Australia Confirms Zaharie Flight-Sim Route to Southern Ocean

In a posting to a section of its website called “Correcting the record,” the Australian Transport Safety Board today confirmed that the FBI found data on MH370 captain Zaharie Shah’s flight simulator hard drives indicating that Zaharie had practiced a one-way flight into the southern Indian Ocean, as I wrote in a story for New York magazine on Friday. Entitled “False and inaccurate media report on the search for MH370,” the post concerns several claims by Australian pilot Byron Bailey in The Australian, including Bailey’s interpretation of the flight-sim data:

Mr Bailey also claims that FBI data from MH370 captain’s home simulator shows that the captain plotted a course to the southern Indian Ocean and that it was a deliberate planned murder/suicide. There is no evidence to support this claim. As Infrastructure and Transport Minister Darren Chester said in a statement, the simulator information shows only the possibility of planning. It does not reveal what happened on the night of its disappearance nor where the aircraft is located. While the FBI data provides a piece of information, the best available evidence of the aircraft’s location is based on what we know from the last satellite communications with the aircraft. This is indeed the consensus of international satellite and aircraft specialists.

While ostensibly rebutting Bailey’s claims, the ATSB tacitly acknowledges the fact that the flight-sim data was in fact found by the FBI.

524 thoughts on “Australia Confirms Zaharie Flight-Sim Route to Southern Ocean”

  1. In the IBT yesterday…

    “For the purposes of its search, the ATSB has not needed to determine — and has made no claims — about what might have caused the disappearance of the aircraft.”

    The ATSB is still singing from the “we don’t need no stinking motive” songbook. A familiar tune.

    Apparently they do not realize how stupid this statement sounds given that they have spent over 130M USD and have found no trace of the aircraft.

  2. @RetiredF4, Cofee
    this is it ad JORN; RMAF told he tracked some u-turned (or 2nd, ID-switched; simply somewhat aggresive) plane, but Hissmamudin told that they are tracking “friendly” target; I am sure for unfriendly the JORN would be focused too, or NORAD or infrared submarine searching sattelites or whatever capable to search them and try to communicate with them (MAS satphoned just exactly ONCE, though – IMO somebody on earth synced them 1hr “ping windows”, and they knew it since then) or bring them down, somehow

  3. A few tidbits about JORN from the Ministry of Defense Australia:

    1.The JORN network is Australia’s first comprehensive land and air early warning system. It not only provides a 24-hour military surveillance of the northern and western approaches to Australia, but also serves a civilian purpose in assisting in detecting illegal entry, smuggling and unlicensed fishing.

    http://www.dst.defence.gov.au/innovation/jindalee-operational-radar-network

    Note : 24 hour military surveillance which presumably implies plausible detection of civilian intruders as well.

    2. Jindalee Operational Radar Network, or JORN, conducts 24-hour all weather detection of north and northwest air and surface approaches up to 2000 kilometres away from Australia’s coastline.
    JORN is an early warning trip-wire in the defence and protection of Australia and our national interests, able to detect surface vessels and low-flying aircraft.

    http://www.aph.gov.au/DocumentStore.ashx?id=bdc9623c-5561-411c-9d27-5c9996c98910

    Note : again 24 hours is stressed and its role as a “tripwire” emphasised. I would further recommend the above link be read in its entirety in order for one to fathom how vital JORN is in the greater scheme of things.

  4. @ Cheryl
    Welcome back.
    @Ron Posted July 23, 2016 at 12:17PM;
    “It seems this status quo had now broken, the need to maintain the cover-up won over the interests of Malaysia and justice. This is a dangerous situation because it’ll force the truth about MH370 to come out and the consequences will be grave.”

    There could be a lot of truth in that. It has been suggested by many that we need to go back and start over. The veneer seems a bit cracked and obviously the truth lies somewhere, it is the manner of how we find it.

    After researching many earlier links about Z’s simulator, the majority of stories seem to negate the brother-in-law/wife comments about it being broken. Without a long boring explanation, I tend to think that may be more semantics related.

    Hopefully now this can serve as a distraction from some rough spots for you. Jeff has my email if you wish to speak further.

  5. 3. From same source (no 2) above:

    The JORN network provides 24-hour all-weather detection of surface vessels and low-flying aircraft across the northern approaches to Australia up to 2000 km from the mainland. It also provides assistance to Customs and Immigration in the detection of illegal entrants to Australia, illegal fishing and smuggling as well as data to assist weather warnings.”

    2. Now onto Exmouth, which I have long regarded as an excellent symbol of the close cooperation that the US and Australia have forged over the years, a friendship that was aptly demonstrated in 2008:

    PR language apart, Fitzgibbon was quite right. AUSMIN 2007 saw the announcement of a new ‘US strategic and military satellite communications system at the Australian Defence Satellite Communication Station (ADSCS) located at Geraldton in Western Australia’. ACDS at Kojarena, 30 km west of Geraldton, is a major signals interception station operated by the Defence Signals Division, and contributes to the worldwide Echelon system. The new joint Kojarena facility will play a key role in the Pentagon’s complex and continuously developing Global Information Grid.

    “Renewed and heightened US involvement in the Kojarena and North West Cape facilities for space surveillance and global military signals intelligence and communication has followed on from a decade of rapid technical and organisational developments in the global US signals intelligence interception system of which the Joint Defence Facility Pine Gap is a key part. The result is that Pine Gap, and most likely in turn Kojarena and North West Cape, are increasingly closely tied to US military operations worldwide, but particularly to operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.”
    http://nautilus.org/publications/books/australian-forces-abroad/defence-facilities/naval-communication-station-harold-e-holt-north-west-cape/

    Note : an advanced surveillance is emplaced at this facility beginning with Trideca Antaennas that have been progressively upgraded to more sophisticated systems over the years. Note also the role of the Geraldton Kojatena facility which with Exmouth combine to form a high tech defensive triumvirate with Pine Gap at its apex.

    Main takeaway : any flight in the general direction of Australia or off its coasts would have been easily detected given the much vaunted and highly respected US and Australian technology in the immediate vicinity.

  6. @Dennis,

    I don’t disagree that the constant was derived on the ground at KL. That constant was added to the logged BTOs to get round trip times and that in turn was used to calculate distance.

    But what constant was subtracted before the values were placed in the log? Are you suggesting it’s the same constant? It can’t be – the KL constant wasn’t known until after the logs were generated. Further, the logs covered all subscribers. There is no reason it would match one particular AES.

  7. One last bit on the TRIDECO system in Exmouth, it’s a VLF system upgraded in 2009. A quick take is available here although the contents do not focus on its capabilities:

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naval_Communication_Station_Harold_E._Holt

    A more technical document is available here:

    http://arlassociates.net/Newman%20AP%20Presentation.pdf

    Note: although primarily designed for submarine and underwater communications, my understanding is that the facility was later upgraded to encompass aerial surveillance and detection especially since 2007.

    For radar capabilities across different frequencies, this link provides excellent coverage:

    http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/navy/nrtc/14092_ch2.pdf

    Thanks @jeff . Glad to be of some use. A warm welcome back to @cheryl. Hope things have turned out for the better.

  8. @Susie Crowe,

    You said:

    “Jeff has my email if you wish to speak further.”

    I’m not sure who do you mean but you can certainly use my gmail address dreamer371.

    And yes, it’s very good that Cheryl is back with us. Her linguistic analysis is more reliable than the FI.

  9. Jeff Wise Thanks for your reports and thanks for your site.
    I know that the last thing professional want is a psychic commenting on MH 370.
    My research points to the McDonald Islands as the final resting place of MH 370. I see it off shore about 20 meters at a depth about 20 meters. Has a hole on top about the mid section.
    Also I guess that barnacles do not grow in waters dipper than 50 meters.
    I have published my idea in my book The Sphinx Code: MH 370.
    Thanks

  10. @DennisW

    I agree with what you said about the ATSB. They, and the Aussie government are in a very dark place, as far as this subject is concerned, at any rate.

    The ATSB are sticking resolutely to the no control at 00:19 scenario. They justify this purely on the BFO apparent high descent rate. Yet their buddies at the DSTG were advised to discount the 00:19 BFO, being considered “unreliable”

  11. Perhaps I missed a point, but what is so new about all this? Those reports go back to 2014.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/malaysia/10917868/MH370-captain-plotted-route-to-southern-Indian-Ocean-on-home-simulator.html

    https://www.metabunk.org/mh370-five-indian-ocean-runways-found-in-captain-zaharie-ahmad-shah’s-flight-simulator.t3316/

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2584123/Revealed-Malaysian-Airlines-pilot-high-security-US-base-Diego-Garcia-programmed-homemade-flight-simulator-deleted-data-just-taking-control-missing-plane.html

    So maybe the 6th point Jeff must not disclose for the time being is Diego Garcia? And that would not prove a thing but refuel all kinds of speculation.

    If the assumption was correct that the pilot acted on purpose, we could drop the assumption that autopilot flew a straight line. I recall there were some Monte Carlo like simulations early on with possible flight paths matching the arcs under different routes. Could someone redirect us to such a thread for a fresh start please?

  12. @SteveBarrett

    I can’t recall mentioning or dragging Singapore into this. It was brought up by others as Singapore might have helped MH370 to escape.

  13. @Louis, I don’t think you’ve read these pieces carefully. The second two merely report that Zaharie’s flight simulator had Indian Ocean airstrips among its featured destinations. They would all be perfectly normal places for a KL-based user to fly to for entertainment (and MH370 didn’t go to any of them). The first piece is more germane, but it only cites and unnamed source, and it gets the story wrong — the flight sim route didn not go to an airstrip. So, yes, as I wrote in the New York mag piece, there have been rumors circulating about the flight sim for a long time; what’s different now is that I’ve seen the documentation and confirmed it, and what’s more the ATSB has confirmed it, too.

  14. @RetF4

    A snippet from your second link below pretty much summarizes the situation

    “Based on the time of day that MH370 disappeared, and in the context of peacetime tasking, JORN was not operational at the time of the aircraft’s disappearance. Given range from individual OTHRs, the ionospheric conditions and a lack of information on MH370’s possible flight path towards Australia, it is unlikely that MH370 would have been detected if the system had been operational.”

  15. Thanks Jeff for clarification. I was just wondering if the straight line would remain straight if the 6th point was added. I don’t know if a route would still match the arcs if for example going to Coconut Island (Diego Garcia is way off). I tried to find some analysis on routes with a pilot in control in Duncan’s archives, but it’s just too much material now to find something easily.

  16. @Louis, The “missing” data point actually lies pretty much in a straight line with the first three, before the turn to the south.

  17. Question on “has it happened before”:

    When has a large transport airplane crashed after fuel starvation without pilot control?

    Susie Posted July 25, 2016 at 9:43 AM “I wonder if an actual 777 or anything approaching that size has ever, actually, run out of fuel. And if it has, what happened next. It’s probably never happened. I guess therefore we’re stuck with exploits from the sim.”

    Gysbreght then Posted July 25, 2016 at 9:57 AM “@Susie: It has happened more than once.”

    NYBanker then Posted July 25, 2016 at 9:13 PM “@Susie: Look up the Gimli Glider.”

    Facts: There are many examples of planes running out of fuel and attempting to land on land and sea under pilot control. Gimli Glider on land. Hudson river A320 and 767 off African coast on water. Many many more with pilot in command. Even myself as PIC. The landing will be little different than a normal landing.

    Many other uncontrolled landings are documented. Payne Stewart was killed in the depressurization of a Learjet in 1999. It was on autopilot. Result: uncontrolled crash in field. No specifics on its last moments. Many small planes have crashed on land and in the water after the pilot lost conciseness and subsequently crashed after fuel starvation.

    @ Gysbreght Where are the examples of large transport aircraft crashing without pilot control?

    Jeff Wise Posted July 26, 2016 at 7:08 AM A good example of a phugoid in a modern transport aircraft. —

    I would like to add that depending on the inherent stability of the aircraft one might not see much of a phugoid. Training aircraft tend to have very stable flight characteristics and will not oscillate much during flight if properly trimmed to begin with. By changing the power settings, the aircraft will climb or descend to a stable flight level. They will oscillate on their way to that new altitude. If power settings are too low the aircraft will have a flight level below ground level and thus will crash/land. Other aircraft that are designed for higher performance might oscillate greatly. Less forgiveness. Modern transport aircraft are somewhere in the middle. They push toward performance and thus efficiency but the basic design is reasonably stable.

  18. @SteveBarrett

    “Victor Iannello expressed it better as “full of inconsistencies”.”

    That is infact one of the readings.

  19. @Gysbreght: re: footled: it is quite possible you are right.

    But I wouldn’t key on “point 6” any more than I’m keying on full disclosure of the cited report. We need to see proof that the pilot’s hard drive contents indicated foreplanning – so far, not only has none been offered, the opposite was publicly confirmed by the FBI in March, 2014 – and the opposite was reflected in search strategy in the 28 months since. While you rightly note that the absence of “point 6” does look suspicious, its appearance is unlikely to address these broader concerns.

  20. @retired F4

    Do not want to belabour the point nor interested in a slanging match 😀 but just for argument sake, this is taken from FAQ site you linked:

    Does the Jindalee Operational Radar Network (JORN) operate 24 hours per day?
    A. JORN was designed and acquired for the defence of Australia. In the context of the defence of Australia and peacetime military operations, the operating hours of JORN are managed to meet Defence’s surveillance priorities.
    http://www.defence.gov.au/FOI/Docs/Disclosures/127_1415_Document.pdf

    Q: does it mention specific operating time limits? No . But it goes on to say ……. “to meet Defence’s surveillance priorities” . Now we can read this differently. For me at least, this last statement is consanguineous with the “political” Ministry of Defense’s vision of JORN being a “tripwire’ and other similar statements emanating from there. The fact that Pine Gap is part of the global US military Echelon framework should also be telling enough. And this should be Clancyesque, at its best for it details what actually goes in there….better still hop over to Nautilus itself but then I digress, suffice to say an unidentified craft approaching a realm at an unearthly was left to its devices!

    http://www.news.com.au/technology/innovation/inventions/pine-gap-nautilus-institute-explores-alice-springs-joint-defence-facility/news-story/4cb8906c915e2df71b61c0c24babc1c9

    Additionally, one could also ask why should an operational limit vis a vis MH 370 is mentioned to the Q below when no such limit is mentioned the first Q above:

    “Did the Jindalee Operational Radar Network (JORN) detect flight MH370?
    A. Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, a Boeing 777-200, was classified as missing at 0240h on 08 Mar 14 whilst enroute from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. On 24 Mar 14, the Malaysian Prime Minister announced that MH370 had probably ended its flight in the middle of the Indian Ocean to the west of Perth, far from any possible landing sites. The aircraft was carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew, including six Australians.
    Based on the time of day that MH370 disappeared, and in the context of peacetime tasking, JORN was not operational at the time of the aircraft’s disappearance. Given range from individual OTHRs, the ionospheric conditions and a lack of information on MH370’s possible flight path towards Australia, it is unlikely that MH370 would have been detected if the system had been operational.”

    Odd isn’t it that for this particular case a peacetime operational time constraint is specifically mentioned and even the likelihood of any such detection is tersely negated! when one wouldn’t know for sure!

    Further if you go to page 7 and number 16 of the following document you will see the emphasis is on
    on ‘continuous Wide Area Surveillance……..” in protection of primary strategic concerns be it in peacetime or otherwise.

    Note I cannot copy and paste for some reason but you can peruse the comprehensive air surveillance philosophy of the Australian Defense authorities in this heavily redacted document:

    http://www.defence.gov.au/FOI/Docs/Disclosures/127_1415_Document.pdf

    My nose smells something but as I said I don’t want to belabour the point and I respectfully agree to disagree with your perspectives and interpretations of the relevant contents.

  21. @Brock McEwen

    There isn’t anything on that computer that links Shah to MH370, suicide and murder.

    @Wazir Roslan

    The JORN is a dead end. It did not record MH370.

  22. @Wazir Roslan

    You are entiteled to mistrust the referenced information. In order not to use more bandwith on a dead horse I see no use to comment further.

  23. Very interesting…

    From The Australian:

    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/aviation/australian-officials-warned-families-of-mh370-data-leak-from-fbi/news-story/c3e20ed1355c1c46cdbe44c53d1faff5

    “””
    Grace Nathan, from next-of-kin group Voice 370, said she and other families met officials from the ATSB and JACC before and after last Friday’s meeting of Australian, Malaysian and Chinese transport ministers that agreed to soon suspend the search.

    “We were already told that the article was coming out by JACC and ATSB, who were here for a meeting last Friday,” said Ms Nathan, who lost her mother on the March 2014 flight, which disappeared with 239 people aboard.

    “They told us that an independent group had been given the (Zaharie simulator) data by the FBI, so most of us were not surprised when the news came out.”

    Ms Nathan said: “I was told by the JACC that the information was provided by the FBI. They work closely with independent groups and said FBI provided information to independent groups who decided they wanted to publish it in New York magazine.”
    “””

    BTW, Duncan Steel says that the route positions were consistent with one terminating at an airfield in Antarctica’s McMurdo Sound.

  24. Ken Goodwin Posted July 26, 2016 at 2:26 PM: “@ Gysbreght Where are the examples of large transport aircraft crashing without pilot control? ”

    Why do you ask me? Helios Airways Flight 522 crashed into a mountain after running out of fuel, with pilots incapacitated due to hypoxia. But that was not Susie’s question.

    Jeff Wise Posted July 26, 2016 at 7:08 AM A good example of a phugoid in a modern transport aircraft. —

    You must have read another post than I did. Good examples of a phugoid in a modern transport aircraft are two incidents where A330’s entered into Alphaprot mode.

    What Jeff Wise described on July, 2016 at 7:08 AM, and you address in the first two sentences of your last paragraph, is static longitudinal stability. Although that plays a role in phugoid motion, that does not really describe a phugoid.

    The rest of your last paragraph is confused rubbish.

  25. IMO an important fact about the simulator path is not that it ended in the SIO but, except for a tiny sliver, the path deliberately avoided Indonesian airspace and FIR boundaries.

  26. @Lauren H

    Good point. The sim run appears to be on the way to the Middle East or Europe and dramatically turns south shortly after clearing the western tip of Sumatra. Coincidental? Not a chance.

  27. Jeff Wise Posted July 26, 2016 at 1:58 PM: “@Louis, The “missing” data point actually lies pretty much in a straight line with the first three, before the turn to the south. ”

    What are the coördinates and altitude of that point and why is it “missing” ?

  28. Gysbreght Posted July 26, 2016 at 4:20 PM wrote “Ken Goodwin Posted July 26, 2016 at 2:26 PM: “@ Gysbreght Where are the examples of large transport aircraft crashing without pilot control? ”

    Why do you ask me? Helios Airways Flight 522 crashed into a mountain after running out of fuel, with pilots incapacitated due to hypoxia. But that was not Susie’s question.”

    Helios Airways Flight 522 had a commercial pilot as PIC when it crashed. Not the same.

    Sorry you found my last paragraph as confused rubbish.

  29. McMurdo Sound as a destination. Puts a different context on it.
    Much ado about nothing?

  30. @David,

    It seems Duncan Steel have a similar opinion:

    “””
    New Zealand-based physicist Duncan Steel, from the so-called Independent Group of investigators into MH370’s disappearance…

    In a later email, he said information from Captain Zaharie’s home simulator was “quite likely irrelevant and cannot be taken to be evidence of any actual intent to fly such a path” given the route positions were consistent with one terminating at an airfield in Antarctica’s McMurdo Sound.

    “It is easy to imagine that an experienced airline captain, bored with flying to the same old places, might like to consider more exotic destinations,” he wrote.
    “””

    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/aviation/australian-officials-warned-families-of-mh370-data-leak-from-fbi/news-story/c3e20ed1355c1c46cdbe44c53d1faff5

  31. @Jeff Wise
    … I know that most folks on this forum are sincerely trying to get to the truth of this missing plane.
    But, … why would anyone actually believe that the pilot was suicidal, much less be capable of mass murder?
    … the new data does not change in any way the image of this pilot as a normal person doing his job with professionalism.

  32. @CliifG

    It is a default conclusion based on the fact that no has any other even remotely plausible ideas relative how the plane could have ended up in the priority search area.

    The main players – ATSB, IG, SSWG, DSTG, and most independent investigators advocating the current search area avoid the issue entirely by saying they don’t need to make assumptions about motive. Well…these people obviously need something, and they need it very badly. Collectively they have managed to accomplish absolutely nothing.

  33. @CliffG, What do we really know about Zaharie? The Malaysian government and his relatives all say he was a great guy, but now we know that they were all lying to cover up for him. So what else have they been lying about?

    Believe me, pilot-suicide is not the top of my list, but it is a real possibility, and all the attempts to sweep this new piece of data are casting a very bad light on those trying to make it go away — some of whom, I might add, are in the media.

  34. Unless it is proven, the 7 hour desolate ocean shrouding of a jumbo jet by theft, by kidnapping, by stealth flying, by murder, by suicide remains incomprehensible to me.

    Given the momentum toward Captain Shah’s guilt, it is obvious many want it to go that direction, either by conviction he did it or conviction to make it appear he did.

    To imagine anyone expending that much time and energy on hiding something as insignificant as an airplane, after they had killed themselves (my apologies, but again insignificant) simply to ensure no one found how and where it happened?

    I do not believe there is a chance in hell that Z spent time designing and planning this act of murder/suicide, to culminate in a dainty as possible roaring ocean landing, to try and keep as many pieces of his plane together so it could sink in one big piece in a most secretive spot that no one could find. And why would this man, who in his life had conducted himself without strife, why would this man even begin to have a thought process, a thought process that only the deranged can possess and only the most twisted can construe? Oh right….because he was mad about Ibrahim.

  35. @CliffG, To basically restate DennisW’s observation, there are just very few ways that the plane could have done the things that it did. The Zaharie-mass-murder-suicide narrative isn’t very appealing for a lot of reasons, but there are no alternatives that are significantly better.

    I’m not saying it’s an open-and-shut case, but this latest development clearly bolsters it.

  36. @Jeff Wise
    In your post at July 26, 2016 at 1:58 PM You Said:
    The “missing” data point actually lies pretty much in a straight line with the first three, before the turn to the south.

    Now, obviously, the turn to the south is your point 3 near the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
    So the “mystery point” must be between your pointts 1 and 3.
    So, it can only be between points 1 and 2, OR between 2 and 3.

    Now, between 1 and 2 is highly unlikely. The distance is very short, and a data point anywhere there abouts would be of no significance at all.

    So, it must be between 2 and 3.

    Now, if it IS in a “pretty much in a straight line”, as you say, AND between 2 and 3, the actual two dimensional Lat Lon position is a no particular interest, a no brainer, if at cruise altitude.

    But the third dimension, altitude, would be telling.

    I don’t suppose that it might be “way lower than FL320”, and just happen to coincide with a point within, or on the perimeter, of the famous white circle, on the imfamous Lido Slide, by any chance, would it, Jeff ?

    I think IT IS TIME to “let the cat out of the bag” Jeff, or this whole FBI 6 points thing becomes quite silly.

  37. @Susie Crowe

    Exactly. If Captain Shah did not commit suicide, and I don’t believe for a minute that he did, then the airplane cannot be in the priority search area or anywhere near it. This conclusion was fairly obvious from the very early days of this investigation, but it was ignored by an army of geeks who were confident that their assumptions about the flight dynamics were correct, and they did not need to connect a path to a causality dot.

    What I have long believed happened is that Shah was a part of a plan to obtain some sort of concession from the Malaysian Government, and the plan unraveled. Shah fully intended to land the aircraft safely somewhere. It just did not work out that way.

    Perhaps the investigation into the Malaysian Government initiated recently will turn over some rocks that provide some insight into what happened to MH370. I can only hope. The current approach and cast of characters is clearly not going to get it done.

  38. @Jeff Wise

    In case others are having trouble working it out, I will be specific.

    Question to you:
    Does the position and altitude of the “mystery point” provide unequivocal proof of “deliberate action” (Najib) to “duck under” the Butterworth / Western Hill” radar horizon ?
    YES or NO.

  39. @Jeff Wise

    Come on Jeff.
    If “the red route” is real, it was “originally planned” for a long flight, from a European Departure, with PLENTY of fuel.
    The plan was to rapidly drop off radar, to make it look like the aircraft crashed in the Malacca Strait, and then proceed to the FMT “at low level”, perhaps even as low as FL100. He would use a lot of fuel getting to the FMT at low level, but if he had fuel for Amsterdam, he had plenty of “fuel to burn”.
    Now, for whatever reason, he did it on this particular day, off a short flight to Beijing, with a lot less fuel.
    He could not stay “low” for long.
    He had to climb back up to fuel efficient cruise altitude fairly soon, and he had to “shorten his track miles to the FMT and the Equator”.
    So, the “white circle” is this descent process. It would make perfect sence, given his fuel situation.

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