Twitter user @AirInvestigate just tweeted this picture. Thanks to reader Ventus45 for posting the link in comments. This presumable is part of the 1,000-page Royal Malaysian Police report that the Independent Group and others have been sitting on for months.
When Victor Iannello described the contents of this report to me, he implied that the only parts that were interesting were 1) the pages describing the flight simulator hard drive data points in the southern Indian Ocean, and 2) confirmation of the Penang cell-phone tower connection with Fariq’s phone. Apparently there was nothing in the rest of it that suggested any hint of what might have happened during the fateful final flight.
Here I’ve used Google Earth to drop a 32 km radius circle centered on Bandar Baru Air Itam on top of a map of MH370’s flight path taken from the “Bayesian Methods” e-book:
UPDATE 11/12/16: @Airinvestigate has posted a second part of the document on Twitter. He describes it as “parts clipped & redacted.”
Interesting to note that the Malaysian police are on the same page with many of those here in this forum in concluding that the plane was flying in excess of 500 knots and at an altitude of 35,000 to 45,000 feet–very clearly not the behavior of someone looking for an emergency landing spot.
@Jeff Wise,
You said:
“@DennisW,
You wrote, “As far as generating a slow curving path to the NorthEast is concerned, it would be a piece of cake. Not sure where the assertion to the contrary comes from.”
You imagine it would be a piece of cake, because you have not tried it. What you will end up doing is generating a flight plan with arbitrary heading and/or throttle changes. Not only are these incompatible with even irrational human behavior, they are vanishingly unlikely from a probabilistic perspective, in that the hijacker would have to have arrived at, by sheer chance, the ones that just happen to match the straight-and-fast ping rings, out of the untold possible routes one could arrive at via arbitrary heading and throttle changes.”
I believe you are both wrong, and the truth lies in the middle.
It is neither ”vanishingly unlikely” nor “a piece of cake” to identify an auto-piloted post-FMT route that satisfies all the satellite data and ends NE of the current search area. There are a very few routes that do this. I pointed this out in your blog on September 1st when I posted a description of three candidate routes using magnetic track or true heading at Holding speed:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzOIIFNlx2aUQTVUOVl4YmtxNWs/view?usp=sharing
Obtaining this result has not been a piece of cake. It has taken me two years to develop a route fitter which can effectively search for curved and slow routes (which are much more difficult to fit than “straight and fast” routes).
Routes to the NE of the CSA can be compatible with the Bayesian results, which show an extension up to about 34S. As Dr. Gordon said, the CSA includes only about 70% of the integrated probability map. A lot of the remaining 30% is to the NE.
During the past several months I have been refining the true heading route because it seems to me to be more likely than a magnetic track. I think the true heading post-FMT route is a result of a route discontinuity at a last-entered waypoint (hopefully Matt Moriarty can obtain a meaningful simulator result in December, but this is difficult because one needs to observe the commanded headings over a very long period of time in order to determine if the route is true or magnetic heading – unless one tests at very high latitudes).
I initially found a candidate true heading route passing through BEDAX, but that one requires two turns – one prior to 18:40 and one afterwards. Recently I discovered another one that requires only one turn southward to ANOKO at 18:37:38 from the 296 degree track ~12 NM to the right lof N571. There are no descents. The PDA is 3.3% which is acceptable for used engines. The altitude is FL370 and the speed is Holding. The terminus is 35.26S. ANOKO is the first waypoint in the “ANOKO TWO CHARLIE” standard arrival pattern at WITT (Banda Aceh). The final pilot input for this route occurs at 18:37:38 which is prior to the 18:40 phone call. It also passes about 2 NM west of Kate Tee (at high altitude from N to S).
I have also been assessing endurance for various speed modes, and I will post on this subject soon. The bottom line is that, on this particular night, no “straight and fast” route can reach the 7th Arc in the CSA. That applies to LRC, ECON 52, MRC and Holding speeds. If my fuel model is correct, the additional 3.7% penalty in fuel flow due to the average +11C temperature above ISAT renders the endurance incapable of reaching the 7th Arc in the CSA for straight routes. Only curved (and therefore slower) routes ending NE of the CSA have sufficient endurance and range to reach the 7th Arc. This would explain the ATSB’s lack of success in that area.
@keffertje, @matt:
However you turn, the hidden messages in the window seal video are not political. At best, they are meant to give his children and posterity a kind of after-the-fact hint that he could have done it with intent because he viewed Malay society as corrupt and that he was the avenger (who just happened to chose mostly Chinese). The reason to hide that message is not political either but would have to be about deniability of suicide/intent. There is nothing there to support anything but, with a stretch, suicide for personal reasons or a wicked act of terror. Otherwise you need to spell it out for me.
If one is kind, one could suggest he put them there like that to poke some fun on society, but that does not make much sense either, since it is hardly an underground newspaper. Also probable could be that he wanted to give a historic/contemporary coloration to the video.
The big question might be if he needs them at all to seal the Windows. If he should paint them it would have been another matter. I might have to look at that again.
@Jeff Wise
“……. Not only are these incompatible with even irrational human behavior, they are vanishingly unlikely from a probabilistic perspective, in that the hijacker would have to have arrived at, by sheer chance, the ones that just happen to match the straight-and-fast ping rings, out of the untold possible routes one could arrive at via arbitrary heading and throttle changes.”
Jeff, if you consider piloted flight as a possibility, which I do, a professional pilot uses waypoints and straight paths at a steady speed.
Shah was a professional pilot, he would have used waypoints and let the plane do the flying.
The previously posted flight paths round below Sumatra fit the BTO data perfectly from 19:40 through 00:11 with straight paths at a constant ground speed using waypoints right to the end.
@Freddie, A lot of people, including me, have spent a lot of time playing with different ways of fitting routes to ping rings. It seems to me that the DSTG has basically done all the work for us by running through their computers all the autopilot-compatible routes to see which come up and which do not.
If the DSTG believes that there is a zero percent chance that MH370 reached a certain spot on the seventh arc, I take this as good evidence that there is no autopilot mode that gets you there (absent a loiter post 18:40).
Note that there “zero percent chance” area extends further to the northeast than the boundaries of the “120K sq km search area” as described in Bayesian Methods. However it does not expand beyond the actual search area, where Fugro Equator was recently scanning with the towfish.
@Jeff Wise
“@Freddie, A lot of people, including me, have spent a lot of time playing with different ways of fitting routes to ping rings …… ”
Jeff, I am not fitting routes to “ping rings”.
I keep emphasising that I fit routes to waypoints, this is a totally different approach.
Sure, they also fit the “ping rings”, that’s a bonus.
@Freddie, When I talk about fitting a route to the ping rings, what I mean is fitting the BTO data
Bobby Ulich writes, “I think the true heading post-FMT route is a result of a route discontinuity at a last-entered waypoint”
Discussion is futile. It is time to take action. I will wager a fine bottle of single malt (say, an 18 year old Glenlivet or equivalent) that a route discontinuity or last waypoint on a 777 results in constant MAGNETIC heading. (Caveat – in the polar regions, as per advice from Boeing, I would conjecture that it would, indeed, be true heading. Matt Moriarty should NOT go there!) As always, I am happy to be shown wrong.
@Jeff Wise
“@Freddie, When I talk about fitting a route to the ping rings, what I mean is fitting the BTO data”
Jeff, I am not fitting routes to “BTO data”.
I keep emphasising that I fit routes to waypoints, this is a totally different approach.
Sure, they also fit the “BTO data”, that’s a bonus.
@Jeff Wise:
This is a screenshot from the FCOM showing the Navigation Display (ND) in WPT mode:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/1a2heg5mi6q3u6u/Schermafdruk%202016-11-12%2023.11.49.png?dl=0
In that mode the ND shows the waypoints that are in the FMC navigation database. The vertical line is the selected track. If the pilot turns the heading selector on the Mode Control Panel (MCP) until the desired waypoint is under the vertical line and selects that heading or track, the autopilot will fly towards that waypoint.
Overhead that waypoint the pilot repeats that for the next waypoint, and so on.
That way you can fit a route to the ping arcs, i.e. the BTO data. I haven’t been able to do that at constant speed, but perhaps Freddie has. Of course a pilot using the autopilot in this mode doesn’t have to fly exactly over each waypoint, so there is some flexibility in matching the route to the arcs.
Sorry, I didn’t explain the display correctly. It shows the airplane corrently flying on autopilot on trk 140 mag. The pilot has turned the heading selector to trk 165 mag, the track toward waypoint ANVIL, but has not yet pushed the heading select switch.
@JeffWise, All
DTG: 2319Z12NOV2016
It would appear that the relevant Phone tower (BBFARLIM2) has 6 (SIX) “standard GSM” allocations, i.e. frequency channels, as extracted from the references, detailed below.
Source:-
http://www.skmm.gov.my/Legal/Registers/Register-Of-Apparatus-Assignments-Search.aspx?src=&type=celcom_cell&fld=Location&sort=location%20ASC&page=83 (Page 83)
AND
http://www.skmm.gov.my/Legal/Registers/Register-Of-Apparatus-Assignments-Search.aspx?src=&type=celcom_cell&fld=Location&sort=location%20ASC&page=84 (Page 84)
(Note:- Sorted by “LOCATION”)
It would appear that the relevant Phone tower (BBFARLIM2) has 6 (SIX) “standard GSM” allocations, i.e. frequency channels, as extracted from the references, detailed below.
REGISTERS UNDER THE COMMUNICATIONS AND MULTIMEDIA ACT 1998
Cellular Station
#.
Assignment Holder
Assignment No
Location
RX Assign (MHz)
TX Assign (MHz)
Region
Expiry Date
2547. CELCOM AXIATA BHD 01940805-000SU/262016 BBFARLIM2 902,4 947,4 UTARA 31 Disember 2016
14186. CELCOM AXIATA BHD 01940805-000SU/262016 BBFARLIM2 894 939 UTARA 31 Disember 2016
38076. CELCOM AXIATA BHD 01940805-000SU/262016 BBFARLIM2 903,6 948,6 UTARA 31 Disember 2016
38077. CELCOM AXIATA BHD 01940805-000SU/262016 BBFARLIM2 898,4 943,4 UTARA 31 Disember 2016
32034. CELCOM AXIATA BHD 01940805-000SU/262016 BBFARLIM2 904,8 949,8 UTARA 31 Disember 2016
32035. CELCOM AXIATA BHD 01940805-000SU/262016 BBFARLIM2 897,4 942,4 UTARA 31 Disember 2016
An image of same:-
https://www.dropbox.com/s/mxck6jb14t11vvr/Phone%20Tower%20Location%20BBFARLIM2.JPG?dl=0
@buyerninety
RE your post
Posted November 12, 2016 at 12:23 PM
Good post!
The best place with the most window space and the best connectivity is the front cockpit.
The insight to have mobiles switched off during flight has escaped the mind of people since at least a decade. And while it is still procedure for the cabin and the cockpit to have mobiles switched off or in flight mode for take off and landings I know a lot of pilots, who do not care about that part, at least not for the sake of some remote electronic interference risk. Electronic equipment of modern jets is hardened against all kinds of inside and outside electronic emissions. If there would be any kind of remote danger from mobile phone emissions then they would not be allowed at all in the cabin or at least there would be measures to detect active mobiles in the cabin by some kind of scanner.
I have the impression that this procedure is still active to have the attention of the people for the emergency briefing prior takeoff and the preparation of the cabin for landing. Otherwise 90% of the people would not listen.
The cell phone connection is a good confirmation for the routing and for an aproximate altitude at that point, but nothing more.
I don’t know whow accurate this is, so, with caution:-
It would “appear” that the tower is on the top of a hill of 75 Metres elevation, very near the Water Tank at:- 5° 24.570’N 100° 17.030’E, but I can not find it in Google Earth.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/btj3pim0i98fol2/Tower-1.JPG?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/t87g33ag7ce5gk0/Tower-2.JPG?dl=0
Lighthouse (Tower ?)
Celcom Air Itam
Address: Hye Keat Estate, 11500 Air Itam, Pulau Pinang, Malaysia
Longitude: 100.28440475463867 Latitude: 5.409407207954223
A second RMP page posted:
https://twitter.com/AirInvestigate
@David
…trying to interpret that page…are they suggesting MH370 was at FL350 to FL450 when the call was received?
@sk999,
I gather you also have no definitive information on the default navigation after a route discontinuity. Too bad. A simulator test may be the only way for us to find out since the investigators/Boeing are unwilling to provide it. If Matt wants to have a useful test, he will have to figure out a route preferably at a latitude < 70 degrees where the difference between true heading and magnetic heading is clearly discernible during the test. I'm not sure how the winds are set in the simulator, but they can affect the understanding of the result. In my opinion it would be best to set the wind to zero so it cannot confuse the interpretation of the resulting track.
I am reading conflicting info of that there was some kind of connection BUT when they tried to simulate in an aircraft they didn’t get same results ???
@TBill, MH. Yes, as I read the two pages the detection was made from BBFARLIM2 Base Station when their information was that MH370 was at 35 to 45 thousand ft. Since they are unable to explain that from their RF measurement results they propose their measurements be provided to network operators ‘for further analysis’.
If done, results?
@Jeff Wise
““@Freddie, When I talk about fitting a route to the ping rings, what I mean is fitting the BTO data””
“Jeff, I am not fitting routes to BTO data. I keep emphasising that I fit routes to waypoints, this is a totally different approach. Sure, they also fit the “BTO data”, that’s a bonus.”
There are two routes that fit coming round below Sumatra that I posted last month, as follows
“Jeff, there are at least two tracks well to the northeast that fit the BTO’s accurately and both pass through the Cocos Islands waypoint.
1. The target waypoint of UXORA gives a possible final location around 20S to 21S with just three waypoints within the five BTO’s from 19:41 through to 00:11 and a constant ground speed through to 22:41 while fitting all the BTO’s without changing the true track at any of the BTO’s.
2. The target waypoint of IPKON gives a possible final location around 8S to 9S with just three waypoints within the five BTO’s from 19:41 through to 00:11 being required to give a constant ground speed and fit all the BTO’s like a glove without changing the true track at any of the BTO’s.”
They are both actually designated flight paths from Cocos out towards the 7th arc, being M641 and G200.
When Duncan published the ping rings back in mid 2014 the above routes fell into place.
I do not know what happened to MH370 but I do know what was intended to happen.
Mention was made of Banda Aceh, Cocos and Bandung.
This led me to a preference for No. 2 above as being the more likely route because IPKON is on the way to Bandung.
@David @MH
More discussion over on REDDIT. Apparently the call-phone connection tests were not well designed, but the implication (per VictorI) could be that “detection” might be possible at fairly high altitude, considering the flight path. Actual “connection” may require low altitude but “detection” may not be as difficult.
https://www.reddit.com/r/MH370/comments/5cil3y/fariq_phone_connection_confirmed/?st=ivg3ncpl&sh=023d6495#bottom-comments
P.S. I find it somewhat controversial that the report even publicly mentions possible 45,000-ft altitude
@All. Are these leaked reports authentic? Is there a way to verify that?
@Ventus45
Your caution is justified. I believe BBFARLIM2 is actually
Bandar Baru Farlim 2, i.e.
Farlim; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farlim
(‘2’ could be a 2nd antenna structure or a 2nd base station site.)
Therefore, if still looking, search about ~1.5 to 2km south of your
previous suggested area
Cheers
Question I have is why only Faraq’s phone made the connection?
There was Malaysian passengers onboard with maybe same service provider..
The report indicates mH370 flying much faster GS500knts at an altitude between 35,000-45,000 ft…
I’m currently digging through technical specs/range on Cell phone making connection with a tower at those flight levels..
Most of what I’ve read so far say a connection can be made for a brief moment, though planes position would have to be almost directly above the tower.. Given MH370’s position to the tower in question..
I can’t possibility see how a connection is made at a flight level around 35,000ft..
Like all Malaysian reports previously this one is no different..
@buyerninety
I think you were correct !
Not sure, but it looks like the tower is on the top of the Sunshin Farlim Mall about 1.5Km south of the water tank.
Positioned at 5° 23.758’N 100° 17.188’E
Anyone able to confirm ?
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ugpy1s6deorpev3/Tower-3.gif?dl=0
@Aaron
“The report indicates mH370 flying much faster GS500knts at an altitude
between 35,000-45,000 ft”
I understand that all official reports released about MH370 flightpath,
in the region where it neared, bypassed and departed the Island of
Penang, omit the altitude that MH370 was at. Can you cite the pages
in that report where MH370 was near Penang Island and was at ‘35000 to
45000 feet’?
Here’s what I posted back on July 27;
(MH370’s) “arrival in near WMKP airspace sets it at about lower
limit of around 4000 feet for several of the approach procedures,
& in the case of one particular procedure, as low as 3500 to 3100
feet for 16NM mostly over Penang State to a low of 2500 feet roughly
South West of the southern end of Penang airport runway”.
http://aip.dca.gov.my/aip/AIP2016/graphics/17509.pdf
(that was back when I thought MH370 was waypointing ENDOR-MEKAT
-KENDI, but I don’t think it was following that particular
navigation path anymore.)
{EDIT to my post above, substitute instead;
“but I no longer hold a firm belief it was following that
particular navigation path anymore.”
@Ventus45
Here’s a youtube of Farlim area at height.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I96aB8TZhdA
1:55 is (very approximately) due south
The white building (seen at the right) whose lower 3rd is brown
colour is called Puncak Terubong. (There have been some more
towers built behind it since the video date, you can just discern
what looks like a construction crane to right of Puncak Terubong.)
I’m wondering if those towers or southwards hilltops have base
stations on them.
@Ventus45
For your ease of spacial orientation, I should add that the point
approximately directly below the camera (launch point) is;
http://www.google.com.au/maps/place/Farlim+Night+Market/@5.389786,100.28286,2927m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x5ff87e27ddd7b3a5!8m2!3d5.389786!4d100.28286
@TBill. ‘Actual “connection” may require low altitude but “detection” may not be as difficult’.
Yes looks like that. Also the two pages use the term ‘calls’ and there is reference elsewhere to ‘registration’, apparently synonymous with ‘detection’. Confusing.
@Johan. Thanks for your response about the fatwa. The uses and abuses of religion in an analytic world prompted my obtuse remarks; on reflection not a topic for here.
@buyerninety @David @others
The report states; detected by sector 2 of BBFARLIM2 base station.
IMO this can only mean one of the three antennas (each covering a 120 degree sector) mounted on the BBFARLIM2 base station tower.
Those antennas are mounted verticaly and have a rather narrow angle of recieving and sending in the vertical plain.
I estimated about 45 degrees.
Therefore it seems impossible to me BBFARLIM2 detected the phone between 35k and 45k. And it didn’t. No base station did.
As the report states BBFARLIM2 did not detect any phone at all during their experiments.
Other Celcom base stations detected the phones only under 8000ft with one exeption of the IPhone succeeding once at 20000ft.
Which base stations? Where?
I assume the phones used in the experiment where the ones they knew Fariq possessed; a IPhone S5 and a Blackberry 9700.
While BBFARLIM2 base station did not detect any phone during the experiments this could/would mean the flown route and altitude during the experiments where not the actual route and altitude flown by MH370 that allowed detection of the phone by BBFARLIM2.
This could/would mean IMO MH370 did not pass Penang Island under its south coast but approuched and crossed the island more north at an altitude under 20000ft.
IMO this seems to me now the only way BBFARLIM2 base station could have detected Fariq’s phone.
It would have been usefull IMO if they had carried out flights that resulted in detection by BBFARLIM2.
But it seems they sticked to their ‘facts’ MH370 was flying between 35kft and 45kft passing south of the island which resulted in no detection by BBFARLIM2.
@buyerninety
The photo you posted of Fariq with his phone.
It’s in a shell-case and the picture is mirrored (look at his jacket).
The shape and layout looks most like a Blackberry Q5 or Q10 to me.
To add:
For no base stations detected or connected a phone between 35kft and 45kft only at or under 20.000ft, most under 8000ft, the experiments carried out prove at least MH370 did not approuched or passed Penang Island between 35kft and 45kft.
The experiments IMO prove MH370 must have flown at much lower altitudes at the time, between ~8000ft and ~20.000ft. Maybe even lower than 8000ft (which gave the most detections/connections).
@Keffertje, Over on Reddit, Victor Iannello (who has a copy of the full RMP report) has written: “The image has edited elements from more than one page, but the elements he includes in that image are from the report. I don’t know why he has chosen to release this at this time and in this format, but I guess he has his reasons.”
@Freddie, You are spouting gibberish.
@Ge Rijn:
“The photo you posted of Fariq with his phone.
It’s in a shell-case and the picture is mirrored (look at his jacket).
The shape and layout looks most like a Blackberry Q5 or Q10 to me.”
Looks like a BB Q5 to me as it has a flat top rather than the slightly arched one on the Q10. Timing is OK too, as it was on the market mid-2013.
Good spot showing the horizontal flip of the photo. Could that have been done to hide the fact that Fariq was married, as he is sporting a wedding ring on his left hand?
@Aaron
I understand now – you got the wording from the topic lead-in
of the police report at the top of this page, i.e.;
“This is due to the fact that MH370 flew at a much higher speed
(>500 knots), at a much higher altitude (35,000ft-45,000ft)”.
I have to admit, if I continue to theorize that MH370 flew past
Penang at a low level, that is in direct conflict with the words
in that report. On the other hand, a cell contact at ~30000 feet
seems to have no basis in any previous experience or experiment.
What altitude does the ‘Bayesian Methods in the Search for MH370’
give for this part of the flightpath? Other than stating that;
“The radar data contains regular estimates of latitude, longitude
and altitude at 10 s intervals from 16:42:27 to 18:01:49″(UTC),
it gives no actual altitude, other than this rather strange
statement; “the ground speed observed by the radar prior to 18:02
is relatively high and implies that the aircraft would have been
at low altitude.”
Huh? If altitude data estimates, at 10 second intervals, for that
part of the flightpath are available, why would a scientist have
to make or take any ‘implication’ as to what the altitude was?
(Elsewhere in the ‘Bayesian Methods..’ is mention of calculations
done using an assumed altitude of 30000 feet, but that is in regard
to different parts of the flightpath than that circa Penang Island.)
@Jeff Wise – Is it correct to say that Dr Neil Gordan appears to
have never been queried in regard to this matter?
@buyerninety, I never questioned Neil Gordon on this point. Given the high speed post-IGARI, it’s been generally understood that the plane must have been flying quite high.
After a good night’s sleep I think I have to expand on my description of the ND again. On reflection, it doesn’t matter whether the autopilot is engaged or not. The inverted triangle pointer on the compass rose indicates the current heading. Turning the heading selector probably generates the dashed line that indicates the heading currently shown on MCP heading window. The “M”-shaped symbol on the compass rose probably indicates indicates that the track 165 towards ANVIL has been selected by pressing the heading select button on the selector knob. The triangular symbol at the bottom indicates the current position of the airplane on the map. The dashed curve at the top of the airplane symbol predicts position after 30, 60, and 90 seconds, based on bank angle and GS. It indicates that the airplane is turning to the right, towards the selected track.
BTW I think this is the method of navigation used after the turn-back near IGARI, when the airplane was flown manually with the autopilot disengaged.
They had both primary and secondary radar data until the secondary data were lost. Therefore they must have had a pretty good idea about the accuracy of the primary radar altitudes. However, they were not interested in the altitudes because the Bayesian method doesn’t use altitudes.
“I have to admit, if I continue to theorize that MH370 flew past
Penang at a low level, that is in direct conflict with the words
in that report. On the other hand, a cell contact at ~30000 feet”
@buyerninety
Direct conflict indeed and conflictswith other reports the Malaysian government has released..
Take the military radar track and the anomalies I,e gaps..Maybe anomaly is not the right word as some ppl here and on other forums have suggested the reason for the gaps in the military radar sweep of MH370 is that MH370 was flying at very low altitude.One of those gaps is south west of Penang..
That contradicts a plane at high altitude..
Question I have once again is why the cover up continues…
@all
With all the tech people onboard someone could have had a cell phone booster perhaps signal only just reached cell antenna from a great hight.
@all
Something like this https://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&sku=1149163&gclid=CNuzxvrtpdACFRa3Gwodz4UGOw&is=REG&c3api=1876%2C90749819162%2C%2C&A=details&Q=&pcur=GBP mobile that connects to an AC power sockets as seen in planes.
@all
From the current Reddit-discussion I copied the following:
“I saw an internal memo from Abdul Farim Fakir Ali, CTO of Maxis, saying that they picked up a call attempt from a “crew member” originating on a cell tower covering Perhentian Besar. He also implied that Digi may have something from a different crew member near or over Jambatan Pulau Pinang.”
Perhentian Besar is an island on the north-east coast of Malaysia not far from Kota Bharu.
Jambatan Pulau Pinang is the northern 13.5km long Penang Bridge connecting Penang Island to mainland Malaysia.
@Johan
“If they are from the same issue of one and the same paper it is weird, but not at all impossible.”
The headline “Bond drops by Afghanistan” dates to 19/11/2012.
The headline “nepotisme realiti dalam PR” dates to 10/10/2012:
http://www.sinarharian.com.my/nasional/nepotisme-realiti-dalam-pr-1.93021
The headline “PKR Johor tolak projec Rapid” could be this one from 5/10/2012, but the link is no longer available:
http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/pkr-promises-to-scale-down-and-move-rapid-project-to-kertih
@Ge Rijn, Interesting post on the memo, if it is authentic. It’s strange that this information would only come out now. If true though, it would seem crew tried to make calls right after the radical turn back and then again over penang on several towers. That would imply that they were trying to place calls immediately after the turn, probably continuously. It makes me shiver, just the thought of it.
Regarding “high” v. “low” altitude, I calculate that the maximum true airspeed for the atmospheric conditions on the night of Mar 7/8 to be 526 knots at a pressure altitude of 30,400 feet (actual altitude of 32,300 feet). This value corresponds to ias of 330 knots and Mach 0.87 (both listed at the maximum for a B777-200). The maximum airspeed given in Bayesian Methods (after correcting the ground speed for winds) is 518 knots, except for a period of about a minute after the turn at IGARI when the airspeed reached 531 knots, but that value may be an artifact of the DSTG filter not following the turn properly. If anyone else has done these calculations it would be useful to know.
@Nederland:
Thanks. Good to hear from you.
The last of the articles you mention refers to statements made by a PKR party representative at a public meeting on 30 Sept. 2012. It is about Anwar promising to disallow a big Petronas industrial Project in Pengerang. As reported in Free Malaysia Today, http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2012/09/30/pkr-to-scrap-rapid-when-it-gets-to-putrajaya/
It might have taken a few days to show up in other newspapers.
Well, these are thus from a limited but not very limited time period of one and a half month or so.
It is of course a little strange that he happens to chose articles that in hindsight can be connected in one way or the other to the disappearance (apart from the second above, where we know of no immediate connection, but with the addition of the missing one, “The end is near for Twilight”, which demands a little benevolent interpretation to be counted).
The non-criminal interpretation of this is that he prefers some pages that will look a little bit better on video and not take the attention from the film/work, at the same time as he might have chosen some because of his or his children’s (relative) preferences (Twilight, Bond); add some historic colouration to that and there is nothing necessarily strange.
From another angle: could it be that he had decided in autumn 2012 to go to his fathers when the time was right and an opportunity showed up? Or that he had the plan for a while and then not and then again? Not impossible. But it is not political, is it? There is no political message of any kind, not here. It is terrorism or extended suicide. How do you say: self-aggrandisement or naïve omnipotency? (But in a very modest fashion as to its expression here.)
I would bet on “not immediately related” to the disappearance of MH370.
But there might be more. Native Malaysians have probably looked at this, and should have.
@all
What a mess to wake up to. How many times do we have to go over this same ground?
Registration and call initiation are two very different things. When your phone is turned on it is continuously scanning for base station SID’s (identifiers) which are broadcast on a control channel separate from the channels used to make a call. The control channels broadcast at a fixed power (usually higher than the regulated power associated with user data channels). When your phone detects a basestation SID it returns its own SID. If the returned SID is recognized by the base station registration is complete. The whole process takes much less than a second.
That is why the often referenced writeup made by a pair of farmers flying around in Ohio in their Cessna trying to call their wives (unsuccessfully) is so irrelevant. Only the carrier has access to registration information. Whether you can complete a call is a totally separate matter.
In the case of MH370, the registration event had to occur some distance from the basestation. Basestations do not transmit or receive in the “vertical” direction. Their antennas are optimized for a horizontal direction for obvious reasons. Sure, there will be some leakage upwards at distances in the far field of the basestation.
Since MH370 flew at an average ground speed of about 500 knots between the registration event and the last radar contact at 18:22, it is reasonable to assume that the aircraft was well above 8000 feet when the registration event occurred near Penang.
Dear Mr. Iannello et al IG
Notwithstanding this latest
evidence disclosure via The RMP
back door drop to the IG…
Of which that verily confirms;
1) MH370 was not subject
to hypoxia.
2) MH370 was not subject to flash
fire within the cockpit.
3) MH370 was flying on and or
upon a trajectory and or at
an altitude that conflicts
with official radar data.
4) MH370 was subject to a hijack.
What is of suspicious nature now
is that you and or your team of
IG Members are now in an awkward
position that if you do release
the entire report it will become
inherently clear that other
evidence exists within said
RMP Report that does not fit
the all mighty Inmarsat data
that will cause great anxiety
to the already strained and
outright desperate efforts
by the IG to keep your now
debunked SIO thesis alive.
As such, I am formally
daring you to release the
entire 1000 page RMP Report
and stop behaving in a
fashion akin to that of
the likes of Mr. Assange.
Thank you kindly,
Andre Milne
Unicorn Aerospace
Military Technology Development
unicornaerospace.com
@aeromilitarytec