Black box data is the ne plus ultra of aircraft accident investigation. But it is not the only kind of physical evidence. Pieces of debris—in particular, their dents and fractures — can tell a vivid story by themselves.
There are five basic ways that an object can break. The two most important for our present discussion are tension and compression. A tension failure occurs when something is pulled apart—think of pulling the ends of a piece of string until it snaps. Compression is the opposite; it’s what happens when something is crushed by a weight or smashed in an impact.
When a plane crashes, it’s common for all different parts to exhibit different kinds of failure. Imagine a plane whose wingtip hits a tree. The impact would crush the leading edge of the wingtip—compression failure—and then wrench the wing backwards from the body of the plane, causing a tension failure at the forward wing root and compression failure at the aft end.
By collecting many pieces of debris after a crash, investigators can place the mechanical failures in a chronological order to tell a story that makes sense, much as you might arrange magnetic words on a refrigerator. This is how the mystery of TWA 800 was solved. When the fuel tank exploded, the pressure pushed the fuselage skin outward so that it came apart like a balloon popping. The plane broke into two major parts that smashed apart when they hit the ocean. Thus tension failures predominated in the first phase of the catastrophe and compression failures predominated later.
So now let’s turn to the issue at hand. What story do the pieces of MH370 debris tell?
In April of this year the Malaysian government published a “Debris Examination Report” describing the 20 pieces of debris that were deemed either confirmed, highly likely or likely to have come from the plane. For 12 of them, investigators were able to discern the nature of the mechanical failure. Some key excerpts:
Item 6 (right engine fan cowl): “The fracture on the laminate appears to be more likely a tension failure. The honeycomb core was intact and there was no significant crush on the honeycomb core.”
Item 7 (wing-to-body fairing): “The fibres appeared to have been pulled away and there were no visible kink on the fibres. The core was not crushed; it had fractured along the skin fracture line.”
Item 8 (flap support fairing tail cone): “The fracture line on the part showed the fibers to be ‘pulled out’ showing tension failure. Most of the core was intact and there was no sign of excessive crush.”
Item 9 (Upper Fixed Panel forward of the flaperon, left side): “The fracture lines showed that the fibres were pulled but there were no signs they were kinked. The core was intact and had not crushed”
Item 12 (poss. wing or horizontal stabilizer panel): “The carbon fibre laminate had fractured and appeared to have pulled out but there was no crush on the core.”
Item 15 (Upper Fixed Panel forward of the flaperon, right side): “The outboard section had the fasteners torn out with some of the fastener holes still recognizable. The inboard section was observed to have signs of ‘net tension’ failure as it had fractured along the fastener holes.
Item 18 (Right Hand Nose Gear Forward Door): “Close visual examination of the fracture lines showed the fibers were pulled and there was no sign of kink.”
Item 20 (right aft wing to body fairing): “This part was fractured on all sides. Visual examination of the fracture lines indicated that the fibers appeared to have pulled away with no sign of kink on the fibers.”
Item 22 (right vertical stabilizer panel): “The outer skin had slightly buckled and dented but the inner skin was fractured in several places…. The internal laminate seems to be squashed.”
Item 23 (aircraft interior): “The fractured fibres on the item indicated the fibres were pulled out which could indicate tension failure on its structure.”
Item 26 (right aileron): “The fitting on the debris appeared to have suffered a tension overload fracture.”
Item 27 (fixed, forward No. 7 flap support fairing): “One of the frames was completely detached from the skin. It may be due to fasteners pull through as the fasteners’ holes appeared to be torn off with diameters larger than the fasteners.”
Note that all of these but one failed under tension. The exception is item 22, which came from the tail—specifically, from near the leading edge of the vertical stabilizer.
It’s particularly remarkable that Item 18, the nose gear door, failed under tension. (Image at top) If, as the Australian authorities believe, the plane hit the sea surface after a high-speed descent, this part of the plane would have felt the full brunt of impact.
Bill Waldock, a professor at Embry Riddle University who teaches accident-scene investigation, says that if MH370 hit the water in a high-speed dive, you would expect to see a lot of compression, “particularly up toward the front part. The frontal areas on the airplane, like the nose, front fuselage, leading edge of the wings, that’s where you’d find it most.”
I spoke to a person who is involved in the MH370 investigation, and was told that officials believe that that observed patterns of debris damage “don’t tell a story… we don’t have any information that suggests how the airplane may have impacted the water.” Asked what kind of impact scenario might cause the nose-gear door to fail under tension, it was suggested that if the gear was deployed at high speed, this could cause the door to be ripped off.
This explanation is problematic, however. According to 777 documentation, the landing gear doors are designed to open safely at speeds as high at Mach 0.82 — a normal cruise speed. The plane would have to have been traveling very fast for the door to have been ripped off. And to be deployed at the end of the flight would require a deliberate act in the cockpit shortly before (or during) the terminal plunge.
The experts I’ve talked to are puzzled by the debris damage and unable to articulate a scenario that explains it. “The evidence is ambiguous,” Waldock says.
In a blog post earlier this month, Ben Sandilands wrote, “Don Thompson, who has taken part in various Independent Group studies of the mystery of the loss of the Malaysia Airlines in 2014, says some of these findings support a mid-air failure of parts of the jet rather than an impact with the surface of the south Indian Ocean.”
A mid-air failure, of course, is inconsistent with the analysis of the Inmarsat data carried out by Australian investigators. So once again, new evidence creates more questions than answers.
UPDATE 5/24/17: Via @ALSM, here’s a diagram of the front landing gear and doors:
UPDATE 5/25/17: In the comments, we discussed the possibility that the front gear door could have come off in the process of a high-speed dive. @ALSM speculated that the loss of engine power upon fuel exhaustion could have led to loss of hydraulic pressure, which could have allowed the gear doors to open spontaneously, and then be ripped off in the high-speed airstream. But he reported that Don Thompson had dug into the documentation and confirmed that following a loss of hydraulic power the gear would remain stowed and locked. Thus it seems unlikely that the gear door could have spontaneously detached in flight, even during a high-speed descent.
UPDATE 5/25/17: There’s been some discussion in the comments about flutter as a potential cause of inflight breakup, so I thought it would be apropos to add a bit more of my conversation with the accident investigator involved in the MH370 inquiry.
Q: Does the MH370 flaperon look like flutter to you?
A: In a classic sense, no, but where you would be looking for flutter would be on the stops, on the mechanical stops that are up on the wing, so the part of that piece that came out. And in looking at that piece, you’ve got different types of failures of the composite skin that don’t appear to be flutter.
Q: What does it look like?
It just looks like kind of an impact-type separation. So it looks like you’ve drug that thing either in the water or on the ground or something. But it’s a little hard with that one because you don’t have any other wreckage, so, one of the keys — you don’t base anything on one small piece, you’re trying to look at kind of the macroscopic view of all the wreckage to make sure that, “Oh, if I think this is flutter do I see the signatures elsewhere on the airplane?” Typically we won’t base it on one piece like the flaperon.
To provide some context, we had earlier talked about the phenomenon of flutter in general:
Q: I can think of a couple of cases where there was flutter, where the plane got into a high speed descent and stuff got ripped off.
A: Yup.
Q: Where would that fall in the bestiary of failures that we talked about earlier?
A: So flutter’s kind of a unique thing, and it’s based on aircraft speed and structural stiffness. So, you know, when those two things meet you get this excitation, an aerodynamic excitation of a control surface which will become dynamically unstable and start going full deflection. So for a flutter case you generally look at the control stops—so there’s mechanical stops on all the flight controls—and you look for a hammering effect on the stops. So repeated impacts on the stop will tell you that, hey, maybe you’ve got a flutter event.
Q: But if you see the piece—there was a China Airlines incident, the elevator was shredded, or part of it was ripped off. What would that look like?
A: Mm-hmm. You know, it’s going to be different for every single case. Sometimes that flutter will generate the load in the attachment points, break the attachment points, and other times it will tear the skin of the control surface, and so you’ll see this tearing of the skin and the separation of rivet lines, and everything. I’ve seen both. I’ve seen a control surface that comes apart at the rivets, and flutters that way, and I’ve seen them where it generates loads to break the attachment points. It depends on the loads that are created and how they’re distributed throughout the structure.
For his part, Bill Waldock told me that the tensional failure of the collected debris implies a shallow-angle impact. Both experts, in other words, believe the debris is most consistent with a more or less horizontal (rather than high-speed vertical) entry into the water.
This is not consistent with the ATSB’s interpretation of the BFO data unless we posit some kind of end-of-flight struggle, à la Egyptair 990, or last-minute change-of-heart by a suicidal pilot. Either seems like a stretch to me.
@Ge Rijn: “In two cases the plane turned to the right and stayed in a right banked turn. Why?
The report doesn’t tell.”
I’m afraid you’ll have to ask the ATSB. Ask also why the report doesn’t tell.
@JeffW
You made some good points above, that Victor’s article tends to rule out both the old and new proposed ATSB search areas. I am not there yet, as I feel 32-35S always looked good for BTO/BFO (eg; Inmarsat orig example in the journal article). So it must be inside Arc7 or else.
@Nederland
Not sure. I think the BTO/BFO up to Arc6 suggests the pilot could have descended to cloud level by Arc6. However, this is not consistent with the debris if the debris came off at high altitude due to Mach speed stresses.
I do not have time at the moment but I will check your path on FS9. 31.1S gets close to no-mans-land in the Broken Ridge trenches that I suspect no one is anxious to search there (which of course is a realistic and not a scientific objection).
@Gysbreght
I’m affraid I won’t get an answer from them either. But you are right when I don’t try I won’t get an answer for sure.
I’ll give it a try and let you know.
@TBill
I think the pilot could have decided to descent fast through the clouds after first engine flame-out after Arc 6 to remain visibility under the clouds while the plane was still under power from left engine or at last only the APU.
The 7th Arc was snapshot captured in this descent by the 8 sec. BFO’s.
IFE was load-shedded so there was no IFE log-on in this case. The plane leveled out and glided to its end destination which could be one of the deep trenches of Broken Ridge.
@TBill
I have also a psychological approuch in this matter like @Donald on Victor’s blog.
Broken Ridge could easily serve as a synonyme for a broken back and soul.
The captain suffered a broken back bone after a para-glide. Political and private there seem to have been issues.
Broken Ridge could have been a destination in a troubled mind.
@Ge Rijn:
To add some contrast to that, though it admittedly enters the far-fetched: if Z had the habit of “reading himself”, or had watched his own now infamous Facebook video (Window seal), then, if considering Broken Ridge for the reasons you mention, it may have come to his mind that Broken Ridge has the only depths in a vast area of the IO that rises above a thousand meters — i.e. what is referred to as the mesopelagic zone among oceanographers, or the twilight zone (recall the clippings’ headline “The End is Near for Twilight”) — where daylight still reaches down. Right next to great trenches. “At the twilight of life”, “life’s twilight” and similar also of course signifies or metaphorizes the decline of something, the less than ordinary or normal, the nocturnal side, death in life etc. If we forget for a moment the “fanatic” Z (with variants) of earlier days or the possibly politically disgruntled or self-proclaimed Reaper, then there is, potentially, also the physically broken melancholic, perhaps in periods scrupulously manic Z, making a “confession”, hinting at an explanation for someone to discover if the plane is found etc.
If I would bet, I would go for the trench rather than the ridge, but it might depend on what is actually the less conspicuos, if any. The headline might fit both options to Z would it not.
For what it is worth.
@Ge Rijn
I guess we could say (haven’t done the math yet) that a crash at 32-34S is intentional, and it has slow down to dip under the clouds at Arc6. As far as Arc7, since in this case I am assuming live pilot, that flight can do whatever we want to meet debris and BFO. To work it needs to make sense and be believable.
If the flight is further East say 27-30S that may be a ghost flight at the end, so it meets BTO without a slow down to descend and dip under clouds.
I don’t know if you had a chance to see my proposed 180S path which you might like.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/149krnQCSITLHDS1KPnOr__pZpiaqRL0mq0Ppc7m9oWs/edit?usp=sharing
I think you should look a bit closer at the statement from the AMM below.
When the RAT is extended and hydraulics off, the airplane rolls left. Two to three units of right control wheel rotation are necessary to hold the wings level.
This is a very specific configuration in that it says hydraulics OFF.
The 777 engine driven pumps provide hydraulic output of 3000 psi; they are rated at 48 gpm at 2850 psi and 3900 rpm. A windmilling engine will turn the N3 rotor at around 30 to 33%, therefore outputting in the order of 16 gpm at between 2850 and 3000 psi.
When the second engine flamed out the flight controls would have still been powered electrically by three of the four ACEs (L1, C and R) for approximately one minute through dedicated batteries in the power supply assemblies. After 1 minute L1 and C would be the only ACEs remaining. L1 provides left flaperon while C provides right.
The tendency in the Boeing simulations for the aircraft to veer left is caused not by a floating flaperon as suggested by Victor but rather the delay in the TAC system resetting to neutral following the left engine flame out.
OZ
OZ:
Re: “The tendency in the Boeing simulations for the aircraft to veer left is caused not by a floating flaperon as suggested by Victor but rather the delay in the TAC system resetting to neutral following the left engine flame out.”
That is not how the system works. The TAC resets to the manually set cruise position (not zero) almost instantly in the Level D simulator, following the second engine FE. Moreover, in our sim’s, we observed turns to the same direction regardless of which engine failed first. It favoured a turn in the same direction expected for the rudder trim setting, regardless of the engine FE sequence.
@ALSM,
I wrote neutral, not zero. The reset will not be instant.
In at least 2 of the Boeing simulations (according to the ATSB) the aircraft turned right.
OZ
OZ: What is your distinction between neutral and zero? The return to the cruise setting is under a second in the simulator. What is your source? All of our simulations went to the right because we were using right rudder trim..
@ALSM,
My distinction of neutral is the trimmed position; if you have 1 unit of trim (left or right), then that is the neutral position from which the system will operate and reset in this instance.
When the first engine fails the TAC inputs up to 60% of available rudder through the trim system at a rate of up to 8 units per second. When the second engine fails the TAC becomes inactive and the rudder trim returns to neutral. It is my understanding that with the TAC inactive the trim would reset at 1.54 units per second similar to a trim cancel situation.
Source is the AMM.
OZ
@OZ
I’m not sure if you referred to me with your comment:
“I think you should look a bit closer at the statement from the AMM below.
When the RAT is extended and hydraulics off, the airplane rolls left.”
In my interpretation the AMM does not say with this sentence the RAT causes the roll to the left.
I would like to retract one of the previous comments on the Reunion debris. i forgot the second confirmation of debris based on part ID.
Revisiting the history, the Reunion flap was positively confirmed to be from MH370 on the basis of French Official Francois Molins confirming(announced in the main press) parts ID tracked to a contrator in Spain. Of course, several weeks after the Malaysian PM’s positive confirmation. Note the contractor being Airbus Defense and Space. A military link again. May all be true but that a military contractor, competitor of Boeing, used for parts of Boeing civil planes is beyond me.
I am sure a structural forensics by a honeycomb panel specialist will gave us some further leads/clues.
@Jeff this forensic you mentioned on the debris included a detailed failure mode/mechanism analysis apart from this very high level compression/tension observations?
@Ge Rijn:
My last post may have sounded too corny, I was just trying to say that symbolism may very well have played a role for Z, and appearing a bit mystic may have appealed to him, getting some self-fulfilment from chosing an end destination with a twist to it. I don’t mean to say that the video was made with the intent to profet the disappearance, but if he planned it in advance, which he must have, and imagined the end leg and his demise, and what would come after, he probably also spent some time going over what was on his FB account, for instance. A troubled mind gets hooked up on ideas — and if parts of his stunt and flight is seen as indicative of a theatralic mind, then he might have gotten some comfort from adding something to the mystery. On the opposite side, since everything else with the flight breathes a lot of professionalism, and he must be considered successful (since we haven’t found him), he apparently didn’t let anything from his possibly manic or trroubled side interfere with his main goal, which appears to be to remain gone for as long as possible. Which leads me to cling on to the idea that he would avoid giving away clues about where he could be found and clues that would indicate intent. One wonders by the way if he thought at all about the commotion that the disappearance would stir up — if he thought about it that way, or if he had hopes of disappearing a bit more “silently”? There is a certain contrast there between the deafening roar of the early stage, overflying Malaysia, and the sordinated whimper of the final disappearance.
While at it: has anyone seen a discussion about how fast sinking parts of a plane and human remains are covered over or consumed by organic life in waters shallower than a thousand meters as compared to deeper? I imagine there would be many more organisms within the “twilight zone” as compared to deeper down, but the difference is perhaps marginal? Would other certain sea floor types speed up the disappearance of the parts (plains of sediment, mud etc.)?
Military plane in Myanmar with 116 people disappearing right now: http://www.tribuneindia.com/mobi/news/world/myanmar-military-plane-carrying-116-missing-army-chief/418828.html
@Johan, Ge Rijn
Again, I remain unconvinced about who might have been flying the plane particularly during the latter stages (no pilot inputs at the end of the flight), but talking about symbolism of Broken Ridge, I have earlier collated some quotations from the Quran which could be of interest:
55:19 He has loosed both seas which still come together;
55:20 between them lies an isthmus which neither tries to cross.
55:21 So which of your Lord´s benefits will both of you deny?
55:22 He produces pearls and coral from them both;
55:23 so which of our Lord´s benefits will both of you deny?
55:24 His are the vessels looming up like landmarks on the sea;
55:25 so which of our Lord´s benefits will both of you deny?
55:26 Everyone upon it will disappear
18:59 Such towns have We destroyed whenever they did wrong, and We fixed the time for their destruction.
18:60 And so Moses told his young man: “I shall not give up until I reach the place where both seas meet, even though I spend ages doing so.
25:53 He is the One Who has cut off both seas, this one being sweet, fresh, while the other is salty, briny. He has placed an isthmus in between them plus a barrier to block them off.
Further speculation on this can be found here:
http://jeffwise.net/2017/04/02/andreas-lubitzs-family-disputes-germanwings-suicide-scenario/comment-page-1/
@Nederland:
Hi and thanks. I had missed the discussions under the Lubitz article. I think there could be something to the muslim extremist suicide act, but I hope not, and as I understand it no one of the passengers fitted such a profile. So someone or several would have had to snuck onboard? Further, I would think that we would have had heard more about it, communicating it logically being an important part of it. A private journey into paradise is not impossible, and perhaps have some traits in common with political extremist acts of the 1970s. One would guess that behind that would be some interest that would want to harm Malaysia and MAS, even if the people executing it have their own convictions. Still, why not choose Petronas Towers? Too easy? Perhaps. Broken Ridge as the isthmus between two seas? Why not. If there is conviction around a challenge there will be someone who is stupid enough to buy into to it. I hope this was not the case, though. I don’t like the idea much from the side of passenger comfort and experience.
@Johan
My primary argument is that the location at Broken Ridge (31.1S) results from a path from BEBIM (west of Cocos Islands) to Wilkins Runway, Antarctica. To the best of my knowledge, this is the only waypoint route that can be conciled with the Isat data, and very well so, the distances between the arcs work out to a mile (assuming straight flight) and the BFOs work out like a clockwork. It also works with an earlier route around Sumatra and from ISBIX to BEBIM.
To my mind, Petronas Towers are not a target for jihadists. They have Islamic artwork, and most Malaysians are Sunni Muslims; jihadists attack Shias.
There were conflicting reports of unidentified passengers on board. In particular the Chinese police reported that the passport number of one passenger matched that of a man who has never left the country. This has never been clarified. A recent French documentary indicates they have seen the police report on the passengers and there is no indication that the police has been able to identify all of the passengers on board, which is somewhat strange as next of kin would normally approach authorities to verify the whereabouts.
OZ:
Re your 01:55 comment…Yes, I agree with all that. My points are (1) the rudder returns to the cruise setting (same as what you refer to as neutral), not zero trim, and (2) it happens fast…about 1-2 seconds (consistent with what you report). This is important because an airplane trimmed for cruise will not be trimmed for level flight once it slows down and eventually both engines are dead. This neutral rudder trim can be either a bit to the left or right, depending on the imperfections in the specific airframe, net thrust asymmetry, lateral CG offset (for ex. from fuel imbalance, cargo distribution), etc. This small rudder trim seemed to be the factor that influenced the direction of the turn following FE in the level D simulator. Of course, the information Don dug up on the left flaperon, once hydraulics are lost, would tend to bias the roll to the left, but we don’t know exactly when that started, if it did start early enough to be a material; factor. The rudder trim bias starts almost immediately.
@Nederland:
I am hearing you. I can’t object. I did think there were no passenger issues left, but I haven’t been at it for quite a while.
My gut-feeling says no, though. But I didn’t forsee an IS attack on Iran’s parliament either. But that would be jihadists on Shia.
Btw: there was under Lubitz a comment citing something about classified satellite imagery of MH370 crashing, but the imagery was stated as “not good enough”. Was I dreaming when I read that or was there some kind of misunderstNding underlying the debate about Chinese NoK trying to free classified AUS search sources? Forgive me if I mix up things.
@Nederland:
The MY authorities take on the CMB letter was early on quite convincingly — that was my impression, I can’t give a source — that there was reason to suspect that the letter was posted by someone who wanted to put the Uighurs in a very bad light, for revenge or for future exploits. Private or local or regionally. The logic being (my interpretation) that (ethnic) “freedom fighters” often take care not to completely ruin their relationship with the international community. Their aim would be the opposite. Terrorists without a territory they could lose, or who are generally against Modern / Western society etc. don’t have to be that particular. Having internet/computer and spelling skills is further one thing (as is the possibly singular act of killing 29 people by a raving lunatic, not representative of the Uighur community at large or even armed militia) — having that, a n d a territory, a n d the means and opportunity to down an airliner and make it disappear without a trace for years without anything slipping through the grapevine is another.
@Johan
Do you mean this:
“The ATSB says the satellite data shows MH370 was in a rapid unpiloted dive at the end, but experts such as former US captain and crash investigator John Cox have said the data is not good enough to reach that conclusion.”
This simply refers to the two finals BFOs which are obviously not classified. John Cox, btw, came up with his assertion long before the mechanisms were made known of how these BFO are potentially influened, so the question should now be settled.
On the other hand, I’m now looking for imagery for the surface search from 28 March to 3 April 2014. This was in the area which I think could be the crash site.
According to the avherald
http://avherald.com/h?article=4710c69b&opt=0
10 planes and 6-11 vessels have searched an area of 254,000 qkm within those days (but there was some interruption on 30 March) and on the first days numerous finds have been reported and only a very few further investigated.
This does not provided much confidence in the ATSB claim that “the fact that the sea surface search detected no wreckage argues
quite strongly that the site where the aircraft entered the water was not between latitudes 32°S and 25°S along the 7th arc” (First Principles Review)
Anyone knows about material on these finds from 28 March to 30 March?
@Nederland:
Yes. That was exactly what I had seen. I misinterpreted a few things there (not satellite images, but data, and on it went). Thanks.
Good luck with the rest. I do wonder about the proportions we are dealing with when it comes to the areal / satellite search and similar. I had (another) dream about that finding debris from mh370 in SIO would be equal to throwing three matches from the Öresund Bridge and then look away for thirty seconds before trying to find them again. No easy task.
@HB, you asked: “this forensic you mentioned on the debris included a detailed failure mode/mechanism analysis apart from this very high level compression/tension observations?”
The answer is that no, it did not.
@Jeff Wise
“One would not expect a computer game to have particularly realistic flight modeling, especially beyond the aircraft’s envelope.”
Is the simulation of an $89.00 computer game a fair comparison to the handling of a quarter billion dollar jet?
@Johan
The Guardian has a full archive of MH370 related news. On 28 March 2014 (after the search was moved to the Broken Ridge area) a piece was discovered (but not recovered) that resembles the flaperon:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/28/mh370-search-shifts-700-miles-closer-to-australia
On 29 March a Chinese aircraft discovered pieces in colours similar to MH370:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/29/mh370-object-colours-missing-plane-spotted
The only pieces recovered were of orange colour, however (mistaken for life vests?).
I think Malaysia only said that the CMB letter seems not to be authentic, although other experts may have given more specific comments. I’m not saying this letter is authentic, I was only coming up with a brainstorming session of different aspects that could point to terrorist activity, independent from each other. I’m not saying it was terrorism either.
@Nederland:
Many thanks! I do appreciate your brainstorming.
On a side note: if a political group has any significance and voice to be reckoned with, and can attract educated or generally able people who will stay/survive/live with such a group, then it is is probably also a power structure and a monopoly of power for a certain domain with economic, geographic and political traits etc., living off the land or a trade. Albeit set aside from the official/central/civic power, and/or from a sanctioned civic/political branch of a group (I hope that came through in an intelligble fashion). A state within the state. Which means that there will be exchange and communication between sides, and the sides will know of each other, since ages perhaps, if located to a certain area or similar: where they live, although they might not be able reach them, or they dare not because there will be uncertainties regarding security, popular reaction, guerilla warfare, infrastructure, health and sanity etc. If this was not the case, then there would be a power vacuum, and power vacuum is the only thing that is more unpopular than the enemy. Power vacuum is mayhem and genocide. So most groups that are for real are known and familiar, and these groups in their turn will not straightforwardy tolerate vigilantism in the area of terrorism. Chaos will have to be rule-bound. So well-versed promises of massive future indiscriminate murder by groups previously unheard of is perhaps an anomaly. Or shortlived. It is what I think. It may have some bearing.
Consideration of any perpetrator initially being outside of the cockpit, should include the passenger’s reaction on MH128.
They effectively responded to the threat by tackling and securing the guy, clearly Illustrating passengers are not acquiescent when their safety is jeopardized
Someone took the plane down deliberately into the ocean at 23 South, 100-101 East. It is right on the 7th arc, and happens to be where the pings were detected by the Chinese boats in March 2014.
Why there?
The Holy Qu’ran Al-Mu’minun Chapter 23:100-101 reads:
Until, when death comes to one of them, he says entreating, ‘My Lord, send me back,
‘That I may do righteous deeds in the life that I have left behind.’ Never, it is but a word that he utters. And behind them is a barrier until the day when they shall be raised again.
It’s so clear and requires no Islamic scholarship to decipher.
Why have these coordinates not been scoured yet?
Stupid question: how do we know for sure Satcom messages on GES Log are positively identified to be from MH370?
So far I am puzzled that we have only one confirmed hard piece of evidence that positively identify MH370 (through a military based contractor) and no money is spent on this.
Until recently, I never paid too much attention to the Sat data given the millions of dollards spent on it, i understood surprisingly that the GES Log DID NOT record any flight ID after the first re-log on (re-log-on yet to be explained). ie the Sat data from Inmersat may be a clue to the investigation but is technically not a hard piece of evidence and millions have been spent on it. The only link between the flight ID and the Ping data is I understood the analysis of unpublished raw Military Radar data and presumptions that the tracked dot is the same airplane.
For me the reason not to publish row mil radar data is nonsense, it can be a screen snapshot, table format, etc. with sensitive details hidden. I have also not sees primary radar screen shots either.
Unless i missed some links, the entire sat data story won’t stand long in a course case.
@Susie
“Is the simulation of an $89.00 computer game a fair comparison to the handling of a quarter billion dollar jet?”
I would say at least someone is spending budget to try to find the right location of the plane. No harm trying as opposed to stop the search despite publicly saying that budget is not a reason to stop the search. I wonder why that is and why budget is not spent on debris then?
@HB:
It does seem a bit convenient with the relogon and two columns of digits pointing “South”, with nothing technically tying it to a specific plane. It has from early on and…, yes. Others will tell you what there is in terms of hard evidence, and then there’s the Aussies in trunks trying to make barnacles stick on dummy aircraft pieces and on one or two mobile home interior panels. And then the natural suspiscion that MH17 was shot down to get the pieces we now find in various places around the Indian Ocean very close to Mr Blaine and a medium sized briefcase.
I’d say that some still have a lot to prove. Still, there are to me after all no really strong reason to believe that the authorities don’t want to find the plane, and are successful at that. Although it would be a welcome explanation for those evaluating the finacial year. But history will not take lightly being led astray in a matter like this, and officials know that and try to act accordingly. So, no, the plane is out there somewhere. We perhaps only need to find the right “upset values”. I really don’t know.
@HB
All logs have the unique octal code 35200217, which positively ties the logs to the 9M-MRO.
@Sunken Deal
It would be more convincing it you can tie the location to a specific route and to drift studies. At the time, there was the possibilty that the plane may have gone that far north in a curved route, but the debris does not support this.
@HB:
Correction: “very close to Mr Blaine and a medium sized briefcase, and two stringed-together shoes dangling from a nearby telephone wire.”
It is btw my guess that it is the Malaysians who don’t want to find the plane, if any, for fear of finding a funny drawing on the wall of the cockpit with the prime minister and the minister of foreign affairs with extra large moustaches. That’s probably where the stakes are.
Forgive me for loitering a bit in this this field. I will straighten up from now on.
@Nederland:
Is that so (the code?). When was that established, do you know?
@Nederland:
…around May 2015 at the latest:
https://mobile.twitter.com/Airlandseaman/status/599778323196084225/photo/1
@Johan
Presumably on the day after the crash, when Inmarsat checked their records, they would first have to find out what the “phone number” is.
You can find this number in the DCLs, bottom of p. 1.
https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/5185657/Upate%20to%20Signalling%20Unit%20Logs_Dec2014.pdf
@Johan:
“Military plane in Myanmar with 116 people disappearing right now…”
More wreckage and bodies found:-
“Recovery teams and local fisherman find 10 bodies in sea search for missing plane”
http://www.independent.ie/world-news/asia-pacific/recovery-teams-and-local-fisherman-find-10-bodies-in-sea-search-for-missing-plane-35802859.html
Burma seem to be as unlucky as Malaysia regarding the loss of plane. Very sad so many children died.
@Nederland:
You are right if course. Thanks.
@Boris:
Thanks. Yes, sad.
@Nederland
Interesting. I missed that. No mention of such reporting on GES log documentation. I ll check
@nederland
Referring to this (https://mh370wiki.net/wiki/MH370/01/15_Factual_Information/1.9.5.3) AES ID is not mention as an output. It maybe that in the complete message you mention AES ID is included in the ACARS message but in empty message ??? Confused.
As a matter of interest, How would the SDU know about the AES ID in the first place with other systems disconnected? Is the iID stored in SDU?
@HB
The section you are referring to does only mention “key information”. If you look a bit further below, you will find that the AES ID is mentioned twice (also next section). OK, it does not specifically say that the AES ID was included in transmissions from 18:25 and after, but it does say the Flight ID was missing. You can manually delete the Flight ID via ACARS, it’s obviously not unique to the 9M-MRO, but the AES ID is unique to the SDU built into the 9M-MRO (well at least until 17:07). It is, however, routed from the AIMS cabinet, but it can’t be changed or deleted.
See also this tweet by @ALSM
https://twitter.com/Airlandseaman/status/599773947077398528
And this log too (although it seems to be “redacted”)
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/sladen/inmarsat-9m-mro/master/inmarsat-su-log-redacted.csv
@Nederland
Thanks. Strange it has been omitted in the previous ref.
@Sunken Deal
“Someone took the plane down deliberately into the ocean at 23 South, 100-101 East. It is right on the 7th arc, and happens to be where the pings were detected by the Chinese boats in March 2014.”
If it’s over there, I have a simpler explanation that 23 south is close to regular airways L894 to Perth, and also there are some very deep trenches over there that could be targets. You might be interested in Ed Baker’s older theory of MH370 with religious overtones, which ends there too: http://mh370apilotperspective.blogspot.com/2015/03/my-full-mh370-theory-what-i-withheld.html
There are various rationale the crash could be over there, at the moment I favor 180S path because I have trouble fitting BTO/BFO over at 23 south, but if you say it is pilot control, you can do whatver yopu want as far as maneuvers to meet BTO/BFO, and Ed Baker’s story is not without merit.
@Nederland @Johan
The CMB claim is very interesting in that it claims the aircraft will never be found, and that was stated on 9-March. I assume it’s not “authentic” from CMB but almost sounds like someone knew what was happening and tried to pin it on CMB.
@TBill
It is also perhaps interesting because it mentions the prayer/confession (knees heading towards Mekka), presumably a night prayer. Penang to VAMPI/NILAM/MEKAR is exactly in the direction to Mekka (just draw a line on google earth and compare this to the route in the FI). The flight route is also close to the one from Kuala Lumpur to Jeddah (the gateway airport to Mekka).
The author of the claim could not have known this direction on 9/3/2014. At that time there was only some indication that the plane may have returned to Kuala Lumpur, which is nowhere near in direction to Mekka.
The claim also gives some prediction of future disasters linked to Malaysia and possibly in connection with Malaysian aircrafts.
Scary.
@Nederland and TBill,
Thanks for taking my very anecdotal and non-analytical musings seriously. While I’m obviously just wildly speculating about 23S,101E and the Qu’uranic verses, the greater point in this baffling mystery to me is that no hypothesis should just be discounted and laughed off. Do I really think some zealot picked that point on the map based on the verses and flew there? No, not really. But the point is, it’s possible.
I do recall Ed Baker’s piece when he wrote it and being intrigued. Same for the “epiphany” that @MattyPerth had on a similar line of analysis.
I don’t think we’ll ever find the plane, but I do know that one of us will be right. And, it just might be a creative writer/English major who nails the right location, as opposed to one of the Ph.D.s here.
@Sunken Deal
I think your blog-name is appropriate regarding MH370. It’s indeed a ‘Sunken Deal’ when you start looking in the Quran for coördinates and answers. Rediqueless imo.
This book is a book of medieval fairytails of heros, Gods, and lust for power and conquest contructed by narcistic medieval man inspired by a psychotic lunatic who served them well.
Get back to more scientific ages please.
@TBill, @Nederland:
I’ll give you that there are some spoky correspondenses, as if the one writing could follow the plane’s track. But the anti-Muslim coloration is the most significant, and fooling or threatening authorities does not seem to be the prime ambition. It appears “gothic” to me, not as a serious threat or demand, and hence meant to induce fear in those already scared of Jihadists. A Chinese/Indonesian/indian/Thai or even Malay radar operator with his/their own agenda? Mainstream rightwing organised criminal racist (Russian?) oildrilling youth? Hard to say.
Who would be in position to see where the plane went but couldn’t tell? Naval excercise? Airbase ot airfield across the border?
Here’s some recent material for further reference and comparison, the Dortmund football player bus attack: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borussia_Dortmund_team_bus_bombing