Nowhere Left to Look for MH370

Image pilfered from Victor Iannello

The suspension of the search for MH370 has been frustrating for many who care deeply about finding the plane. They feel that solving the mystery is essential not just for the emotional well-being of the passengers’ relatives but to protect the safety of the flying public. One group of MH370 relatives has gone so far as to raise money to fund a search on their own.

Assuming one were to raise the money, though, the question would then become: where to look?

Turns out, it’s not so easy to say.

Officially, of course, Australia says it knows where the plane most likely went. As I wrote in my last post, they’ve released a CSIRO report that uses drift modeling and other techniques to argue that the only plausible endpoint is on the 7th arc between 34 and 36 degrees south.

But as Victor Iannello points out in a recent post on his blog, there are some holes in the CSIRO’s logic. For one thing, according to their drift modeling, no-windage debris that enters the water at 35S will reach the shores of Western Australia in fairly significant quantities, but will not reach the South African coast by December 2015, when the real stuff started to turn up there. (You can play around with the kmz files that the CSIRO has made available online; say what you want about the Australians, they have been fabulous about explaining their work and making gobs of data available to the public.)

There’s another problem: the area between 34S and 36S has been searched out to 10 nm and beyond. I am very skeptical that a plane last spotted accelerating downward at 0.6 g, and already descending at 15,000 fpm, could possibly travel anywhere near as much as 10 nm. If anyone has produced flight sim runs that accomplish this, I would very much like to see it. (The IG said as much in their September 2014 paper.)

I’d add my own third reason to suspect that no wreckage would be found in the ATSB’s new search zone: it doesn’t play well with the DSTG’s Bayesian analysis of the BTO data, which is why it was excluded from the 120,000 sq km seabed search as it was ultimately defined.

So if not the ATSB’s new area, then where? South of 39.5S is ruled out because the plane couldn’t fly that far. 36S to 39.5S is ruled out because it’s been searched. 34S to 36S is ruled out for the reasons discussed above. And north of 34S is ruled out because the debris would have been spotted during the surface search.

This is where we stand, three years after the disappearance: with lots of different kinds of clues delimiting where the plane could have gone, it’s hard to make a plausible case that MH370 went anywhere.

UPDATE: Elle Hunt has written a story in the Guardian about Victor’s criticism of the ATSB’s new search zone. Unfortunately it takes seriously the idea that 30S is a plausible alternative. In addition to the ATSB’s assertion that the debris here would have been spotted during the surface search phase, there are the additional problems that:

  • Low-windage debris would have reached the coast of southern Africa in early 2015, and the flaperon would have arrived in Réunion late 2014. Both are way too early.
  • This endpoint was calculated as having a zero percent probability in the DSTG Bayesian analysis of the Inmarsat data.

125 thoughts on “Nowhere Left to Look for MH370”

  1. If there is “no plausible case that MH370 went anywhere”….then it would seem plausible that something is very dirty of fishy.

  2. The area 32-35S has not been adequately searched given the uncertainty in the data…ping rings could be off by, what, 10 km? So the idea to search there is not totally wrong.

    Makes sense to me that MH370 PIC may have cut back on speed after getting “safely” through Indonesian air space, and I think that argues for roughly due South track down around 93E (which is similar to DrB’s path (but I might make some variations including a non-ghost flight at least through Indonesian air space).

    After that I would question ATSB ruling out anything north due to lack of debris.

  3. Interesting story from the Noyaya Gazeta, the Russian independent newspaper (crazy that there is such a thing; a number of their journalists have been gunned down–talk about brave) reporting that the GRU colonel I wrote about earlier admitted that Moscow was responsible for the shootdown of MH17:

    https://www.unian.info/society/1892464-russian-journalist-presents-exclusive-proof-of-khmuryi-involvement-in-mh17-downing-video.html

    If we know that Russia deliberately destroyed one of the Malaysia Airlines 777s that was lost in 2014, it would only be reasonable to put them under suspicion for having done the other one, too.

  4. I would say to search the military bases in Malaysia and Sarawak. The publicly provided data has too many inconsistencies to be a flight to the SIO along with drift models not agreeing with debris arrivals/etc/etc

  5. Overall the issue with the Bayesian analysis is the assumptions, basically assuming a ghost flight making no intentional speed or heading changes as the aircraft meandered aimlessly over the SIO.

    In contrast, many observers including myself feel the aircraft was in all likelihood intentionally diverted, which suggests a different set of assumptions.

    Part of the rationale for NOT pursuing the intentional diversion possibility, is that in that complex case, MH370 may could be lost forever (too hard to find in the vastness of the SIO). But a more pro-active focus on the intentional diversion scenario could possibly lead to improved search zone priorities.

    Obviously, of course, MY and perhaps Boeing have no interest in “getting to the bottom” of what happened to MH370, in my mind, probably because it was intentional diversion, and they would rather not go into the dirty details about what may have happened in that case. In Boeing’s case the lack of interest is because it could suggest to the public the need for design changes to help mitigate the chance of rouge pilot take-overs.

  6. @Jeff Wise

    Come on Jeff. You know attacking those people won’t help a bit to find answers on the case. It’s all frustrating after so many years for many.
    Nevertheless CSIRO/Griffins conculsions now there is lot of combined drift data now available which point to an area between ~31S 30S IMO.

    I see progres luming.
    Please keep your scientific spirit overrule your emotional spirit in this case ( I know how this can work..).
    Your voice has been essential over the years.
    I hope you don’t spoil it with negativety too much anymore.

    IMO it would be a waste.

  7. @MH:
    “…The publicly provided data has too many inconsistencies to be a flight to the SIO along with drift models not agreeing with debris arrivals/etc/etc.”

    I’ve strongly suspected a cover-up for some time. Not sure if the cause of the disappearance was a high-jacking or some asset – either cargo or personnel. I agree that a search of military bases in Malaysia would be worthwhile and maybe also the RAAF hangers at Pearce, near Perth.

  8. @Boris, if the published data is near correct, one other Australian location would be military base near Exmouth/Learmonth or might be buried in the lands nearby … aka “mirror” of “Kazakhstan theory”.

  9. @Ge Rijn

    An impact area around 31/30S is also a very good match with all independent drift studies that do not presume the plane crashed south of 36S (see appendix, below).

    It is also a good fit with the Isat data imo (although I can’t calculate performance limits etc. but it seems there is a great deal of uncertainty in altitude changes anyway):

    https://www.docdroid.net/idroxeX/mh370-waypoint-20.pdf.html

  10. As seen from an independent followers @richard_e_cole updateshttps://twitter.com/richard_e_cole/status/805124377411022849 it can be seen that there are areas of ATSB’s Bayesian that have not been Bathy-scanned would it be feasible for funding if available to be put forward to complete these areas of small probability. Or would it be a waste of money, it seems that the ATSB have their confident reasons whether public info or restricted info for using Bayesian method and would it be correct and complete to fulfil their method, by searching the whole Bayesian of probability however small that probability may be. I understand that the probability of finding any of main wreckage debris is minute because of how far these unscanned areas are from the seventh Arc. But a probability non the less (a what if). As well as scanning the New area North as ATSB has confidence in.

    Although not specific to a location may show that Malaysia, China and Australia are doing their very best to find MH370. And gradually whittling down these probabilities. However small.

    Why create a Bayesian of probability from the best estimated GUESS terminal endpoint, that had at the time a confident approach towards the interpretation of the data and not fulfil it fully.

    I know the probability decreases dramatically the further away from the 7th Arc but what if that small probability is a find. Continued Hope by the commanders of this search is needed. Confidence has been broken many times because of no concluded result. Keep up the hope. Never give up.

  11. @JW

    “If we know that Russia deliberately destroyed one ”

    uhm, that’s not what’s stated in the article

    why are you so confident that Russia intentionally downed a civilian jet that only brought them bunch of problems

  12. @StevanG, The Russian military brought it over, fired it, took it back, all under the command of a GRU officer. Trained anti-aircraft missile personnel do not fire their weapons without authorization. There is a chain-of-command responsibility.

  13. @TBill “…..I would question ATSB ruling out anything north due to lack of debris”

    Its not realistic to accept the ATSB/CSIRO assumption that the area to the North towards Java has been searched by aircraft and ships and as no debris was spotted MH370 could not be there. This is based on having experience of SAR at sea from the air for long periods of fruitless searching.

  14. There are two other planes that “crashed” but didn’t leave any irrefutable evidence of having actually crashed at the crash site. And both cases were more than a dozen years earlier, more than enough time to perfect the deception technique. If mh370 never actually took off, would not that explain pretty much everything?

  15. MH370 will eventually find us. It was seen by credible witnesses descending in a death glide south of The Maldives, seven hours after it disappeared. It’s in 5000′ of water.

    Australia is a well-meaning patsy. Many governments and institutions do not want to find it because it will reveal the cause (lithium ion batteries in the hold) and their incompetence.

    Michael Hogan, PhD, P.Eng. Toronto, Canada.
    Track me live at http://www.flightaware.com Tail # CFROL

  16. @JW

    it’s word “deliberately” that’s problematic in your statement, I don’t doubt russian military was inolved in shooting

  17. @Sad Jim:
    “…If mh370 never actually took off, would not that explain pretty much everything?”

    Strangely I had the same thought some time ago. The event being masterminded by Penn & Teller, with the main objective being to carry out a clandestine search for a top-secret military asset previously lost in the SIO. The mystery cargo and human assets were simply a juicy bonus and the reason why this particular flight was chosen to be disappeared.

    The logistics of completing this illusion are complex, but not too difficult to achieve providing it’s dark and you have the use of a stealth bomber. Several nations have the resources to carry our this type of operation and orchestrate the subsequent cover-up.

  18. This will probably draw more sarcasm, but namely two 757s which supposedly crashed in Virginia and Pennsylvania in Sept 16 years ago. Too many inconsistencies, very little evidence and nothing irrefutable that proves the official stories, that these planes crashed there. So, if they didn’t crash there, they likely never flew there. Similar situation here: very little evidence, none of it irrefutable proof of the official story, possible spoofing (a technique that has been discussed in much earlier false flag intel documents, not even a new idea) and many unresolved inconsistencies that seem like they could be easily sorted out if there was the will. (Radar, satellite logs, US and U.K. Intel, inspection of the debris et al). Nobody used their phones before takeoff. (I believe that’s true, if it was debunked I don’t know). So maybe the ruse started much earlier than any of us suspect. Maybe it never took off. Maybe a spoof took off. I’m saying look, this isn’t really all that unique of a situation through the lense of willful deception. What I don’t know is what would make it all worthwhile. Why do it. Those poor people. I don’t know what happened to them, (on any of those planes) but it surely wasn’t good.

  19. @Sad Jim: What a spooky idea, had this 16 years ago , too. Did the pax even board the planes? What about the relatives that took them to the airports. People walk on observatory decks to watch the plane take off. They are all fooled? Way too many people involved for a hoax. MH 370 took off and up to IGARI was a normal flight. From there it’s all believe and speculation. Radar blips, Inmarsat pings, believe it or not. The real story of that flight ends at IGARI. That is the problem!

  20. @TimR
    Thank you for the insight.

    @Sad Jim
    I personally donated to the Flight 93 Memorial. The Pentagon 757 probably used the same trick as MH370 – turning off the transponder at the boundary between two air traffic control districts.

  21. @JeffWise

    The Neue Züricher Zeitung (NZZ) is a paper with high reputation like Guardian or NYT or Spiegel.

    They published a very detailed account about the Dubinski background, where he lives now, and why he might have been only a an inferior rank in the decision to shoot down MH17. It was a witness (Tiunow) cited, who personally asked Dubinski after the event, and got the answer, “I didnt command the shoot down . it were those miserable in moscow …” Tiunow was a comrade of Dubinski in the Afghanistan war

    The link to the lengthy article is here – its german language

    https://www.nzz.ch/international/mh17-katastrophe-in-der-ukraine-das-waren-die-missgeburten-aus-moskau-ld.1288943

    there might be an english version on the website of NZZ

  22. @all

    Dubinski

    As a key witness to the MH17 case he will not live very long, as has happened to many “rebel” leaders in eastern Ukraine

    he lives right now in a closed military town with a large GRU special ops unit near Rostow on the river Don.

  23. @all

    There was also a quite elaborate report from Facebook about how the russian troll factories are abusing Facebok for influencing elections in Russia, France and Germany.

    I really wonder now, why Russia spent so much resources of their trolling activities on a desinformation campaign in regard of MH370

  24. The CSIRO report says:

    « Our earlier field testing of replicas of the flaperon was unable to confirm numerical predictions by the Direction Generale de L’Armement (DGA) that the flaperon drifted left of the wind. Field testing of a genuine Boeing 777 flaperon cut down to match photographs of 9M-MRO’s flaperon has now largely confirmed the DGA predictions, at least with respect to drift angle. The impact of this information on simulated trajectories across the Indian Ocean is that the July 2015 arrival time at La Reunion is now very easy to explain. »

    Why did nobody use the MH370 flaperon from Réunion for drift testing ? Yes, it’s a piece of evidence, but they had 1 year to examine it, so I guess they have already done all the work on it. And putting it into the water, let it drift for a while and recovering it later won’t damage it anyway.

    The Australians sure could have gotten it from the French.
    And even if they couldn’t:
    Why did they use replicas in the first place (instead of a genuine flaperon) ?

  25. « […] 16 years ago […] possible spoofing (a technique that has been discussed in much earlier false flag intel documents, not even a new idea) »

    you could even go further back than 16 years … all the way back to 1962:

    « 7. Hijacking attempts against civil air and surface craft should appear to continue as harassing measures condoned by the government of Cuba. […]

    8. It is possible to create an incident which will demonstrate convincingly that a Cuban aircraft has attacked and shot down a chartered civil airliner enroute from the United States to Jamaica, Guatemala, Panama or Venezuela. The destination would be chosen only to cause the flight plan route to cross Cuba. The passengers could be a group of college students off on a holiday or any grouping of persons with a common interest to support chartering a non-scheduled flight.

    a. An aircraft at Eglin AFB would be painted and numbered as an exact duplicate for a civil registered aircraft belonging to a CIA proprietary organization in the Miami area. At a designated time the duplicate would be substituted for the actual civil aircraft and would be loaded with the selected passengers, all boarded under carefully prepared aliases. The actual registered aircraft would be converted to a drone.

    b. Take off times of the drone aircraft and the actual aircraft will be scheduled to allow a rendezvous south of Florida. From the rendezvous point the passenger-carrying aircraft will descend to minimum altitude and go directly into an auxiliary field at Eglin AFB where arrangements will have been made to evacuate the passengers and return the aircraft to its original status. The drone aircraft meanwhile will continue to fly the filed flight plan. When over Cuba the drone will being transmitting on the international distress frequency a “MAY DAY” message stating he is under attack by Cuban MIG aircraft. The transmission will be interrupted by destruction of the aircraft which will be triggered by radio signal. This will allow ICAO radio stations in the Western Hemisphere to tell the US what has happened to the aircraft instead of the US trying to “sell” the incident. »

    http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/news/20010430/northwoods.pdf

  26. Remember, this was 55 years ago. So with technology more than half a century old.

    I think that answers the question if it was possible to remote-control MH370 with today’s technology.

  27. @Peter Norton:
    “…I think that answers the question if it was possible to remote-control MH370 with today’s technology.”

    Agreed. Don’t forget other tech areas have also been developed and refined, such as CGI, OH Radar, satellite radar and gravimetric submarine tracking. All these are and more are very useful if you want to produce a convincing spoof.

    The tool kit for special agents has developed exponentially since the start of the ongoing cold war back in 1948 – we don’t even have many clues about current top secret tech and it’s capabilities.

  28. Has anyone ever thought that this could be two-fold.
    Captain Z’s (grandson?) was in hospital for 6 days in January 2014. Could be quite innocent, but its worth having a look.

    So perhaps Captain Z was being strong-armed into a political/terrorist attack.

    Malaysian authorities aren’t known for being super vigilant, but Thailand’s known for their RAF planes?

    So picture this…

    Pilot with threats made against him and his family, forced into doing something that was politically motivated.

    Thai air force spotting an unidentified plane, which wouldn’t respond, and they shot it down? (I probably would). And then the cover-up follows.

    These countries are neighbours with each other, they also have a common interest in travelling/tourist destinations.

    Both Thailand and Malaysia are hugely populated with tourists, at all times of the year.

    No one can agree on the Inmarsat data that authorities have given/or not given. And no one can agree on the pilot suicide theory.

    I’m from Western Australia (and yeah call me an idiot, like many of you do…???), but I would bet that the ATSB has been fed the info required to inadvertently lead to a dead end.

    Cheers,
    Laura

  29. @Laura

    You are probably 100% correct is stating: “but I would bet that the ATSB has been fed the info required to inadvertently lead to a dead end”. In other words spoofing of the ISAT dataset.

    The rest is speculative, including the shoot down and increasingly Captain Z did it hypothesis.

    Apart from your last statement all of this sits uncomfortably with an extraordinary fog around the “loss” of 9M-MRO.

  30. I don’t think Capt Z did it, I think he may have been forced to do it,(like I said).

    Of course its speculative, as is everything written, spoken about, or theorised about Mh370. As far as I know YOU haven’t found it

    If that plane came down near any coast in Australia it would have been noticed by someone. We have military and military radar that wouldn’t loose sight of an unidentified Boeing 777.

    Australians are paying a shit load in extra taxes to cover the cost of this (absurd) search, so as a reader and a Aussie, it would be nice if the US or Boeing could take over the search and the cost and then do your own reports.

  31. As far as finding the plane, I could envision a joint industry R&D organization and approach. However, as many have been pointed out from the beginning, most officials and airline industry participants, and Malaysia, would rather not find this aircraft and probably rather not handle the outrage associated with advising the public the truth about what happened in this accident, if the aircraft were ever found. So we have to come to understand the fact that countries and industry would rather hold air crash investigations as top secrets, and would rather not find the causes, in some cases.

    International rules allow this approach, and for the future we need to consider if International rules actually indirectly cause accidents by limiting liability and allowing countries sovereign right to control the spin and crash investigations.

  32. “… allowing countries sovereign right to control the spin and crash investigations. “

    I would call for civil aviation accidents to be investigated by ICAO, not nationally (and in some cases even airlines investigating themselves).

  33. @Laura

    Agree with all your points, in particular the disturbing possibility that Australia may have spent more than A$100 million and 9M-MRO may not even be in the SIO. In fact it may not have crashed. What debris have been found are as convincing as the ISAT and radar dataset.

    Also as an Australian the wastage of money is a real concern.

    Finally I don’t know where 9M-MRO is. Though increasingly it’s looking like a highly sophisticated hijacking (beyond Captain Z’s expertise).

  34. @Laura: Obviously all this is mere speculation, but I would say that a point in favour of your hypothesis is that Z abducting the plane (for whatever reason) is a ‘simpler’ explanation than some different sort of hijack. I think a good starting point for coming up with/evaluating different hypotheses is the logic of ‘how complex is this scenario, how many assumptions about things that sound easy in theory but require a leap of faith to assume that they worked out in practice have to be made’. Basically, I’d argue that ‘the actual pilot kept on piloting the plane somewhere’ is less complicated and thus improbable than ‘someone other than the pilot took over etcetc’.

    I wanted to follow up on reports about a spotting in Tawi Tawi island in eastern Borneo. (Sorry if everyone starts face palming now…) I have recently researched personal travel plans in the Philippines/Borneo/eastern Indonesia and was somewhat surprised to learn that apparently, the area east of Borneo, the Sulu Sea and the Celebes Sea, basically the area between Sulawesi, Borneo and Mindanao, is supposedly a sort of no-go area with limited governmental control and frequent clashes between police and law enforcement (when such LE does venture into the area). For further info, take a look at the travel warnings by the US, UK etc and news reports. It pretty much sounds like a lawless area where frequent kidnappings happen etc. Afaik, no one actually did follow up on the Tawi Tawi reports – because it’s not safe to go there? Personally, I’d wondered before whether this area might be a good explanation. Essentially, you start from the Gulf of Thailand and turn east. Pretty simple. (See logic above). To me this sounds simpler than some complex manoeuvres above several countries… It would also explain a bunch of issues – not least why no-one saw the plane on radar. Also, if no foreigners can go to this area because it’s too unsafe, and even local LE has issues, it sounds like this could actually be the kind of area we’re looking for? Basically, the scenario would be “Abu Sayyaf took plane and landed in Tawi Tawi, abducted and probably killed passengers”? Governments keeping quiet because some passengers possibly still alive, or maybe because something this big would require a real response which no government actually want to have to engage in? Or maybe because spoofing the whole numbers shebang is actually way simpler than governments would like air plane passengers believe? I took a look at public satellite imagery of Tawi Tawi recently and did believe I saw a field next to the airstrip that looked like Jeff’s Kasachstan plane depository, you know the soil having been moved etc.

  35. @Havelock,

    It seems to have been investigated – to some degree – and the general consensus seems to have have been amongst the locals that there was nothing to be seen?

    http://globalnation.inquirer.net/129486/afp-no-mh370-wreckage-in-tawi-tawi

    “Since yesterday, we deployed a gunboat there because of the news. We interviewed the people there, the fishermen, but they have no knowledge about it,” Captain Giovanni Carlo Bacordo, commander of Naval Task Force 61 said on Monday.

    Also, wouldn’t a terminus there be inconsistent with the ping rings? Granted, in the case of a spoof drone, that wouldn’t matter – but that sounds (to me?) a little beyond the capabilities of the Guerilla groups in the area?

  36. Yes exactly @abn397. Hence my “”. Annoying that several more of the UK rags seem to.be perpetuating it.

  37. @Will, You wrote, “wouldn’t a terminus there be inconsistent with the ping rings?” Yes, and not only that, BTO values spoofed from aboard an aircraft can only be faked to make the plane look further away, not closer, so it wouldn’t be possible for MH370 to have been at Tawi-Tawi.

  38. @Jeff,
    That sounds like a fairly solid justification for the lack of follow-up, then 🙂

  39. “Not a single body has been found throughout the long search – just 33 pieces of wreckage.”

    33 pieces of wreckage
    0 bodies

    Is that completely normal and to be expected, given that the crash happened (in all likelihood) in the middle of the ocean? Or is this something peculiar, that none of the 289 washed ashore ?

    Do bodies sink or float ?

    Have there been any ship accidents, aircraft crashes or other accidents on the high seas, where bodies washed up on a coast ?

  40. « A 2002 study in the journal Legal Medicine examined nine bodies that had drifted hundreds of kilometers in cold waters off the coast of Portugal and Spain.
    […]
    A 2008 study on two human bodies recovered following aircraft accidents found one body off of Sicily to be partially skeletonized after 34 days and a second body off of Namibia to be completely skeletonized after 3 months.
    […]
    Of course, sharks are an important scavenger in warm waters […] However, the idea that the…[seas]…are carpeted with sharks…is a misconception.»

    https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/news-blog/how-long-do-dead-bodies-remain-inta-2009-06-10/

    « Body drifting is difficult to predict. Remains floating at the sea surface may drift at the rate of 5–100 hundred miles per day depending on the forces driving the currents. Tidal currents range up to 10 miles per hour. The Gulf.
    Stream flows as fast as 5 miles per hour. As a result, in 1 day a body may drift 100 miles […] »

    “Handbook on Drowning”, Joost J.L.M. Bierens, 2006, p.1150

  41. @Peter Norton
    So if a crash occurred (say) 1000 km from land, bodies would probably not drift ashore. They might have been noticed by ships or low-flying aircraft in the first few days if they were searching in the correct area. So it is not surprising that no corpses have been recovered from the ocean.

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