New York has obtained a confidential document from the Malaysian police investigation into the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 that shows that the plane’s captain, Zaharie Ahmad Shah, conducted a simulated flight deep into the remote southern Indian Ocean less than a month before the plane vanished under uncannily similar circumstances. The revelation, which Malaysia withheld from a lengthy public report on the investigation, is the strongest evidence yet that Zaharie made off with the plane in a premeditated act of mass murder-suicide.
The document presents the findings of the Malaysian police’s investigation into Zaharie. It reveals that after the plane disappeared in March of 2014, Malaysia turned over to the FBI hard drives that Zaharie used to record sessions on an elaborate home-built flight simulator. The FBI was able to recover six deleted data points that had been stored by Microsoft Flight Simulator X program in the weeks before MH370 disappeared, according to the document. Each point records the airplane’s altitude, speed, direction of flight, and other key parameters at a given moment. The document reads, in part:
Based on the Forensics Analysis conducted on the 5 HDDs obtained from the Flight Simulator from MH370 Pilot’s house, we found a flight path, that lead to the Southern Indian Ocean, among the numerous other flight paths charted on the Flight Simulator, that could be of interest, as contained in Table 2.
Taken together, these points show a flight that departs Kuala Lumpur, heads northwest over the Malacca Strait, then turns left and heads south over the Indian Ocean, continuing until fuel exhaustion over an empty stretch of sea.
Search officials believe MH370 followed a similar route, based on signals the plane transmitted to a satellite after ceasing communications and turning off course. The actual and the simulated flights were not identical, though, with the stimulated endpoint some 900 miles from the remote patch of southern ocean area where officials believe the plane went down. Based on the data in the document, here’s a map of the simulated fight compared to the route searchers believe the lost airliner followed (see above).
Rumors have long circulated that the FBI had discovered such evidence, but Malaysian officials made no mention of the find in the otherwise detailed report into the investigation, “Factual Information,” that was released on the first anniversary of the disappearance.
The credibility of the rumors was further undermined by the fact that many media accountsmentioned “a small runway on an unnamed island in the far southern Indian Ocean,” of which there are none.
From the beginning, Zaharie has been a primary suspect, but until now no hard evidence implicating him has emerged. The “Factual Information” report states, “The Captain’s ability to handle stress at work and home was good. There was no known history of apathy, anxiety, or irritability. There were no significant changes in his life style, interpersonal conflict or family stresses.” After his disappearance, friends and family members came forward to described Zaharie as an affable, helpful family man who enjoyed making instructional YouTube videos for home DIY projects — hardly the typical profile of a mass murderer.
The newly unveiled documents, however, suggest Malaysian officials have suppressed at least one key piece of incriminating information. This is not entirely surprising: There is a history in aircraft investigations of national safety boards refusing to believe that their pilots could have intentionally crashed an aircraft full of passengers. After EgyptAir 990 went down near Martha’s Vineyard in 1999, for example, Egyptian officials angrily rejected the U.S. National Transport Safety Board finding that the pilot had deliberately steered the plane into the sea. Indonesian officials likewise rejected the NTSB finding that the 1997 crash of SilkAir 185 was an act of pilot suicide.
Previous press accounts suggest that Australian and U.S. officials involved in the MH370 investigation have long been more suspicious of Zaharie than their Malaysian counterparts. In January, Byron Bailey wrote in The Australian: “Several months after the MH370 disappearance I was told by a government source that the FBI had recovered from Zaharie’s home computer deleted information showing flight plan waypoints … my source … left me with the impression that the FBI were of the opinion that Zaharie was responsible for the crash.”
However, it’s not entirely clear that the recovered flight-simulator data is conclusive. The differences between the simulated and actual flights are significant, most notably in the final direction in which they were heading. It’s possible that their overall similarities are coincidental — that Zaharie didn’t intend his simulator flight as a practice run but had merely decided to fly someplace unusual.
Today, ministers from Malaysia, China, and Australia announced that once the current seabed search for MH370’s wreckage is completed, they will suspend further efforts to find the plane. The search was originally expected to wrap up this month, but stormy weather has pushed back the anticipated completion date to this fall. So far, 42,000 square miles have been covered at a cost of more than $130 million, with another 4,000 square miles to go.
“I must emphasise that this does not mean we are giving up on the search for MH370,” Malaysian Transport minister Liow Tiong Lai said. Officials have previously stated that if they received “credible new information that leads to the identification of a specific location of the aircraft,” the search could be expanded.
But some, including relatives of the missing passengers, believe that that evidentiary threshold has already been past. Recent months have seen the discovery of more than a dozen pieces of suspected aircraft debris, which analyzed collectively could narrow down where the plane went down. (The surprising absence of such wreckage for more than a year left me exploring alternative explanations that ultimately proved unnecessary.) The fact that Zaharie apparently practiced flying until he ran out of fuel over the remote southern Indian Ocean suggests the current search is on the right track — and that another year of hunting might be a worthwhile investment.
UPDATE 7/23/16: Here is some data on some of the points recovered from Zaharie’s flight simulator. Note that one of the points is missing. There are also additional fields that I am not yet at liberty to disclose. Watch this space…
This is sickening to me.
Forget about the Malaysians. What this means is that individuals in our own FBI and elsewhere in our government SAT on this info, letting the Australians search the wrong area for two years, let the families suffer horribly, and violated every oath to uphold justice that any of them ever took on joining the bureau.
What kind of person can wake up and look himself in the mirror for two years straight, knowing what the hell is going on in the SIO.
Just. Sickening.
@ir1907 – widely accepted, according to who?
Even if was widely unknown, it stands to reason that it was unknown in part because nobody cared. Nobody cared because nobody wanted to make a plane disappear.
It stands to reason that somebody who wanted it to disappear would go a little further.
One more point: it was widely accepted that the EE bay was secure. Until it wasn’t.
Just because aviation blogs weren’t full of discussion about satellite tracking doesn’t mean a sizable number of pilots had inklings of it.
As I said, we don’t know what he knew, and if he is responsible for what happened, we should start with the assumption that he knew everything and his plan worked perfectly, until we find otherwise. Not – he had this complex plan but he forgot a few things and he didn’t know about a few things and we still can’t find the plane.
First thing I’d do is search at the flight sim’s (deleted) terminus.
Just to give some numbers re dawn at the end of the red line for 22 June.
From:
U.S. Naval Observatory
Astronomical Applications Department
For Sunday, June 22, 2014
Universal Time
(Longitude E105° 0′, Latitude S45° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 00:05
Sunrise 00:39
(Longitude E105° 0′, Latitude S46° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 00:08
Sunrise 00:43
(Longitude E105° 0′, Latitude S47° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 00:11
Sunrise 00:47
(Longitude E106° 0′, Latitude S45° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 00:01
Sunrise 00:35
(Longitude E106° 0′, Latitude S46° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 00:04
Sunrise 00:39
(Longitude E106° 0′, Latitude S47° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 00:07
Sunrise 00:43
(Longitude E107° 0′, Latitude S45° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 23:57 on preceding day
Sunrise 00:31
(Longitude E107° 0′, Latitude S46° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 00:00
Sunrise 00:35
(Longitude E107° 0′, Latitude S47° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 00:03
Sunrise 00:39
(Longitude E108° 0′, Latitude S45° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 23:53 on preceding day
Sunrise 00:27
(Longitude E108° 0′, Latitude S46° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 23:56 on preceding day
Sunrise 00:31
(Longitude E108° 0′, Latitude S46° 0′)
Begin civil twilight 23:59 on preceding day
Sunrise 00:35
Takeaway ?
Sunrise changes 4 minutes per degree of either latitude or longitude if the other stays the same.
google is your friend:
http://nym.ag/2a1D9gp
The point that I am struggling to make, is that the only plausible reason for the FBI to release this information, is to:
(a) reinforce the “the pilot did it”
by implying that:
(b) it was deliberate
(c) it was well planned
(d) it was “ditch at dawn” – with all that entails
(e) ie, “time and place” has to be:
(e-1) day of year specific
(e-2) time of “that day” specific.
I agree, and calculated the required end of flight descent and ditch profile long ago. (see auntypru)
Position: In the vercinity of 38S 83E
(which is inside the 7th arc)
For some reason the link did not paste.
Here it is:
http://auntypru.com/forum/-MH370-time-to-think-of-it-as-a-criminal-act?pid=3569#pid3569
@Ventus45
I think you missed the most important point of all, granted it is subtle.
So here were are with the ATSB just finishing tossing $130M USD in the crapper. This expenditure in the face of the fact that only a moron would start the search at all based on the spreadsheets of a bunch of geeks (a point I have made here many many times).
So to avoid a pitchfork parade in Perth our friendly FBI comes along, and says they found a path that supports the ATSB stupidity. How nice of them to take the ATSB off the hook for a complete violation of public trust.
It would be very illuminating to see all the other paths on Shah’s simulator. Of course, we won’t be given that data because it serves no useful government purpose, and would only dilute the reason above.
@DennisW
True enough, but the point I made long ago was that the ATSB’s seminally stupid act was the calculation of the “adjusted BTO” that defined the 7th arc, it was a “geek’s fudge”, (which they refused to “verify” at sea), in the first place !
It was sold to the world as “trust us – we are the experts”.
In fact, the whole 7th arc search was a “fudge” from day one !
The question that has to be answered is “why did they never “test the 7th arc” with a complete, identical Satcom fit to 9M-MRO, on a ship, at sea” ?
I have asked this question many times, and never got any kind of answer from anyone.
For my money, the last BTO of “any value” and “certainty” (as certain as we can be, given the whole “bias” callibration in the first place) is the 6th ! The 7th is garbage.
If you look at it from the perspective of a “mission planner” (as I have, at GREAT length, the aircraft HAS TO BE INSIDE the 7th arc, and indeed, very near the 6th.
Didn’t Miles O’Brien have this info a very long time ago, but the spineless Islamophiles at CNN suppressed it or something?
“It’s possible that their overall similarities are coincidental — that Zaharie didn’t intend his simulator flight as a practice run but had merely decided to fly someplace unusual.”
Coincidental? When compared with the whole of the possible flight paths, the similarities are rather telling. Unusual indeed.
@Ventus45
I too am very mistrustful of the 00:19 BFO/BTO, and terminate all my analytics at 00:11.
Of course, I am not using the ISAT to stick a pin a map. I use to qualify possible paths in a broad sense, and to rule out paths such as the Maldives, Diego Garcia,…
@All
First the US officials gave us their analysis of the ISAT data and told us the plane either flew North or South but no way did it go West.
Then these same US officals told us the F/O’s cell phone connected to a cell tower in Pennang so that plane seen on radar at that time (~17:52UTC) must have been MH370.
Now we are also finding out that these same US officials have known for some time the Captain programmed a flight path on his flight sim into the SIO so he must been the one who did this and they somehow forgot to mention this to the public?. CASE CLOSED!
Question: How do we check the facts of these US Officials?
SHOW ME THE DATA!
Do we just go with blind faith because they’re the US and they have no reason to lie to us? They are the good guys or do we question their actions and motives more closely?
It is possible this may just be more orchestrated misinformation to make us believe the pilot did this and they’re still on the right track so lets keep searching in the SIO because they don’t want this plane found.
If US Officials can blame Zahaerie without showing us any data to support their claims, and we believe everything they tell us then that pretty much makes them in control of the narrative of the story and the cover-up.
I am by no means someone who is Anti-US in anyway but in this case I do not accept their statements on blind faith, I want to see the full reports ,the data, and who in the FBI said what to who? This information should be released through a FOIA.
Without showing the public any data to verify their assertions then this may very well be just more smoke and mirrors of a carefully orchestrated cover-up.
“It has long been clear that the wreckage of MH370 will not likely be found in the current search area. This, in turn, means that the “ghost ship” scenario can be ruled out: MH370 did not fly south on autopilot until fuel exhaustion and then plunge into the sea without human intervention. As this fact has become increasingly clear, the most popular backup scenario has been that a suicidal pilot flew the plane southward until it ran out of fuel, then held it in a glide so that it flew further south beyond the search zone. Both of these new drift analyses, however, suggest that this scenario is not correct, either. If the debris originated north of the search area, then the plane must have taken a slow, curving flight under pilot control.”
author= Jeff wise
I humbly rest my case
With all due respect Ken S., the FOIA is a been there, done that and as hugely frustrating this charade is, we are not going to bully the US or any other government into disclosure. Brock McEwen has constantly asked others to rally for accountability from officials. You know as well as I Brock, whether we ask nicely or as a threat, it has gotten us nothing. My questions are; what was the logic of the FBI sitting on this information? Is there a correlation between the seizing of assets related to Najib’s 1MDB and the confirmation of Z’s supposed flight simulator find
The red route in the map above approximately overflies the fictional “Commonwealth of New Island”. There are two questions we must answer before jumping into conclusions:
* Did captain Shah have a Microsoft Flight Simulator X scenery file for this fictional island? Note that in principle he could have prepared a simple one himself.
* How accurate is the red route in the map above? Does it really overfly/overshoot the island?
Microsoft FSX is just a game. If captain Shah simulated a flight to the airport of this fictional (but elaborately planned) island it would explain the early media reports of “a small runway on an unnamed island in the far southern Indian Ocean”.
I am still of the opinion this can and will be solved here, but not from playing into the hands of the powerful or becoming swayed by the deceitful
@Susie
Sadly Susie, you are right on that, we the people, really don’t have the power to bully our Governments into disclosure.
Interesting that you mention the 1MDB fund, I’ve been wondering about the timing of that too and it’s connection with US shell companies. Who really owns these shell companies and where is the money coming from? Follow the money trail.
Peculiar that the purported simulator route in red does not deal with what could be presumed to be the trickiest parts of such a flight : leaving and then crossing back into Malaysian territory, making that turn back exactly at regional air traffic hand off, and splitting the Thai and Malaysian border as it made that crossing. Those are the things that seem like they would need to be more practiced or closely navigated or timed than a take-off and then only an over-water long, long left dogleg into oblivion.
@Jeff Wise, not to impugn your excellent journalistic skills, and certainly don’t know when you received the FBI information, but I’m wondering if you considered the timing of what sure seems like a Friday night Data Dump–making the information public but not as widely know as could be. Or whether–and I don’t how, but I do find the timing curious–if this leak could be related not to the end of search but somehow meant to bring some pressure to bear on Malaysia after this week’s story about asset seizure.
In the months after the disappearance, the FBI assisted Malaysia in analyzing Zaharie’s computer. As per Byron Bailey, the results were then shared with the ATSB. Certainly the ATSB/SSWG tried to make sense of this data when it reconstructed paths. (The path described by the coordinates do not match the BTO data.) If there is anybody to blame for not disclosing what was found on Zaharie’s computer, it lies with Malaysia, not the US, which was helping both Malaysia and the ATSB. I suspect there was more uncovered in the Malaysian criminal investigation that has been sealed. Unless you believe the US fabricated the data, it is Malaysia that needs to provide answers.
Well this is no surprise as the Malaysian officials have lied since day one. I think once US had this info they told other governments involved like Aust. But didn’t disclose to the public.
@Jeff and others looking at the flight track from the simulator.DID Mh370 fly longer on the north west track before it turned south?
That would explain why Indonesia military radar did not spot mh370..
What was the co-pilot doing all these hours? Seems like it must be considered. Or did I miss it?
@Scott: thanks, but I was actually requesting the report Jeff cited in his NYMag article (which I’d already read – with keen interest). My first action would be to forward it to next of kin, who deserve to read it much more than do either Jeff or I.
@Susie: while I’ve never “threatened” to do anything more heinous than repeat what I’ve learned – to everyone willing to listen (and more than a few who aren’t!), I know what you mean. Hence my decision to let all the major airlines know I’m not flying on their unsafe jets until such time as these governments come clean about MH370’s fate.
@Victor: with all due respect, what I see in the U.S. and Malaysia is two governments pointing at each other, and then ducking for cover until the smoke clears. After 28 and a half months, it hardly matters which – if either – is the primary driver of deception; one is either actively or tacitly abetting the other, making the behaviour of both nations utterly gutless, and utterly shameful.
It is time for these nations to muster the courage and the conviction to tell the actual truth.
This article is not official info so take it with a big grain of salt, but: it never made sense that all the “coincidences” from turning off the transponders at just the right time, etc that occurred for it to be a ghost flight. Someone, not necessarily the pilot, was at the controls for it to end up in the SIO has to be the primary hypothesis except for political influences from Malaysia promoting ghost flight.
Finally, if Malaysia knew of the simulations all along why have they tried to hide it? How could a suicide flight embarrass the government – that is something worth speculating on.
@lkr. You posted, previous page, “It’s worth remembering that the flight simulator data, by itself, is only weakly incriminating. It’s the equivalent of finding that someone who may be guilty of a gun crime has visited a firing range in the previous month.” I for one agree that too much can be made out of this: it neither proves nor disproves. Since his simulator would not match the real thing why would he use it as others have said? If intent on a dawn ditching he could just get the co-ordinates as Ventus45 has done and insert them, using FCOM for range and endurance could he not? If not intent on a ditching he could simply insert a required track, having restored power as necessary, and leave it there.
None of this needs connect his home simulator efforts with the flight? VictorI has said that there may be more to come from the Malaysian criminal investigation but as it stands there is not much to go on.
There is another part to the all this. Finding the wreckage could prove disappointing except in confirming there was no major technical or pilot skill failure. However this is not the same as Air France 447, 842 or TWA 800 among others. A failure like these as a cause now seems so unlikely that sensibly it can be discounted.
Since the early MH370 flight profiles and equipment state changes surely require human intervention of some sort, how can it be determined from the wreckage who was responsible among crew, hijackers (directing the crew?), stowaways? Chances are the CVR will be wiped.
If a materiel/pilot skill failure sensibly can be discounted a large part of the airworthiness and accident prevention issue is put aside. As to finding the wreckage helping with closure for most spouses/relatives, as it now stands the hypoxia hypothesis should be a help. This is distinctly on the cards and that is the way it could well be left. For my part, albeit not being a spouse/relative, the Ministers have taken the right decision.
The case for continuing past the current search has been weakened by this FBI revelation though its timing may well not have that purpose. While it could be just out of frustration, that is less justified if the contents were known by those who needed to, which would not necessarily have included the French.
The Australian Government/ATSB implicitly have the position that currently there are no grounds for review of the route or end-of-flight so logically will see further work on this as unwarranted at this stage. The FBI revelation should make no difference, the ATSB doubtless knowing of that earlier as per Victorl. The Australian stance was not endorsed explicitly in the meeting communique though the indefinite suspension in following the current search amounts to much the same. Grace, the relatives rep at the Sky interview before the meeting said that Boeing had been tasked with modelling the aircraft breakup. Presumably this will continue, contributing to the final report at least.
Of course it may be that the wreckage is found in the remaining search and/or there are more disclosures, which will alter things, but in the meantime there will be the data promised by the Malaysians to work on for those with a continuing interest, though this we are told may take some time.
Incidentally as many will remember the ATSB refuted some of what Byron Bailey wrote in his 9 Jan 2016 article, including his statement, “ When the flaperon was analysed by Boeing, the manufacturer said…that it had been broken off in a lowered position, consistent with the theory MH370 had made a controlled ditching into the sea.” The ATSB responded, “To our knowledge, Boeing have not made any statements regarding the flaperon.” http://www.atsb.gov.au/newsroom/correcting-the-record.aspx
@all
This info release to me is ‘writing the script to close off the search’.
Probable all gleaned from blogs like this.
As for the money side of the PM, they are drowning from the world wide accusations. The Malaysians have been trying to play with the big boys but have failed miserably.
These articles cover a whole range of misappropriation .
Particularly the Wall Street Journal.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-36852560
http://www.wsj.com/specialcoverage/malaysia-controversy
Cheers Tom L
RON has a credible explanation for the conspicuous path, namely that the pilot was curious, as to the actual existence or otherwise, of the “Commonwealth of New Island”… which prompted the pilot to plot a path towards 35S,99E… and see if the island was actually in his MS flight simulator.
After over-flying the island’s alleged location, and realizing it was not part of the software program, the pilot got up and took a shower and grabbed a bite to eat, or something like that, whilst meanwhile the simulated A/C reach fuel exhaustion.
Then, next time he returned to his computer, realizing the island was most likely bogus, he deleted the superfluous path, and tried something else new & different, i.e. the next of the “numerous other flight paths charted on the Flight Simulator”.
Curiosity is a very parsimonious explanation of the conspicuous route.
This is the content of an email I sent to CNN on March 21, 2014.
“Here’s my theory of Malaysian Flight 370…
“The captain was wild enough about flying that he put a professional flight simulator in his home. What else would he do with a personal flight simulator (at least eventually) other than test the limits of his ability? He’s in the age group of people for which the movie “Firefox” (1982) was formative in setting the bar for imaginative flying possibilities (he was 21 years old; also close to when he became a pilot). Now we learn that the plane may have flown for 7+ hours after “lost.” So… he wanted to land the plane on an ice floe in the southern Indian Ocean or someplace similar enough to prove that he could accomplish his Clint Eastwood fantasy. Why try with his employer’s jumbo jet full of innocent passengers? He’d have no other access to an aircraft capable of flying the distance or with the technology required to even attempt landing on an ice floe. My guess is that he did not successfully land the plane because, if successful, and with no motivation or reason to harm the crew or passengers, he would have activated the equipment necessary for the plane to be located for a rescue operation. The airplane is very far south in the Indian Ocean. Farfetched? Maybe. But possible for someone bored-out-of-his-mind by his job; who realizes that his window of opportunity is closing soon because of mandatory retirement age; and improving technology that at some point soon likely would make it impossible to fly such an aircraft so far with nearly complete stealth? Sure. If he fails, no repercussions of any consequence to him. If he succeeds, he ends his career with the ultimate adventure, pleads insanity and stays out of jail, and goes down in history. Maybe our captain is just another middle-aged guy struggling with meaning-of-life issues who happened to have a $270 million advanced long-range aircraft at his disposal that he happened to fly with great skill.”
@ Erik N,
Exactly ! The only sensible explanation so far. Perfectly innocuous.
I wonder how the [conveniently discovered] flight sim data matches B777 real life characteristics, e.g. speed, altitude, fuel burn etc etc
As said before, I think we are mislead again. May the experts please explain the following:
The red path suggests a late turn, a lot further northwest than the assumed FMT, which always made some semse in regards to the possible detection risk from Indonesia. This former assumed FMT, derived from the BFO values however was a keystone to the argument, that MH370 turned south to the SIO. What is the evidence under this new report, except the report itself, that MH370 turned south at all? Sure that would again bring planted debris evidence into play again.
Or are we sticking to the former FMT and to the former routing, on which the presents search relies on, then why has the search party not come up with wreckage?
Enthusiasm from the new information aside, how does the new information, IF IT IS AUTHENTIC AND CORRECT, alter the routing AND the search area, how does it fit into the data known until now, what kind of information believed true is obsolete and has to be replaced by new information?
At the moment I see more chaos of information than clear picture.
Malaysia’s official language is bahasa Malaysia. I doubt that an official police report to Malaysia’s Annex 13 investigation would be written in English.
Still waiting for a satifsctory explanation for the “Chandelle” at IGARI, why the autopilot was off while on primary radar, yet the general assumption that the airplane was entirely on autopilot all the time.
What a bunch of cynical garbage.
There is no evidence that this [unverified, undated, unsourced, non-specific] *ahem* “information” was used in any way in the search. Not even any satellite imagery tasked at the path/7th arc intersection (or beyond). Which tells me that even if the sim flight record were “true”, no import/significance has been awarded to it by the investigation or the search.
Why should such a story emerge now? 22 July 2016 was obviously going to be a big news day for MH370 in light of the conference/announcement and news outlets are looking for fresh material.
The inestimable one-trick-pony JW took the opportunity (and the meal ticket) to sell this piffle to news outlets hungry for material. Hogwash, I say.
The plane only flew just far enough out to not get detected by the indonesians. The red path is too far out. I suspected there might be an intact empty fuselage to the east but not that far south. I wouldnt tell the search team to look exactly there but if i had the money i would give into my curiousity by paying myself.
@Erik Nelson
Could be.
@All
Why such an expression of surprise on the timing of the FBI simulator data release at this point in the saga? Weren’t people expecting a whistle blower to show his cards the moment the search was called off? Come on, you cant have it both ways. Just accept the simulator data as legit, which it very probably is.
The red simulator track confirms two things imo:
1) that Z had no inkling of Inmarsat’s ability to reconstruct his actual flight path from the pings. Most of us had already come to the same conclusion, anyway.
2) that Z deliberately set up the 00:19 logon to give the impression the aircraft was pilotless at the time of fuel exhaustion.
This was obviously a decoy track, deliberately longer than the actual fuel range of MH370. The world would think he had crashed somewhere along that red line, but wouldn’t know where. Wouldn’t know where to concentrate any search. It would take them time to search the line, and they wouldn’t find the plane, prolonging the agony/embarrassment of the Malaysian government.
The pilot was evidently confident that once he was outside Butterworth primary radar range, he couldn’t be tracked.
The best evidence we have of where the aircraft actually resides, is the DSTG Bayesian best fit path, and the nature of the recovered debris. The debris flung to date, strongly suggests a controlled ditching. Put these together and we get a terminal point downrange of the current search area.
But should the search continue? Should more money be spent, and lives risked on stormy seas? Probably not. Enough is already known about the circumstances to allow a line to be drawn under the affair.
This is sickening to me.
Forget about the Malaysians. What this means is that individuals in our own FBI and elsewhere in our government SAT on this info, letting the Australians search the wrong area for two years, let the families suffer horribly, and violated every oath to uphold justice that any of them ever took on joining the bureau.
What kind of person can wake up and look himself in the mirror for two years straight, knowing what the hell is going on in the SIO.
Just. Sickening.
THIS ^
A MILLION TIMES THIS.
@retiredf4
Very good points you make.
I’ll say this again.. Why did someone reboot the SDU while Mh370 was on its northwest track before it supposedly turned south?
Some have suggested this was very sophisticated way of tricking the immarsat data..
Also I’m starting to be very suspicious of the timing of this new info being released.As others have said.. wreaks of a cover up.
@Aaron
“Why did someone reboot the SDU while Mh370 was on its northwest track before it supposedly turned south?”
Because it is not true that no one knew about being tracked. This was done exactly for that purpose. There was nothing wrong with the “plane”.
Was all this done because of the cargo? Maybe.
“New York has obtained a confidential document from the Malaysian police investigation into the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370”
Why don’t they put that document on line? It’s a hoax.
https://s32.postimg.org/ctvt53hd1/May_Day_6_N.png
If the acting pilots waited until all systems powered up & stabilized in nominal condition, then turned the A/C off of N571 c.18:34 to initiate straight-in approach to WITT, perhaps including an “initial descent” to FL240 @ M0.75…
Then the A/C would have reached the 6N boundary demarcation line between KL FIR & Jakarta FIR, i.e. the A/C would have been exiting Malaysian airspace and entering Indonesian airspace…
c.18:43, when some sort of MayDay request for emergency landing, and explanation of the extraordinary situation necessitating unfiled entry into foreign national airspace, would be expected if not legally required (?).
Alleged 18:43 “cabin disintegrating” MayDay distress signal could have occurred as the A/C was crossing 6N and transiting from Malaysian to Indonesian airspace, near WITN & WITT airports, whose night-duty ground crews would provide a plausible target audience.
Picturing fuselage fragments flying off the frame — do B-777s have fuselage-mounted speed-brakes, whose deployment in a maximum-speed descent could have caused fuselage failures ?? — and flight-deck wind-screens fracturing with shards peppering pilots’ faces…
Not impossibly the pilots aborted the landing attempt, having not obtained authorization to land or enter foreign airspace or national waters, and desiring not to cause an international incident and to avoid likely casualties on the ground…
and so quickly effected a few more control inputs, redirecting the A/C away from Indonesia, out of Indonesian airspace, and towards the open ocean beyond (?).
Subsequent “ghost-flight” could have occurred, either “high and fast” if “initial descent” did not occur, or somewhat “slower & lower” if otherwise.
I understand, that if the pilot used FLCH to effect the “initial descent”, then the A/T would have engaged in “THR” mode, reducing engine thrust as necessary to maintain constant speed as altitude dropped. I understand further, that as soon as the A/T begins to retard thrust levers towards IDLE, then any manual pilot override disconnects the A/T.
So, trying to visualize the FD in such circumstances, thrust levers would have been very far forward, commanding high thrust, all along the radar track… Said levers would have begun to slide towards IDLE… Hypothetically the pilot makes a split-sec. life-critical decision, and somehow deflects the flightpath to 185-190deg heading… The A/T disengages… without further pilot inputs, neither human pilot nor computerized A/T would adjust the thrust levers… I think that tells us, speculating wildly, that the A/C would have continued flying in the effective equivalent of a THR HOLD setting, i.e. constant thrust for the next 5.5 hours.
A/T off, thrust constant (after abort) ?
VNAV = [pressure] ALT HOLD (after initial descent to FL240) ?
TAS ~= M0.75 ~= 410kts ?
LNAV = route discontinuity = MAG HDG HOLD ??
Heading ~= 192deg (to reach 19:41 arc) ???
@Jeff Wise
You wrote the article.
I assume therefore you have seen and read the documents with your own eyes.
Can you confirm that?
And also their authenticity?
@All, There’s been a lot of speculation — and eyebrows raised — about the timing of the publication of this story, with many voicing suspicion that this revelation came out on the same day that the nations leading the search announced they would suspend further efforts. I would like to clarify that responsibility for the timing lies with me. I have been trying to get this information out for some time, negotiating with a skittish source over how much I could reveal, and felt that the tripartite announcement was the deadline after which it would make much less of a difference whether this story came out or not. Actually I was hoping that New York would publish the story on Thursday, but it happened to be a big news day, with Trump officially getting the Republican Party nomination.
Finally, to everyone who wants to see the full set of documents on which this is based: these things take time. More will emerge.
If this is all true the simulated flight could also mean a ‘best first option’ flight.
A flight directly going north west away from Malaysia with a lot more fuel.
Maybe the ‘best first option’ flight was a flight to a destination in Europe.
There would be much less risk of detection and suspision involved in a flight like this.
It could mean he did not get that ‘best first option’ flight opportunity and the flight option to Being necessated him to partly adjust his plan.
And assuming he could have taken this ‘best first option’ flight which point would he have chosen to go dark?
I assume then he would have followed the same procedure as he did for going dark around IGARI on the FIR boundary between Malaysia and Vietnam.
He would have chosen a FIR boundary to go dark and make his FMT short after that.
And the first FIR boundary on the route to the north west he took after Penang would be the Chennai FIR boundary.
As the plan changed in a flight to Being this wasn’t necessary anymore but likely he would have sticked to the same FMT on that Chennai FIR boundary.
@Jeff thanks for the clarification..
@Trond
Hide cargo..That’s another topic the Malaysian authorities kept secret and then have been deceptive about..
1st took them sometime to release the cargo manifest only to find out that page 1 was missing..Then when they finally released page 1.. It sates 2tonnes of unknown cargo? at front end cargo hold.. Has that ever been rectified or cleared up?
Add to that the edited ATC audio transcript..Some parts have been cut out and edited, why? What did Malaysian government NOT want the world to hear?
If I can speculate… Did Captain Shah make some kind of statement for what ever reason..
and because Malaysian ATC acted so slow to respond..They edited the ATC transcript to save face… Saving face is a big thing in SE Asia to a point where they’ll lie through their teeth!
If they cut out something they did not want the world to hear perhabs that was the terrifying part they admitted to that the public must never know about.
@jeff
I feel little bit weird since you started to delete my comments, mostly those about Scientology. It is not something unreal, the same as the Hizmet movement which I didnt knew until Turkey events few days ago… Its interesting that the ISIL and all the terorist attacks grew up into media deep in 2014 and continue and rise till now (just yesterday some mad guy in Munchen was shooting… and I am more and more thinking that somebody would try to misuse the poor muslims for totally another target and purpose, just against them all and just against all of us… who?? the neonazis, scientologists, hizmetist or I dont know who else manipulating with peoples brains such advanced way, that its almost undetectable until its too late)
In close relation to MH370 case let me review the timeline of some events:
2013-11 Kiev student protests at Maidan
(Yanukovich in fact signed #ukrexit in advance; and I remember I asked my ukrainian friends what they expect from EU better than from cooperation with Russia, having similar language, alphabet, history … as simply one day, we will be finally cooperating all together, so… what the heck in EU? there was huge corruption scandals of miusing the EU funds but it just started to be investigated and solved…even in our country; and we all knew here that country with huge economical troubles will be vulnerable in EU, or worse can poison it even more… huh)
2014-02 XX. Maidan violence + armed govt turnover
2014-02 20. 88-100 ppl killed near Maidan
2014-02 22. PM Yatsenyuk (later linked to sceintology by “some” sources (not confirmed); now out of govt already)
2014-02 23. Kiev parliament tried to BAN russian language as official in eastern regions and Crimea
(sure, huge protests of Russia; reverted back later, but…)
2014-02 24. RF secret service saves Yanukovich from killing by RightSector
2014-02 27. Russian military action in Crimea
(secret/quick – prolonged hidden till 3/21; described year later in docudrama)
2014-03 07. Obama-Putin hour long phone call
2014-03 08. 777 lost
2014-03 16. 777 u-turn reported, Crimea referendum (97% ok)
2014-03 21. Sevastopol and Crimea officially part of RF
2014-03 23. 777 expected SIO termination
2014-05 02. Odessa 42 dead, in fact burned alive by Right Sector neonazi protests
2014-07 17. MH17 downed at Ukraine
2014-10 21. HRW confirms Ukraine used cluster bombs in civilian areas of east
2014-11 12. NATO gen. Breedlove says that russian combat troops are entering Ukraine in columns;
(but he was replaced later for some reasons)
I was personaly under official narrative that ugly Russia anexed Crimea and Ukrainian revoluiton is some kind of good thing against the devil. I was ready to take guns against Russians and go to war with them in case they will try to continue to raid on Europe or so… but together with MH370 case, the emotions started to provoke thinking what the heck is going on there and to provoke the search deeply where is the truth hidden. I am sure such search would never happen without MH370 case. Thats my 2c
BBC ukraine timeline 2013/11 – 2014/11
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26248275
Reuters ukraine timeline 2013/11 – 2014/03
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-timeline-idUSBREA270PO20140308
UNPO ukraine timeline 2013/13 – 2016/02
(crimean tatars mostly; missing 5/2 Odessa deaths, 7/17 MH17, …)
http://www.unpo.org/article/17122
idebate.org crime crisis timeline 2014/02-03
http://idebate.org/debatabase/ukraine-crisis/crimea-crisis-timeline
the docudrama (somebody may call it propaganda, ya)
https://www*youtube*com/watch?v=t42-71RpRgI
@jeff
I just posted here something bigger with more links, in fact to you, please, try to read it and if possible, to reply somehow; tnx
”What was the co-pilot doing all these hours? Seems like it must be considered. Or did I miss it?”
He was locked out. He tried to estabilish contact with his cellphone to explain his situation but it failed.
@jeff
Could you please indicate on your map (toop of page) the 6 waypoints found on the flight simulator?