Blaine Alan Gibson Finds 3 Possible MH370 Debris Pieces in Madagascar

8733949
The “second” piece

 

Hot on the heels of a reported possible MH370 piece in South Australia, news reaches us that Blaine Alan Gibson has found three pieces of suspected MH370 debris in Madagascar. This article says, in part:

Three new fragments which could have come from Malaysia Airlines Flight 270 were discovered on the morning of Monday, June 6, on the Island of Nosy Boraha, in the northeast of Madagascar…

These fragments were found by Blaine Alan Gibson, an American businessman, while he was accompanied by a from the France 2 TV show “Complément d’enquête.” They were on a long, almost deserted beach near the village of Sahasifotra, where tons of waste arrive every day from the Indian Ocean.

One piece in particular, 77 cm wide by 50 cm, apparently made by composite materials, strongly resembles another fragment which Gibson found in February on the coast of Mozambique.

” These two fragments are very very similar: the same paint color, the diameter of the attachment holes is identical. and on the back the texture is the same. I believe that it is a piece from MH370,” Blaine Alan Gibson told our colleagues. Two other parts were also found, a smaller panel with the inscription “FB” as well as another plastic part which could be the frame of an economy class seat’s video screen.

8733895
The “first” piece

 

8733957
The “third” piece

UPDATE 6/9/16: Here’s a screengrab of a YouTube video showing a Malaysia Airlines 777 economy class seatback (thanks to reader @sk999). The coat hook in particular looks like a good match for the third piece.

Economy class screen

Here’s an even better shot, via @BBCwestcott. Note the color of the fabric around the “COAT HOOK” button:

westcott

774 thoughts on “Blaine Alan Gibson Finds 3 Possible MH370 Debris Pieces in Madagascar”

  1. @Jeff
    I wonder if it might be worthwhile for a member of the press to
    enquire of Dr Alec Duncan if ALL datasets from (Curtin Universities)
    Centre for Marine Science and Technology ‘IMOS hydrophones’, as
    mentioned here 2014 ;
    http://news.curtin.edu.au/media-releases/curtin-researchers-search-acoustic-evidence-mh370/
    were (by now) recovered and examined.
    I understand from his (discouraged sounding) 2015 comment;
    “After months of further analysis, Dr Duncan told The Weekend Australian this week: “Unfortunately the reality is that there are so many ifs, buts and maybes involved in all this that it would be more correct to say that our team has identified an approximate possible location for the origin of a noise that is probably of geological origin, but cannot be completely ruled out as being connected with the loss of MH370.””
    that they probably had been examined, but it would be interesting
    (not only to Brock) about what other hydrophones, their locations,
    and if their datasets were available for download somewhere.
    To be sure, we would be interested only in those dataslices that
    existed for the time period 8th March 0018:00 UTC to 0025:00 UTC.
    (Allowing for timing inaccuracies in the hydrophone recording
    device, allowing for 4 to 5 minutes of unpowered flight after
    0019:38, etc.).

  2. @buyerninety: strongly support your suggestion – with one amendment: if we’re looking to exhaust possibilities, we should check for sounds from…

    Mar 7 17:15 UTC (or 4 to 5 minutes prior to point of last confirmed cockpit communication)
    to
    [as late as we can possibly get]*

    * If the Inmarsat data is faked – a possibility we are unwise to rule out – timing of impact is no longer bounded by it. Our minds should thus be open enough to contemplate the possibility of an interim landing, and perhaps even a refueling.

    While the family of scenarios involving a landing and faked Inmarsat data skew strongly towards no impact at all – and thus toward faked debris, as well – I think we should keep our minds open to the possibility the debris IS authentic, but from an impact in an embarrassing location, or with an embarrassing cause. If the ISAT data is faked, who knows HOW much later into the event such an impact may have occurred?

    (For clarity: I’m neither assuming nor trying to convince anyone else that impact was dramatically later than 17:07 ACARS-indicated endurance; just making sure all based are covered. Wouldn’t it be interesting if the hydrophones picked up something significant 72 hours later?)

  3. @Buyerninety

    I would suggest to add at least 15 minutes after 0:19.
    With your suggestion to only 00:25 you still count a possible long glide out.
    That would create another missed opportunity imo. To be shure make it 20 minutes after 0:19.

  4. @Jeff, you have not mentioned Kazakhstan in a long while. Do you still believe the plane is there as per your book?

  5. @ Ge Rijn – seconded.

    @ Buyerninety, Brock et al – it was suggested a few topics back I think, by someone whose name I don’t recall, that perhaps someone ought to ask the Curtin chaps about other incidents that may have been recorded by their instruments and how they compare to this.

    There must have been other aircraft impact situations during the study – whether their locations were useful or apropriate for comparison is something I don’t know, but I don’t remember reading anything about how this ‘noise’ looked in comparison to other similar incidents.

  6. @Susie

    Seconded? My dutch again.. not shure what you mean by this. Can you explain again?

    The one ocean plane crash I read about that was checked out on hydrophone data was AF447.
    The impact was not registrated.

  7. @Bill, I do think that scenarios 1) and 2) are the only viable ones that remain, and if 2) holds, I think there is little doubt that a state-level actor was responsible. Given that it is becoming increasingly clear that MH17 was brought down as part of a GRU (Russian military intelligence) operation, I think it is implausible to imagine that by sheer coincidence another Malaysia Airlines 777 was targeted by a different advanced state actor four months prior. Then, of course, there is the fact that the DSTG analysis of the BTO data puts MH370’s northern endpoint in central Kazakhstan.

  8. @ Ge Rijn,

    It means I agree with what you said to Jeff. In traditional voting practices sometimes there is a ‘proposer’ and a ‘seconder’ who supports what the proposer, erm, proposes : )

    Interesting that AF447 did not register. I would have expected it to.

    @ Jeff,

    I see an awful lot of anti Russian propaganda here in the UK and when I look at the American press, it’s far worse still.

    I don’t like it, and I don’t see Russia or Putin as simply a convenient bogeyman on which to pin almost anything bad that happens.

    I think one has to be very careful not to fall into this trap. And I don’t see any motive or evidence to substantiate such a claim (that Russia may have been responsible for MH370). MH17 is a more complex scenario as they were clearly, on some level, involved, if only secondarily by location/circumstance.

    In short, I don’t know why you state such things so freely, and you may have your reasons for doing so, so please don’t take this the wrong way – but I see so much prejudice regarding Russia that I am heartily fed up of it.

  9. @Susie, I don’t single out Russia out of prejudice. I happen to like Russia and Russian people as individuals. However, the fact is that there is significant evidence linking the Russian army chain-of-command to the MH17 shoot-down. This will become non-controversial once the Dutch criminal report is issued. The clues that link the Kremlin to MH370 are more technical and abstruse in nature, but they are real. As I have said many times, the question remains open.

    I recognize the validity of your feelings, but the fact that the Kremlin has been roughly treated in the UK and US press does not mean that their innocence must therefore be presumed. We must not let our emotions limit the quest for truth.

  10. @ Ge Rijn, Many thanks for the link – I shall have a look at that.

    @ Jeff,

    Understood. I concur that prejudice in either direction is very unhelpful, and won’t lead us to what ultimately matters.

    It’s just such a delicate situation, or so it seems to me. I hate the thought of inflaming things further, on any platform. I don’t know if you’re younger than I am but the fear I felt growing up during the cold war still rings in my ears.

    I just feel it is important to be careful not to make things worse. Returning to that state of affairs is something we really, really want to avoid, if we can.

    Flinging around suggestions of possibly Malaysian involvement, or other parties in that region isn’t so sensitive; we’re not, historically, their enemies, and in that sense we’re fairly neutral and can make such suggestions without it being tainted by the existing climate of mistrust and prejudice (which I don’t think anyone would deny exists).

    Russia is a thing, for want of a better word, that requires rather more tact, though obviously nothing much can really be ruled out entirely at this stage.

    Hope this makes sense, I will leave it there.

  11. @Susie, Understood and agreed.

    @Ge Rijn, thanks for that link. That sidebar is so interesting I’m just going to post it here, with key parts highlighted:

    Sound travels well in the oceans, but detecting the noise of surface impacts is not easy.

    Detecting the sound of an aeroplane crashing into the ocean’s surface, and locating where it occurred, is challenging. Sound travels well in water, and microphones on the seabed can often detect low-frequency noises at great distances — sometimes across entire ocean basins. But the sounds that travel best are those that occur at depth and get reflected into the ‘deep sound channel’. This is a horizontal ocean layer in which sounds can travel thousands of kilometres without losing much intensity. It is usually found about 600–1,200 metres down in low and middle latitudes; deeper in the sub-tropics, and nearer the surface at high latitudes.

    The channel exists because sounds in the ocean slow down as the temperature falls, and speed up as the pressure rises, and the waves refract towards the area of minimum speed. This means that sounds are refracted downwards as temperature decreases with depth, and upwards as pressure increases with depth. So at the boundaries where these forces meet, sounds are bounced up and down, and they become trapped in a horizontal channel.

    Sounds such as a depth charge exploding a long way below the surface are transmitted efficiently into the deep sound channel. But most of the sound energy of an aeroplane crashing into the ocean’s surface propagates straight down to the seabed, so the noise would not typically be reflected into the channel, explains Mark Prior, a seismic-acoustic specialist at the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) in Vienna. This makes it difficult to detect surface impacts that occur great distances from the recording source, he says. He notes that the CTBTO found no trace in its data of the impact of Air France flight 447, which crashed in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean in 2009.

    But if the crash occurred over a sloping seabed, for example, the sound could be reflected horizontally into the channel, says Prior, adding that any pressure-induced implosion of parts of a sinking aircraft could also be detected. “The combination of circumstances necessary to allow [detection of an ocean impact] would have to be very particular,” he notes.

  12. @jeffwise said: ” I think it is implausible to imagine that by sheer coincidence another Malaysia Airlines 777 was targeted by a different advanced state actor four months prior. ”

    Not implausible at all if you take a moment to consider that MH17 may have been an act of retaliation and/or a warning to people in power at high levels in the MYG for their involvement/complicity (whether before, during or after) in the diversion of MH370 and/or the subsequent concealment of data/events.

    And as for (yet another) ‘sheer coincidence’ in this saga of coincidences – as it has been said before here – out of all the aircraft passing over that region that day (in both directions) it was a Malaysian aircraft that was targeted, and on its return leg. And that aircraft, on that return leg, was carrying the step-grandmother of both Najib and Hishy. If not planned, what would the probability of that coincidence be?

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/10977708/Malaysia-PMs-grandmother-killed-on-Flight-MH17.html

    That could be seen as a very clear warning to (specific members of) the higher levels of the MYG what might/will happen if they became involved in Russian affairs.

    The 3 to 4 month delay between events could be waiting for that specific festival to trigger the journey (see linked article).

  13. @Jeff: of course, the dominoes all fall the other way just as easily: if 3) holds, then it stands to reason the perps would need someone/something to pin it on. Ideally, they’d want a suspect list as long as possible, and as plausible as possible. Mis/dis/non-information throwing suspicion onto the pilot, Malaysia (the “useful idiot” with a very handy pre-existing reputation for corruption), [whatever nation we hate most at the moment], etc. would surely pay rich dividends. Perhaps the perp shot down MH17 – and is manipulating (the reporting on) its investigation – for precisely this purpose? We really don’t know.

    But since both 2 and 3 tend to resolve the MH17/MH370 coincidence by pinning it primarily on a superpower run amok, I feel no two people who have a different superpower in mind stand a snowball’s chance of swaying each other by appealing to hypotheticals and foggy reporting alone. We need hard evidence. Forcing the MH370 search teams to turn out their pockets – as I’ve begged us to rally behind, for 2 years – is our best chance to let actual evidence help break the tie.

    This reminds me of a story I once heard about a small town whose residents voluntarily submitted to DNA testing to clear themselves of a heinous crime police couldn’t solve on their own. Those who refused to submit fell under ever-increasing suspicion, by process of elimination.

    Wouldn’t it be great if the folks in charge of the search for MH370 voluntarily threw their models and data wide open, and proved beyond all reasonable doubt that their search was 100% on the up-and-up from the get-go? Wouldn’t this help build support for Case 2?

    And doesn’t refusal to do so build support for Case 3?

  14. jeff,

    Your “good bye” to Oleksandr was in my view uncalled for and, if I may say so, a tad arrogant (no bad feelings).

    Your “why are you still talking about it”, I would answer with “because Gysbreght and RetiredF4 (and apparently you) still don’t get Oleksandr’s point”.

    Both are dismissing O’s paper on the basis of their assertion of the stable and settled flight conditions after a change in wind and ignoring the small incremental changes from one to another state.

    Albeit both are (subconciously?) accepting Oleksandr’s subject matter of the transient period:

    Retired F4
    “You release the basket from the ground and the basket and hull straighten out”

    Gysbreght
    “…the pilot allows the rudder to go to the neutral position, the aircraft yaws into wind to zero sideslip, …”

    The balloon does not become instantly straight, but STRAIGHTENS (it takes time)
    The rudder does not instantly go, but GOES (taking time), the aircraft doesn’t instantly change orientation, but YAWS (taking time).

    Same applies when the wind changes during flight. The aircraft is not instantly carried with the new wind without losses. The system momentarily is out of balance with a non zero cross wind component, inducing side force and windcocking moment, pushing the aircraft sideways and yawways until it again becomes aligned after a short while.

    So while Gysbreght and RF4 apparently dismiss Oleksandr’s paper with their argument, they actually do not, but rather are “missing the point”.

    I for one would like to see this argument resolved. It would be a shame, if Oleksandr left the forum and/or discussion of the topic would be banned. Your forum would be diminished.

  15. Just a quick hello to y’all and brief intro. I have been following this enlightening blog since shortly after MH370 disappeared. I know nothing about airplanes, other than my experience as an infrequent flyer.

    Though much of the technical information I read here goes over my head, I am fascinated by it, nonetheless. I have every faith that something will click some place along the way and it will be the result of your collective efforts that will solve this mystery for us all.

    QUESTION:
    With so much talk about the validity of Inmarsat’s BTO and BFO data, I can’t help but wonder if anyone in your group has ever considered testing the validity of Inmarsat’s BTO and BFO data gathering and interpretation against actual completed flights from engine start to engine shut down, to see if BTO and BFO interpretations accurately matched said plane’s actual movements from start to finish?

    Please pardon my ignorance, but logically, it seems that if BTO and BFO data is to be considered relevant, then there should be evidence that substantiates that the BTO and BFO data gathering and interpretation provided by Inmarsat is accurate. If not a precise science and Inmarsat’s interpretation has the potential for inaccuracies, then when comparing multiple other completed flights within its range and gauging the inaccuracy by a percentage or degree or whatever other means is used to measure against, it would be known what corrective changes need to be made to their interpretation. Then, if off for those flights, it would seem that the same corrective measures or principles could conceivably be used to determine a fairly accurate flight path and end to flight MH370.

    Thank you in advance for reading my post and best regards to you all.

    Katheesue
    USA

  16. @jeffwise: Another possibility is that MH17 is more closely related to the 1MDB scandal than it is related to MH370. You can’t steal multiple billions of dollars without SOMEBODY getting angry. Of course, MH370 might also somehow be related to the 1MDB scandal.

  17. @all
    last time about Orlando tragedy…
    to ban all muslims enter your country is of course absolutelly stupid idea

    @jeff @all
    supporting the option #3, I think that its orchestrated joint effort war with 7th empire, with the MEDIA … not because they are intentionally untrue, but because they are often under pressure of somebody in background and often too lazy to go deeper for the facts (our shared experience here too)

    kindly please, watch this Lavrov interview; theirs war journalist woman is angry at him, why they didnt take over whole Ukraine with military force (we already know, no problem for them technically); she is obviously following the Zhirinovskij approach (his right winger extremist party there, not supported by official government at all, but tolerated as anybody voted into parliament, including former bolsheviks, both with insignificant power, but they are there too; simply radically angry people, I believe somewhat similar situation as in your country just now) – BTW, the “russian-insider” really seems to be the russians nationalists supported site, so some kind of propaganda (hating yours country too much etc) and its totally different thing than RT, which reports even about Orlando tragedy and simply covers worldwide news, quite similary as CNN – pls, compare the approach; but no matter which media, I believe in direct speeches of leaders, skipping any political comentators who (mis)interpret them often for somebody else in background; twisted and spined media IS real problem any where; then democracy seems to be like dead; but it isnt at all, if peoople arent alzy to go deeper for the facts…

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0L2628FHpE

  18. @Brock

    You make a good point.

    It all comes down to “If you are innocent, what have you got to hide ?”

    The DNA case was ground breaking in many ways. It happened in my home state, New South Wales, in 2000, in the little town of Wee Waa. There is an interesting paper here.
    https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjhn9P0tKbNAhVjGKYKHeKnDpcQFggiMAE&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.austlii.edu.au%2Fau%2Fjournals%2FCICrimJust%2F2001%2F20.pdf&usg=AFQjCNFaJ2FDhaSiph6BQ53SvU92eXu4xw&sig2=qeJBjKowotIiz9Eivdm1GA&bvm=bv.124272578,d.dGY

  19. On the subject of the finding of the item on Kangaroo Island, South Australia (a wonderful place I visited back in 1995) I have sent Samuel Armstrong (the guy who found it) the following:

    Samuel, had you been to the same site in the recent past, say within the last few months ?

    Is it a site commonly visited by other people, either locals or tourist holiday makers ?

    The reason I ask is this:
    Is it possible to establish a “time window” in which it washed ashore ?
    ( For example, no it is a deserted remote site only a few “locals” would ever go to, and, I was there in April, and it was not there then.)
    That would allow us to infer:
    (a) It is highly unlikely that anyone else would have seen it, and
    (b) It arrived between April and June.

    The “time window” is important for the “ocean drift study boys”, so it would greatly help matters if you can nail that down with any precision.

    Secondly, the mangosteens.
    There were a few tons of them on board the aircraft, which equates to thousands of those little mangosteens.
    You found one.
    There is a distinct possibility that there may be others on the shores of KI somewhere.

    Given that you are probably something of a local celebrity by now, I presume the locals have been “tuned in” to the MH370 saga, if they were not before this.

    Are you and the other locals aware of the fact that there may be more debris or mangosteens on KI, waiting to be “found” ?

    Is everybody “keeping their eyes open” ?

    Is there any suggestion of an organised search of your coastline ?

  20. @victori & @jeffw – relation of mh370

    Perhaps mh370 had something on board which was to head to Russia or was Russia’s but got diverted.
    The hiding and diversion was to throw off Russia but as a reminder- mh17 was shot down to send a warning message to Malaysia as agent of disappearance to recover and pay Russia compensation of some sort. It was stated the issue was resolved via “diplomatic channels”

  21. Just got a reply from Samuel Armstrong, and a little chat as follows:

    Samuel Armstrong replied:
    Yes if the plane piece is from MH370 there will be a search and the item would of only been there the last 6 months.

    I replied:
    Thanks for that Samuel, I will pass on your “6 months” window.
    On the perhaps pending search, will this be a “locals effort” or are there indications of a planned “official search” by the Police/SES or ATSB ?

    Samuel Armstrong replied:
    ATSB. If the piece of plane is from MH370 I will be returning to the site and other spots on Ki

    I replied:
    OK thanks. It will be interesting to see how seriously the ATSB conduct the search, and if they involve you and others. If they do ask you to help, it will probably be on the basis of requiring you agree to “secrecy” and all that crap. It is crap, so refuse to go along with that mate.

  22. Inmarsat located MH370 near NILAM at 18:25, at 800kph @ 300deg heading. Heading on N571 to IGOGU is only 295deg, requiring higher airspeeds of ~900+kph to match the first BFO.

    BFO data from 18:25-18:28 is most consistent, with a straightforward extrapolation of military radar track, from MEKAR turning onto N571 at last-known position, and continuing on N571 with constant heading of 295deg and speed of 900-930kph.

    BFO data also requires a steep FLCH-like climb @ NILAM of ballpark +6000′. BFO data is most consistent with straight-forward continuation of radar-track along N571 towards IGOGU until ~18:30. At 930kph, MH370 just reaches IGOGU slightly prior to first sat-phone call. (Sorry if earlier confusion was “contagious” and misled, Inmarsat’s best candidate path was along N571 to IGOGU b/c that is a better fit to the BFO values)

  23. @Ventus45

    Sorry but to look for mangosteens on the beach of Kangoroo Island (or anywhere else) is utter nonsens and completly useless.
    You expect one of those fruits to survive after 2 years in the water?
    You expect them to drift around like pingpong balls?
    And if someone found one how would you ever relate one to MH370? There are millions of mangosteens produced in Asia each year exported all over the world.
    You expect each of them to be stencilled or something like that?

    Sorry but regarding this nonsens I also seriously doubt your ‘chat’ with the finder of the piece there.
    I ask you to provide prove of this by objective evidence.

  24. @Victor: agreed – I’ve long harboured at least some suspicion both MH370 and MH17 events could have been a geopolitical knee-capping aimed at Malaysia.

    I haven’t followed the 1MDB saga (smelled like propaganda on both sides). But if true, who is supposed to have been bilked?

    Casting a wider net: Malaysia was by early 2014 advancing economically – I’d heard at some point they were even making a play for ownership of some of the oil-sands up here in my back yard. And MAS was a gem of a state-owned company – destroying it knocked Malaysia down several rungs.

    It would seem the “organized crime” meme offers multiple plausible scenarios…

  25. Thanks for doing that, Ventus.

    It doesn’t sound as though he is the chatty type but some information is better than none.

    Perhaps he is sick of questions!

  26. @ Middleton, @ Jeff – bloody hell. I’d missed that too, about the grandmother.

    That is huge. It puts an entirely different spin on everything.

  27. @ALL

    Slightly off topic, but only slightly. I have to admit the political situation in Malaysia is far more complex (and confusing) than I ever imagined:

    BBC News today: Malaysia’s first Islamic-compliant airline Rayani Air has been barred from flying, for breaching regulations. The Malaysian DCA said there were concerns over it’s safety audit and administration.

    One thing that’s come to light since March 2014 tragedy is the frighteningly lax and inept attitude to air security and safety in Malaysia.

    In December 2014 a Malaysian news site reported ex PM Mahathir Mohammed as saying, quote “the Malaysians are stupid and do not know how to manage aviation”. I remember at the time thinking the remark was just sour grapes or political opportunism. But if Mahathir was just being honest, then perhaps we shouldn’t be so surprised about their confused handling of the tragedy.

    Ineptness and incompetence shouldn’t be misinterpreted as devious behaviour, possibly?

  28. @Ventus45

    I hope I didn’t scare you off or something.
    By looking for mangosteens your story just sounds strange to my ears.
    Hope you can explain further.

  29. @Ge Rijn

    I think you had done some work on the score marks and holes visible on the debris?

    What were you conclusions?

  30. @Jeff
    I had not thought that my suggestion would be so quickly endorsed –
    upon further reflection, the time period we would want would be, of
    course, the previously suggested time PLUS however long it takes for
    the propagation of sound to reach Western Australia. Looking at the
    comments section in that webpage my previous post cited, the speed
    of sound mentioned by Dr Alec Duncan is 1480 m/s.

    When all the back of the envelope figuring and considerations are
    done, I’d be interested in seeing the timeslice recorded by any
    Perth-near hydrophone from 8th March UTC 0045:00 to UTC 0059:30 .

    @David
    When I looked at B777-Engines_and_APU.pdf that you mentioned, I
    saw this;
    “”RR Engines
    There is no”…”automatic continuous ignition function.”…
    “The auto-relight function is activated whenever an engine is at
    or below idle with the FUEL CONTROL switch in RUN. When the EEC
    detects an engine flameout, the respective engine ignitors are
    activated. If the engine does not recover and continues to run
    down below 35% N3, the EEC shuts off fuel and ignition and
    disables the auto-relight function.”
    Couldn’t this mean, upon left engine fuel exhaustion (and therefore
    flameout), that the EEC could disable the auto-relight function,
    and so when the APU eventually started, even though the APU could
    try to provide fuel to the left engine, the EEC may still have
    the relight function disabled?
    (Presumbly it was taken as understood that the rationale for
    disabling the auto-relight function was that the pilots would
    thereafter go on to do a manual restart if that was so desired –
    of course, it was never a consideration that the pilots may be
    incapacitated/dead, so without the pilots… no restart occuring??)

  31. @Rob

    No conclusions yet but observations and some assumptions.
    Almost all pieces have those same distinct (deep) knife-like cuts in the skin. It takes a lot of force to penetrate this kind of material.
    All four panels are also pierced through the the skin what appears to be also caused by sharp knife-like objects.
    Imo this can only happen when those objects hit those pieces with high speeds and the objects were small, massive and heavy(metalic).

    The trailing edge piece shows a rather big hole through it which I suspect also being caused by a small heavy object hitting it with high speed.

    I don’t know how to explain it. Most easy explanation would be a high speed impact I suppose but -as you know- I still don’t (cann’t) except that.

    Another cause could be a disintegrating engine shooting fragments from turbine, compressor blades and other stuff around.

    Or perhaps -what Oleksandr mentioned- an exploding tire in the landinggear bay blowing the closing doors out and other stuff.

    Or the most disturbing one; the explosion of an object outside near the plain.
    Which gives offcourse direct reminders to MH17.

  32. @Ge Rijn

    Thank you for the update, interesting to get your impressions.

    The two flaperon closing panels (the ones with the seals) both have distinct score marks on their upper sides, caused by projectiles from the same direction, front to back.

    My theory at the moment is that most of the shrapnel came from the disintegrating RH engine cowling, rather than metal parts from the engine. Pieces like the RR fragment.

    Still working on this.

    Thanks, Rob

  33. @Rob

    Yes, the engine cowling is kind of different in more ways than one. This is a very strong piece which is damaged very badly. The cowling must have been shattered by tremendous forces I assume. In a ditching the engine front would take the brunch of impact forces. Maybe that explains it.

    In another way it’s also different. It’s found in the most far spot of all pieces. Almost reached the Atlantic and arrived there ~5 mounths after the flaperon did on Reunion. Both were full of barnacels when first found. When it traveled along the same route it must have covered that distance between ~Reunion and Klein Brak river in max. ~5 months. This would imply that if you assume all pieces floated more or less with the same speed along the same route, all the other pieces have probably arrived sometime before the cowling piece.

    It’s a complicated puzzle.
    Goodluck with your investigating 😉

  34. @Ge Rijn:

    “Brunch is a combination of breakfast and lunch eaten usually during the late morning but it can extend to as late as 3pm.” (source: Wikipedia)

    Just teasing … 😉

  35. @Gysbrecht

    Terrible..
    In my previous post I see I wrote ‘plain’ instead of plane..

    Lets make it ‘the brunt of’..
    And try to stop making a fool of myself this way at least 😉
    Thanks.

  36. @Ge Rijn

    Thank you those kind words.

    Please don’t get embarrassed about your spelling of English. You English is much better than my Dutch, after all 🙂

  37. Those debris finds have influenced this group considerably, and I’m not sure if it is for good or bad. We are threadmilling over a hand full debris parts, which we hope will lead us to the crash area by analyzing a dozen different forward and backward drift studies. Some of us are heel over head in a forensic analysis of those few parts in order to find the exact way of Mh370 from higher levels above the sea to the assumed deep sea resting place.

    Will such forensics really help the case MH370 or is it more a sporting event who will finally have come closest to the hopefully once uncovered facts?

    Whatever we were thinking a year ago, and whatever theorie we had, it seems pretty obvious now that the debris and the ISAT data point to a loss of MH370 somewhere in the SIO. The underwater search either missed the debris or it was done at the wrong spot in this wide and deep ocean. Doing a reality check I’d say, that the investigation body has far more assets available to evaluate and retune the search decisions than we will ever gain. But the decision to end the search, at least for the time being, seems to be a fact. It is fair to assume, that despite this surplus of knowledge they see no chance to do better in the future. A future find of MH370 is left to chances.

    Since the first debris part, the flaperon was found, this group and other investigative groups on the net have lost their focus on other main questions, which are still unanswered. Those are reconstructing the flightpath from IGARI to FMT including the vertical profile, detailing the events at the FMT, thus narrowing down the timeframe, altitude and speed this turn happened, and searching and detailing possible flightpathes within the constraints of ISAT data to areas differet from the present search area. The ISAT data, the RADAR data, the published informations about this part of the flight and the possible eyesightings have to be scrutinized unbiased, disregarding own former scenarios and restrictions orderly flight crews would adhere to.

    The key to the motive, to the culprits and ultimatively to the wreckage is burried in those early moments of the flight, not in the found debris pieces. The debris and the search have spilled the vital and available information already: MH370 ended in the SIO outside the present search area, the aircraft was destroyed upon contact with the water, nobody survived the event. The search will end without further results.

    We have to restart at point zero, but have to use the information we gained over the last two years prudently. I hope that contributors who left this blog for whatever reason or who retreated to read only mode will come back and give this search for the motive and the culprits new spirit and finally success. That includes Oleksandr, whose cuved flightpath to a more northern crash area with flight modes other than fully operational autopilot is worth further scrutinity, although we differ in details how this curved flightpath could happen.

  38. @RetiredF4 Good Summary in your last post. Do you know of anyone who has tried to construct a flight path for MH370 that is consistent with ISAT data disregarding SOM track. In other words from just south of Penang. It would be interesting to see what conclusions are drawn.

    I know SOM track is consistent with ISAT data and I’m not going to question any analysis. It would be just interesting to see what conclusions arise without any SOM track.

  39. RetiredF4

    I can only speak for myself, but I believe a forensic study of the debris finds can only be helpful to the cause. They are actual pieces of the plane, after all. Most of the other evidence, the radar, the ISAT and the circumstantial/speculative evidence concerning possible motives of perpetrator(s)etc. can be interpreted in as many ways as there are contributors to this forum. You are never going to form a useful consensus (I mean useful to the searchers) that way.

    The discovery of MH370 debris in the SIO has at the very least taken Kazakhstan off the table. But it can do a great deal more than that. Reconstructing the what how and why of the final moments is going to be of more use to the searchers than any amount of speculation about what happened in the early stages. Martin Dolan himself has admitted as much, for goodness sakes.

  40. RetiredF4

    Just to keep things lighthearted, I will tell you this. You have probably heard it a million anyway.

    The Phantom was retired from active service, but then set up business in retirement. Phantom Inc. is the world’s largest distributor of Mig parts, apparently.

  41. @Jeff,

    Point taken about raising subjects without new information.

    It is curious, though, about the woodwork. There must be either a very large lurking audience, or some folks have certain topics on alerts, or there is sock puppeting going on.

    In my view, it’s better to let the noise in than to lock the signal out. Even “plants” make mistakes and drop clues sometimes.

  42. @RetiredF4

    Since I spent a lot of posts and time on this debris I feel a bit called on to give a reaction.
    First I like to say that it’s the current topic that Jeff put in for discussion. To my knowing it’s kind of common rule in a blog to try to stay on topic more or less.

    The debat about interpretation of the Inmarsat data after more then two years is still going on between the experts still far from reaching consensus. There seems to be still just too much ‘room’ for interpretation to possibly reach agreement.
    The Inmarsat data and interpretations have proven not to be sufficient on its own to find the plane (till now).

    But in combination with the latest drift studies and the found debris I think it’s possible to define a more accurate search area and find clues to causes and maybe even motives.

    I agree, offcourse the ATSB and others allready know a lot more than everyone else. But it won’t be the first time they pick up information from unofficial sources and use them in their investigation.

    I give it a rather big chance a blog like this and other sources get read by ‘officials’. Some things said here and by Jeff Wise also are picked up by several media even in Holland. Thats why I believe a blog like this has the potential of influencing the ‘official’ investigation.

    For me it’s not about sport, for me it’s about this. And that’s why I think all serious input here can be of importance. On debris, on Inmarsat data, radar data, drift studies and motives.
    But it’s up to Jeff Wise to moderate the blog and I think he is doing a good job by giving a lot of space even if it’s not on a current topic.
    I think consideration for this is also needed from those who left.

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