids you observed, or perhaps even more because of them.

  7. StevanG,

    Re: “Somalis hijacking Boeing to get to CI already happened, however no such persons existed on this flight if officials are to be believed and they wouldn’t have reason to lie in that case.”
    What persons? I never meant Somalis to CI. I meant the aircraft hijacked by Somalia pirates as a possible destination.

    Re: “In case of hijack you need very technically verse people who would risk their lives to pull something like this, I don’t deny such people could exist in the world but very low chance they would be on the flight.”
    You just said Shah would need to have a friend in the cabin, who helped him to realize the plan. Also, you are too naive to think it is possible to check background of every person onboard, and also that nobody else was hiding in the airplane.

    Re: “planes don’t fly themselves along national borders and FIRs, as broken as they get”
    Who said it flew by itself along FIRs? You are totally confused.

    Re: “think again, known flight path up to the IO entrance(and even after the turn) was ideal to reach CI unchallenged (or at least raise your chances)”
    Why do you think so? Have you compared it with other options to get to CI, pros and cons? And again, I don’t understand why it was required to go specifically to CI to make a political statement? Dejavu.

  8. airlandseaman,

    Have you read the story, link to which was provided by RetiredF4? What is your opinion on the settings of B777, which could result in a similar landing instead of a spiral dive? If not possible – why?

  9. Littlefoot – speaking of barnacles – where are they these days? Who has them and still no info released. Barnacles for heavens sake. No ordinary plane crash, never been treated that way and still isn’t.

  10. [PDF]B777 Electrical – SmartCockpit
    http://www.smartcockpit.com/download.php?path=docs/&file=B777-Electrical...
    7. 4. 1. 2. 3. 11. 19. 9. Boeing B777 – Systems Summary [Electrical] …. The AC electrical system is the main source for airplane electrical power. Electrical Load …

    Designing the 777 Electrical Power System – Angelfire
    http://www.angelfire.com/ct3/ctenning/electrical…/777elecpwr/777_design.html
    A short description summarizing the design process and details of the electrical power generating system for the Boeing Model 777.

  15. Some kind of war against media? Is democracy really dead?
    Hope that nope – watch UN Sustainable Development Goals for future

  16. @Oleksandr

    “– a friend in the cabin;”

    not necessarily if someone else has entered E/E bay

    ” – negotiators in Malaysia, who keep the silence;”

    what negotiators? I think he didn’t contact anyone, just tried to get to another country and land there. Malaysia didn’t have a clue where the plane was until they reviewed radar logs.

    “– a technical glitch (or human error).”

    yupp something like that absolutely yes

    2a) maybe KL is better covered with radar better said radar operators care a bit more in that area(or he thought so)

    also he would achieve nothing and probably get death penalty as a terrorist, he wouldn’t have enough fuel to get to any first world country in that case

    2b) again, unauthorized straying into airspace of another country is something which happens on a regular basis

    landing is a bit different but he would probably contact them as soon as he got close to the airport, they would have to let him land since he was low on fuel so nothing unauthorized in that case

    2c) but it wouldn’t be, even Australians themselves would question the government about him, he would have to be allowed to speak

    Australia is not Malaysia, there are regular internal controls so it’s not easy to hide such a big thing.

    3a) check their interception history, they had many interception in these 15 years and everyone has been forced to land for papers/luggage check etc.

    3b) it was the mistake in communication, if korean pilot had proper communication with the russian AF pilot he would obey him, check the case again

    4) yupp it could be many things, personally I like the theory about copilot and engineer trying to distract him by turning off some systems, maybe they have accidentally turned off navigation computer too

    5) maybe a friend maybe not, maybe he had a deal with copilot that worked up to a point…

    6) but does it send a message if something is turned off in E/E bay?

    7) no they don’t have active radars there, it might be too far but what it shows is that CI was within reach and leaving 150-200 miles of fuel for reserve sounds about right in situation like this

    amount of fuel wasn’t sufficient to reach australian mainland in flight envelope like that, there is around 1000 miles from 7th arc to australian mainland

    if they didn’t get around Indonesia yes there would be enough fuel

    yupp that scenario was of course possible but unlikely because it would produce lot of debris and we have none except flaperon

    also it’s not supported by drift analysis

    “What persons? I never meant Somalis to CI. I meant the aircraft hijacked by Somalia pirates as a possible destination.”

    persons that could be connected with terrorism or hijackings, you can be sure all countries that had passengers on the flight have thoroughly checked them with their intelligence service

    I know you didn’t mention Somalis to CI, just wanted to tell you there was a similiar hijacking try that also didn’t succeed and also had distracted pilot that failed to ditch it properly.

    “You just said Shah would need to have a friend in the cabin, who helped him to realize the plan. Also, you are too naive to think it is possible to check background of every person onboard, and also that nobody else was hiding in the airplane.”

    huh I don’t think it’s easy to hide someone in the airplane (although not impossible), + Shah’s friend could just be someone he got to help him but later on the flight changed his mind, and no he wouldn’t need a friend as a must(but possibly had)

    “Who said it flew by itself along FIRs? You are totally confused.”

    well part of the flight along Malacca Strait it did (or very close to it), all in all the point was to evade indonesian airspace and interrogation by their ATC

    “Why do you think so? Have you compared it with other options to get to CI, pros and cons? And again, I don’t understand why it was required to go specifically to CI to make a political statement? Dejavu.”

    yupp, for that specific flight it was the best option to get to CI and he likely did it on a whim after the court decision as he couldn’t wait for another flight and was itching to do some harm to the governmernt

    CI was the only first world option for him on this flight, thus such decision

  17. There appears to be a Confirmation Bias from those of you who live in Australia/New Zealand (not all of you, but definitely there is a pattern), and this clearly emerges when you posit the different end of flight scenarios for MH370.
    This confirmation bias appears in the form of Christmas Island/Australia/Asylum/Bad politics in Malaysia (in contrast to the democracy in Australia) etc.
    Although Australia is a beacon of hope and democracy in the Asia/Pacific region, and is actively involved in the search for MH370, this confirmation bias is not very helpful when it comes to finding the truth.

    A different kind of bias could be levelled against those of us who posit the Russian connection too, the bias of proportionality, which is the tendency to assume that big events have big causes.

    Now, one could also be accused of evaluating arguments not on their merits, but on the basis of their source (Aust/NZ), aka the Genetic Fallacy. To rebutt this accusation, I will say that I’m only pointing out what appears to be a pattern. This pattern may or may not be pointing to the truth.

  18. StevanG,

    With all due respect, if this was done on a “whim” after the court decision, isn’t that in direct contrast to what most believe took months or more of planning to execute with all this military precision in timing, the first disappearance exactly at IGARI, knowing most likely that RMAF was asleep, supposed SIO simulator practice landings, etc. Or are you saying that he had all this planned out well in advance but needed something like the court decision to catapult his plan against the government into action?

    If this was some kind of a statement gone wrong without being fully accomplished, which I still do not believe it was, I think this is much greater than Zaharie or beyond his control, then for sure he would have had the book thrown at him if he had landed. This is no simple revocation of a license, this is downright international kidnapping, terrorizing people against their will and taking them thousands of miles away from their intended destination, this is grand theft aircraft, a form of terrorism. Those passengers paid MAS for their safe transport to Beijing, the aircraft is not Zaharie’s property, it belongs to the company he works/worked for, MAS and his using one of the fleet this way is illegal and unauthorized and misuse of company property at the very least, not to mention a murder rap if the passengers were not alive, vehicular homicide, reckless endangerment, and whatever other legalities are involved.

    And all that could be null and void if the initial, intentional IGARI diversion was a life saving measure.

    I think the ISAT data, the IG, and ATSB still may come out right on point, the flaperon drift model may be right on point too with the current search area, Airlandseaman I think is right about the flaperon coming off right before impact into the SIO, and with a little more patience I pray it is found. BUT………..Jeff asked the perfect question a couple articles back, how far is far enough in the current search area????? That needed to be asked.

  19. @Cheryl
    Thank you for a sound post, which I hope brings back the discussion to facts away from the different motive driven speculations.
    This riddle is only solved if we collect as much evidence or presumed evidence as possible, check their individual probability and maybe validity and try to connect this evidence to a puzzle, which finally may morph into a picture.

    If we continue to discuss the assumed end product without accepting that other evidence tracks are possible as well, these discussions will end nowehere.

    The motive driven search for evidence is a dead end at the moment. As mentioned before the culprit/ culprits could have been one of the crew, it could have been a group of passengers, it could have been hijackers hidden in the EE-bay on the ground or a combination of those possibilities. And in the end it could have been a black swan event with technical problems involved. Any of them could have different motives. The motive will not find the aircraft.

  20. Victor – in your radar analysis you said “The sharp turn to the left at around 17:23:38 UTC is unexplained, and could be due to either an inaccurate graphical portrayal of the radar track, or crossing radar tracks from two aircraft.”

    Is a second aircraft a possibility? If a second plane passed by deliberately, could the burning object seen by the oil rig worker be mh370? And a black plane heads out to SIO with fake electronic signatures? I know there are debris problems.

  21. @Matty, since the barnacles are apparently so territorial, they are of the utmost importance IMO. Maybe even more so than any driftstudy. The drift models can only come up with estimates based on variables we don’t know for sure if they are correct. But the barnacles ard real. If they are from a sub-species which doesn’t dwell in the priority search area, then the flap can’t have come from there.
    @Trip, some of us discussed a second-plane scenario. But it’s hard to see how the plane could’ve come down where the oil rig worker saw a glowing object. There was no debris in that area. And if a second plane crossed the peninsula and later posed as mh370 this must’ve been planned sometimes in advance. It couldn’t have been done in oerder to obfuscate an accident.

  24. @littlefoot,

    Not quite. The flapperon only needs to travel through the barnacles region, not necessarily originate from it.

    Still, the barnacle region and ages of barnacle found on the flaperon may put limits on possible flaperon drift origins.

    Cheers

    Will

  25. @all

    about safe or corrupt data

    The only reason to follow the odd terminus in the SIO is a certain trust into seven data points. Since the beginning of the search i was delivering the sermon, that we have be very reluctant about uncorroborated data, because more brilliant and capable minds work rather on the corruption of data and how to deceive the public about it, than to the benefit and wellbeing of people. The infamous fraud of the global player VW just confirmed my warning again: software was successfully and deliberately corrupted to serve the interest of the stakeholders and neglect the damage to the health of people worldwide. The malware was built into millions of cars, and there is a strong presumption, that other global player companies did the same as well.

    Does anyone doubt that a player like Inmarsat that is very close to some sources of deceptive data corruption is not capable or otherwise immune against a spoof?

    Its quite naive to ignore the widespread abuse of data especially if they are uncorroborated and the only evidence produced, as well as they start at a quite convenient mark within the timeframe an d beg the convenience of a good excuse, if the A/C is not detected.

  26. @Muone

    The barnacles had a very tight schedule for their colonization of the flaperon. The french found, that the colonization was older than a year, which was a conservative assessment and the disappearance was about 15.5 months before the find. I presume, the French found some mature individuals among the barnacle population and this gives a hint only for a minimum time of one year, but colonization might even been some more months ago.

    Its also not very realistic to think that you can be a piece of drift in the ocean for a couple of months without any barnacle fouling. Just read some papers about barnacle fouling and you see that its considered a plague.

  27. @Cheryl

    ” Or are you saying that he had all this planned out well in advance but needed something like the court decision to catapult his plan against the government into action?”

    Yes.

    “This is no simple revocation of a license, this is downright international kidnapping, terrorizing people against their will and taking them thousands of miles away from their intended destination, this is grand theft aircraft, a form of terrorism.”

    aircraft diverts happen on a daily basis and passengers often finish in another country or back to the airport, technical faults weather or what not

    technical faults are sometimes caused by bad maintenance from the company so somebody is guilty again

    also Zaharie would rather get jailed in Australia for couple of years than live under malaysian dictatorship, people with ideals do exist

    “I think the ISAT data, the IG, and ATSB still may come out right on point, ”

    well in theory yes they may, but the chance is very very low if you connect all the dots

    basically it would have to be the Oleksandr/Gysbrecht theory about all hijackers exiting the cockpit (highly unlikely) then stumbling upon locked door when they wanted to get back, then aircraft would crash leaving lot of debris while only flaperon has been found

    add to it independent drift analysis without adding side factors like wind etc. that all point to area NW of Australia and you get very very very low probability that it originates from the current search area

  28. @retiredF4

    Your post was funny. Ridiculing motive just because you can’t think of one. Crimes have been solved by careful consider of motives for centuries, maybe you should gett out more.

    Not too long ago you were believing the flaperon was faked. Do you think it is real now?

  29. We seem to be approaching this from 2 complementary perspectives.
    1. The motive will find the aircraft.
    2. Finding the aircraft will show the motive.

    Both approaches are valid. One is based on science and the other is based on psychology. However sometimes stuff just happens without explanation

    Jeff, I think we would be better served by having these 2 approaches as separate threads.

  30. Oleksandr
    re posted September 21, 2015 at 5:34 PM to airlandseaman:

    Which story by RetiredF4?

  31. RetiredF4,

    I totally agree with your post: the motive driven search for evidence is a dead end at the moment. A black swan is more interesting topic for discussion rather than diarrhea of thoughts about hell in Malaysia and paradise in Australia.

    Technical (i.e. mechanical or electrical) failure scenario does not find fair support in my opinion, while being one of the two most likely scenarios. There is a need in exchange of necessary information, but it is virtually absent. Most of the discussions are about gut feelings and crystal balls.

  32. @ Trip- i dont mean to come off as being too critical of anothers idea…especially if i dont fully understand it. “The motive” #1 you referred to could also be interchanged with the word(s) “his reason” will find the aircraft (which is kind of what this is all about) we simply have nothing more, at this time, to sink our teeth into, except a number of hypotheses to direct us to the final resting spot….so which “motive” do we pursue….? ? Now as far as #2 goes “his” last will and testament on the CVR will/maybe/should explain his thoughts….if he had the class and fortitude to honor us with those thoughts ( which i believe he did ) in the final moments of his time in the “office”….we will one day know… Hope i didnt sound too melancholy…

  34. airlandseaman,

    I have a permanent problem with the posts containing links. This time the entire post has gone (just in case it will re-appear later).

    It is about “the cornfield bomber”:

    http(colon)(slash)(slash)www(dot)f-106deltadart.com/580787cornfieldbomber.htm

    What settings of B777 could result in a similar landing?

  35. Regarding a general topic of convo regarding all this, some people seem to think that this would take months of planning. I, for one, completely disagree. For a pilot who has years of experience and familiarity with their country and their surrounding county’s general dispositions, everything we know that happened up until the turn south should not have taken more than a night or two of thinking and planning. What exactly would a person be doing for months on end planning for this? What exactly would not be able to be figured out with only a night or two of deep thought and planning?

  36. Oleksandr: It’s a good question. I’m not familiar with the details on the “the cornfield bomber”, but I assume there was no electrical power interruption at the time of the bailout, and some subset of AP functionality was still working…maybe just some type of stabilization? I’m just guessing here. But in the case of MH370, the only functionality on board capable of controlling a steady path of any description was turned off and disengaged circa 00:15:49 when the second engine flamed out. When the APU came on line ~1 minute later, full power was restored to the Autopilot hardware and software, but it remained disengaged (not controlling anything). In this mode, the plane will descend as we (and ATSB/Boeing/MAS) demonstrated in the simulator.

  37. @ Jay – i’m on the same sheet of music with you….he may have been simmering these ideas for some while…then, “events” on his homefront pushed him over and down the hill…like a big snow ball. I can’t get the image of him sitting in the cockpit, for so many hours…..contemplating his life, what he has just done, and about to do…..not to mention what will be left for us……this..

  38. @airlandseaman
    the F-106 was ina flat spin, no autopilot, engine running.

    “One often discussed possible explanation among the pilots and engineers as to why the aircraft recovered from its flat spin after Lt Foust ejected is that the ejection seat rocket blast was enough to change the attitude of the aircraft to get back into a normal flight. During the recovery efforts Lt Foust took prior to ejection, which were all by-the-book, standard ‘Spin Recovery’ procedures, was to trim the aircraft back to ‘neutral trim’, which means taking hands-off the stick, hitting Takeoff Trim and see if the aircraft recovers itself. In this case it didn’t work, however, when he did finally eject, the aircraft was in fact in that takeoff trim configuration, a perfectly trimmed aircraft, and as Maj Lowe reported the minute the ejection seat left the aircraft, the aircraft nosed all the way down and began to “fly off into the sunset” perfectly level because it was at this point a ‘very well trimmed’ airplane. So, the blast force of the ejection seat was probably just enough force for the aircraft to level out… as is expected during Spin Recover procedures, just with the pilot in it.”

    I referenced it as an example that there are things possible which we would not believe in, the “black swan evens”. And as a distraction from fights over motives and ongoing tea leaf investigation.

  39. @Jay

    exactly, people think this had to be something meticulously planned while in reality experienced pilot like him could plan this in a very short period of time

    it could be running through his head for days though, especially if he had acknowledged that ethiopian case two weeks before MH370 flight (also because coverage focused mainly on mocking swiss military for working 9h-17h weekend free, something almost everyone out of Switzerland was unaware of before that happened)

  40. RetiredF4, airlandseaman,

    …takeoff trim configuration…

    Can it be considered similar to TO/GA mode of B777?

    I am trying to find a basis for my “constant thrust settings” model, and link it to the possibility of unmanned gliding-style landing as opposite to the spiral dive.

  41. @jay & @Stevan:

    What exactly requires “a pilot who has years of experience and familiarity with their country” and an “experienced pilot like him” ?

    Does it require prior planning or could everything have been improvised on the go?

    Are there other possibilities than “the captain did it” ?

  42. RetiredF4:

    Yes, I read several accounts after my previous post. Also watched some historical videos. So, the F106 had electrical power, no AP engaged, but I’m pretty sure the F106 had some type of automated 2 or 3 axis stabilization…not the AP… but something to make a naturally unstable high performance aircraft easier to fly. Perhaps you know or could find out.

  43. @ StevanG and Jay He, quite feasibly, could have done this decision while walking thru security…remember how he just dropped his arms, almost dejectably, sort of “whats the use”. The only two things that happened that required a degree of luck were getting the cockpit to himself ( no opposition ),and the soft ditching in the middle of nowhere….(limited debris) not to be heard from again….unless he had a “symbolic” aiming point or target in mind….which, with the correctly applied detective work, someone just might discover. My point being, i just cannot fathom him leaving a loose end like this untied. Gotta give him credit for having a certain amount of class, and a whole lot of style….( kinda like us ).

  44. Oleksandr: Without thrust, if there was no autopilot engaged, and no human control, it would spiral in after a few minutes. It would not “glide” down and land “hands off”. However, I suppose it is possible (highly unlikely, but possible) that MH370’s ATs were disengaged (constant throttle setting, manually set) and the AP engaged, up to the time of fuel exhaustion. Not sure that would even work for VNAV.

  45. @Gysbreght

    “Does it require prior planning or could everything have been improvised on the go?”

    I think there probably was some prior planning (maybe not on paper but at least in his imagination). Something might have been improvised on the go too, especially after things went wrong way…

    “Are there other possibilities than “the captain did it” ?”

    of course but lot less probable as you have to add factors of getting access to cockpit exactly at IGARI…without pilots squawking emergency

    @George

    “and the soft ditching in the middle of nowhere….(limited debris) not to be heard from again…”

    he wouldn’t turn towards Australia at all if he wanted to ditch with minimal debris, nor he would wait for fuel exhaustion

  46. airlandseaman,

    Thanks. If I am not mistaken, previously you mentioned that in some your tests B777 was stable for a little while after the fuel exhaustion. What did keep it stable? Could it be some type of automated stability system powered by APU until APU flameout?

    Also, you said that “it would spiral in after a few minutes”. The issue is that AP model terminates at FL350. My “constant thrust settings” model terminates at the altitude of ~7 km. After the flameout of the first engine, the aircraft would start descending in contrast to the AP. And when the flameout of the second engine occurred, it could be already at significantly lower altitude. Then these “a few minutes” could be insufficient for MH370 to enter a spiral dive.

  47. @StevanG:

    It wasn’t “exactly at IGARI” but after the turn towards BITOD. And what is so special about IGARI anyway?

  48. @airlandseaman
    So, the F106 had electrical power, no AP engaged, but I’m pretty sure the F106 had some type of automated 2 or 3 axis stabilization…not the AP… but something to make a naturally unstable high performance aircraft easier to fly. Perhaps you know or could find out.

    The F106 was naturally stable, like all fighter aircraft built in that time. I think the F16 was the first operational naturally unstable and FBW aircraft.
    The F106 had afaik a 3-axis stability augmentation system for dampening purposes.

    I do think that we can’t draw any conclusions for Mh370, except that you never know…..

  49. @Gysbreght

    I acknowledge it, meant exactly at handover point (to vietnamese ATC).

    Eventual hijackers would have to make sure they could gain access before that point. Far from easy.

  50. Victor,

    Coming back to the APU… Thanks for your thoughts.

    Not sure if you are aware, but I’ve just found that FI stuff on the APU is copied/pasted from the B777 manual. At least now we know this mess is not coming from Malaysians.

    APU has a switch “OFF-ON-START” (Chapter 6, Section 10, Electrical controls and indicators). To turn APU on, it is required to turn the switch to START position, and keep it for 1 second or so. After that the switch will automatically move to “ON” position. Basically “START” is nothing but ignition. To switch APU off, it is required to turn switch to “OFF” position.

    If APU is on, it does not mean it powers the buses. If one of the buses goes down, APU will automatically power it without interruption, but only if APU was switched earlier. If APU is “OFF”, then power will be taken from the other working IDG. If both IDGs go down, APU will be started automatically, but if it was not running earlier, there will be some delay.

    If APU cannot start, backup magnetic generators will provide power to both the buses, but some equipment will be shut down to save power. This includes SATCOM and one of the HVFs. If backup generators also fail, than RAT will be deployed as the last resort. The latter can be deployed only one time per a flight.

    Now why the investigators think that APU was off. It appears that SATCOM could be powered by IDGs or APU only. Reboot of SDU on the flameout indicates the interruption of the power. If APU was “ON”, there would not be power interruption to the buses, and as a result there would not be the 00:19 log-on. In other words SDU come back 00:19 only due to the start of APU.

    But now we came to the most interesting part: 18:25 log-on. If it was because of the same reason as 00:19, APU would be “ON” after 18:25. That means either APU was shut down manually after 18:25, or it was always “OFF” during 18:25 log-on. If it was “OFF”, then either at least one of the IDGs was functioning properly at 18:25, or APU could not start, for example due to fire protection (it has smog and temperature detectors). If at least one of the IDGs was functioning, then SDU reboot 18:25 did not occur due to de-powered buses. It could occur only due to manipulations with SDU itself.

    Summarizing, one of the following took place:
    – SDU was rebooted 18:25 due to some manipulations with it, and not because of the power interruption.
    – APU could not start 18:25 because of fire protection or some other malfunction.
    – APU was switched off manually after 18:25.

    Does this make sense to you? Please correct me if I am wrong.

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