One minute after MH370’s flight crew said “Good Night” to Malaysia air traffic controls, and five seconds after the plane passed waypoint IGARI at 1720:31 UTC, the plane’s Mode S signal disappeared from air traffic control screens. As it reached the border of the Ho Chi Minh Flight Information Region (FIR) approximately 50 seconds after that, the plane made an abrupt 180 degree turn. The radius of this turn was so small, and the ground speed so low, that it appears to have been effected via a semi-aerobatic maneuver called a “chandelle.” Similar to a “box canyon turn,” this involves climbing under power while also banking steeply. The maneuver offered WWI pilots a way to reverse their direction of flight quickly in a dogfight.
Chandelles are not a normal part of commercial 777 operation. They would not be used by pilots responding to in-flight fire.
The fact that such an aggressive maneuver was flown suggests that whoever was at the controls was highly motivated to change their direction of flight. Specifically, instead of going east, they wanted to go west.
At the completion of the left-hand U-turn the plane found itself back in Malaysia-controlled airspace close to the Thai border. It flew at high speed (likely having increased engine thrust and dived from the top of its chandelle climb) toward Kota Bharu and then along the zig-zaggy border between peninsular Malaysia and Thailand (briefly passing through the outer fringe of Thai airspace) before making a right-hand turn south of Penang. We know this “based mostly on the analysis of primary radar recordings from the civilian ATC radars at the Kuala Lumpur (KUL) Area Control Centre (ACC) and at Kota Bahru on the east coast of Malaysia; plus (apparently) the air defense radars operated by the RMAF south of Kota Bahru at Jerteh, and on Penang Island off the west coast,” according to AIN Online.
At 18:02, while over the small island of Pulau Perak, the plane disappeared from primary radar, presumable because it had exceeded the range of the radar at Penang, which at that point lay 83 nautical miles directly behind the plane. Then, at 18:22:12, another blip was recorded, 160 miles to the northwest.
The most-asked question about the 18:22 blip is: why did the plane disappear then? But a more pressing question is: why did it reappear? If the plane was already too faint to be discerned by Penang when it was at Pulau Perak, then how on earth could it have been detected when it was three times further away?
One possibility is that it was picked up not by Malaysian radar, but by the Thai radar installation at Phuket. An AFP report from March 2014 quoted Thailand’s Air Marshal Monthon Suchookorn as saying that Thai radar detected the plane “swinging north and disappearing over the Andaman Sea,” although “the signal was sporadic.”
At 18:22, the plane was approximately 150 miles from Phuket. This is well beyond the range at which Penang had ceased being able to detect the plane. What’s more, when the plane had passed VAMPI it had been only about 120 miles from Phuket. If it hadn’t seen the plane when it was at VAMPI, how was it able to detect it when it was 30 miles further? And why just for a momentary blip?
I don’t believe that, as some have suggested, the plane climbed, was detected, and then dived again. As Victor Iannello has earlier pointed out, the plane was flying at around 500 knots, which is very fast, and suggests a high level of motivation to be somewhere else, not bleeding off speed through needless altitude changes.
I propose that what happened at 18:22 was that the plane was turning. Entering into a right bank, the plane would turn its wings temporarily toward the Phuket radar station, temporarily presenting a larger cross section. Then, when the plane leveled its wings to straighten out, the cross section would shrink, potentially causing the plane to disappear.
Why a right bank? The diagram at top is an annotated version of one presented in the DSTG’s “Bayesian Methods” book. The vertical white line is the 18:25:27 ping arc. The orange line represents the path from the 18:22:12 radar detection to the first ping arc. It is 13 miles long. To travel 13 miles in 3.25 minutes requires a ground speed of 240 knots. Prior to final radar return, MH370 was traveling at approximately 490 knots. A plane can’t slow down that quickly without a radical climbing maneuver, which can be dangerous at cruise altitude (cf Air France 447.)
If it had continued at its previous pace, the plane would have traveled 26.5 miles in that time — enough to carry it to the unlabeled yellow thumbtack. Or, to turn to the right and take the path shown in green.
I don’t mean this path to seem so precise and deterministic; there are errors associated with both the position of the ping arc and the radar return. The ping arc, for instance, is generally understood to have an error bar of about 10 km. If the ping arc radius is 10 km larger, and the radar hit location stays the same, then the heading will be be 336 degrees instead of 326 degrees; if the ping radius is 10 km smaller, the angle will be 310 degrees, representing just a 20 degree right turn from a straight-ahead path.
It does not, however, seem possible that the combined radar and ping-arc errors will allow a scenario in which the plane continued on its VAMPI-to-MEKAR heading and speed. As the “Bayesian Methods” book puts it, “the filtered speed at the output of the Kalman filter is not consistent with the 18.25 measurement, and predictions based purely on primary radar data on this will have a likelihood very close to zero.” Neil Gordon confirmed to me in our conversation that something must have changed.
Dr Bobby Ulich, in his recent work examing different flight-path scenarios, has also concluded that the plane turned north at this time. He looked at a southern turn, too, but observed that “the left-hand turn… needs a turning rate higher than the auto-pilot bank limit allows.”
Looking at the over picture of MH370’s first hour post-abduction, we note that:
- The timing of the silencing of the electronics was coordinated to within several seconds to the optimum time to evade detection.
- The 180-degree turnaround maneuver was highly aggressive.
- The plane’s course allowed it to remain in Malaysian airspace. After Penang it stayed closer to the Indonesian FIR (lower black line) than the Thai FIR (upper black line).
- Post diversion, the plane was traveling at high speed, faster than normal cruise flight. This suggests that whoever was flying it was motivated to escape primary radar surveillance–they wanted to get away.
- When last observed, MH370 was likely making a turn to the northwest, in the general direction of Port Blair in the Andaman islands. This is consistent with Air Marshal Monthon Suchookorn’s assertion that Thai radar detected the plane “swinging north and disappearing over the Andaman Sea.”
The overall shape of the flight path from IGARI to 18:25 is U-shaped, curving around Thai airspace. In the Malacca Strait it remained closer to the Indonesian side than the the Thai side. It is possible that the turn at 18:22 resulted from a compromise between two goals: to stay beyond the detection range of the radar station at Phuket, and to travel in a northwesterly direction.
It is widely believed that, since the plane presumable ended up in the southern Indian Ocean, the flight up the Malacca Strait was undertaken in order to avoid penetrating Indonesian airspace en route to the southern ocean. If this were goal, and the person flying the plane should have turned to the left at 18:22, onto a westerly or west-southwesterly heading.
The fact that they did not suggests that, whatever ultimately transpired aboard the plane, the goal prior to the “final major turn” was a destination to the northwest, and that the reason the plane flew southwest from IGARI before turning northwest was to avoid Thai airspace and radar surveillance.
Interesting!
I think the question of whether or not Penang spotted MH370 in between 18:02 and 18:22 depends on a) the authenticity of the Lido picture b) internal records of radar data.
Concerning a) this high resolution image shows time stamps and radar blips in between those times. The circle/radar hole can perhaps be explained because the operator was switching from short to long range.
http://s1.ibtimes.com/sites/www.ibtimes.com/files/2014/03/21/mh370-search-briefing-3.jpg
Concerning b) Neil Gordon also said that all they received was a snapshot from the 18:22 sighting and he thinks it is possible that it was taken from a comprehensive video recording.
The FI states “the tracking by the Military continued as the radar return was observed to be heading towards waypoint MEKAR”. This is underneath the heading “Malaysia Military radar” (p. 2f.)
Notwithstanding this, it is interesting to note that the FI also states the radar return “disappeared abruptly” at 18:22.
@Ge Rijn
@Amsterdam, a city in Holland, famous for a number of things, including canals and bicycles 😉
@all
This is a truly remarkable analysis. Logic is, when even a child can understand it, and this author is capable to transpose enormously complicate topics into digestable stuff.
I would say that i am fully with the conclusions of the author, e.g. when he states that someone wanted to get away as fast he possibly could. Not to mention that this would not fit to the job description of Z., who probably would not be able to ride this particular plane like a wild horse, but there is one important shadow cast on the erroneus information given to HCM ATC, since this plain wrong information from MAS Headquarter seems to have been of great help to the hijacker. I have the suspicion, that the information of the plane in cambodian airspace was given to the HCM ATC only for one reason: to stop him in the emergency protocol and to stop him asking until the plane had escaped.
That would nearly make it safe to say. that the hijackers had assistance inside MAS, and that means inside the government, which would explain everything about the secretiveness and ambiguity of the malaysian investigation.
Nicely writ, Jeff. Nicely put together.
This is overall looking even more like something very few people could have managed.
It is getting a bit scary.
@CosmicA, The Chandelle is required for obtaining a flight certificate in most countries. Pilots train for it. Your comment that this does fit Z’s job description or his inability to execute such a manoevre is complete hogwash.
@Jeff, As always you tickle our minds with interesting articles! Thank you for that.
Of all surrounding countries, it seems Cambodia was the only one that did not spot MH370 at some point on their radar as their closest airport was already out of range.
Perhaps this amounted to confusion that night. You’d expect Vietnam to check with Cambodia and, as no coordinates were given (“somewhere over Cambodia”), Cambodia to check further with radar operators. The software seems to have shown the correct routing, however, because when coordinates were supplied proper, MH370 was thought to be east of Vietnam rather than in Cambodia.
Jeff Wise posted above: “Post diversion, the plane was traveling at high speed, faster than normal cruise flight.”
I’m not sure of that. According to the ATSB, the airplane flew approximately a t FL320 and M.82. FL 320 is consistent with the primary radar data. Prior to IGARI the autothrottle kept the speed at M.82. The agressive 180-degree turnaround would automatically have disengaged the autopilot, but the autothrottle would have remained engaged at M.82 unless the pilot deactivated it.
FL320/ISA+10/M.82 equals 490 kt TAS, and windspeed was 15 kt from the north-east.
@keffertje, @Johan, @Cosmic Academy, Thank you!
@Nederland, As you’ve aptly pointed out, I hardly began to scratch the surface of the mystery surrounding MH370 primary radar data. What does the Lido image represent? How could it be so different from ATSB and Malaysian descriptions of what primary radars saw?
BTW I should mention that due to the uncertainties surrounding the 18:22 radar return, the DSTG analysis uses as its starting point the 18:02 radar return, and subsequently allows routes that do not pass near the 18:22 point, and so are not constrained to turn northwest in the way I describe here. I was very curious to see what population of routes would be possible if the starting point was at 18:22, and that’s why Neil Gordon produced Fig. 3 in the previous post “Exclusive Interview with Top MH370 Search Mathematician Neil Gordon.” I was a little disappointed that his answer wasn’t more illuminating.
@keffertje
We have two issues here:
a) a hijacked 777 which tries to get away as fast as possible (it was often mentioned “military style”)
b) a plain wrong information to the responsible ATC in the midst of a catastrophic crisis that leads to unforgivable non-action and thereby assists the getaway
if you don’t conect these two dots, it would be downright ridiculous imho
Very good article.
I got the brainstorm idea yesterday (watching Fareed Zakaria GPS on CNN) that perhaps IBM’s Watson could be used to assist in finding MH370 and/or assigning probability to various theories.
@Nederland
While the programmed flight path of MH370 shows the plane flying East of Cambodia, that is not the way the flight tracking programs work when they are estimating positions. When the destination is known, the flight tracking programs will propagate aircraft positions for up to two hours using the last reported location, the destination, and a great circle path between the two. The great circle path from IGARI to Beijing is well into Cambodia.
@JeffW
I should have added re: Chandelle action…you mention climbing…does this explain 40000+ ft altitude (which has been discredited by ATSB)? Does this explain dropping down to lower altitude that could explain visual sightings by the fishermen near the Thai border? When ATSB says primary radar altitude was unreliable due to lack of calibration, could it still be relatively correct? Or do we have to totally discard all Malay primary radar altitude data?
@DennisW
If it showed direct great circle routing, it is odd that the one coordinate supplied proper indicated MH370 was on the scheduled route rather than the great circle route:
https://www.google.com/maps/place/14%C2%B054'00.0%22N+109%C2%B015'00.0%22E/@14.9,109.25,5z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x0!8m2!3d14.9!4d109.25?hl=en
(copied from the Wikipedia article)
http://onemileatatime.img.boardingarea.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/MH370-Flight-Plan.png
In that case I’d expect the system moving the position to the west.
This article also says that the system showed MH370 was supposed to be in Vietnamese airspace.
https://www.malaysiakini.com/news/261725
@Nederland
I have no idea where your point came from. There is no data that can possibly support it. The flight plan is useless since the aircraft obviously did not follow the flight plan, and the flight tracking services do not have access to the flight plan.
I am merely advising how the flight tracking services estimate position in the absence of ACARS. Feel free to discard it.
Actually Thai radar tracking commenced 8 minutes after Igari turn:
He said the plane never entered Thai airspace and that Malaysia’s initial request for information in the early days of the search was not specific.
‘When they asked again and there was new information and assumptions from (Malaysian) Prime Minister Najib Razak, we took a look at our information again,’ Montol said.
‘It didn’t take long for us to figure out, although it did take some experts to find out about it.’
Flight 370 took off from Kuala Lumpur at 12:40 a.m. Malaysian time and its transponder, which allows air traffic controllers to identify and track the airplane, ceased communicating at 1:20 a.m.
Montol said that at 1:28 a.m., Thai military radar ‘was able to detect a signal, which was not a normal signal, of a plane flying in the direction opposite from the MH370 plane,’ back toward Kuala Lumpur.
The search area for the plane initially focused on the South China Sea, where ships and planes spent a week searching.
Pings that a satellite detected from the plane hours after its communications went down have led authorities to concentrate instead on two vast arcs — one into central Asia and the other into the Indian Ocean — that together cover an expanse as big as Australia.
Thai officials said radar equipment in southern Thailand detected the plane.
Malaysian officials have said the plane might ultimately have passed through northern Thailand, but Thai Air Chief Marshal Prajin Juntong told reporters Tuesday that the country’s northern radar did not detect it.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2583553/Thai-military-says-missing-flight-MH370-followed-twisting-path-Strait-Malacca.html#ixzz4KiRpLbbm
This was a pilot who deliberately flew fast over Malaysian territory barely skirting Thailand because he didn’t want to risk a shoot-down by the Thais. He probably knew the Malays would be slow to react or would NOT react given that he may have tried this stunt before and/or familiar with their protocols. His prime concern in traveling fast was to mitigate the probability if the Malays DID react.And he probably even indulged in a bit of terrain masking which explains low flying plane sightings by fisher folk near Kota Baru.
Once he got away he was picked up by the Thai radar at Phuket as he was making that fateful turn to SIO. So why did he fly to Penang. He was paying a homage of sorts before the final act. Penang was hometown and Australia his intended destination was where a NOK was. He accomplished both and let the plane drop after that though he may have attempted a sully which went awry (less likely given the recent evidence).
All those maneuvers , the absence of portable ELT activation, deliberate avoidance of communications, non reportage of any form flaming aircraft by pilots in the vicinity, non-communication with other pilots via VHF, the tell tale signs of personal problems etcetera are IMO indicative of someone bent on suicide, though I hope I may be wrong. Nothing political or sinister….or anything complicated
I can see why the pilot avoided Thai airspace. The Royal Thai Airforce has their mean SAAB Gripen multirole fighterjets at Surat Thani. 🙂
@TBill, A chandelle could produce marked changes in altitude but not, I believe, to the extent that were initially reported, which would have put the plane above its ceiling for its weight at the time. And probably not so low that it would have been noticed, in the middle of the night, by fishermen.
@Wazir, You wrote, “Once he got away he was picked up by the Thai radar at Phuket as he was making that fateful turn to SIO.” Very important to understand that this is not the case.
@DennisW
The coordinate is from the FI, p. 98:
“Malaysia Airlines Operations Centre
informed that aircraft still sending the movement message indicating somewhere in Vietnam and giving the last position as coordinate N14.90000 E109 15500 at time 1833 UTC [0233MYT].”
It is also in the protocols, App. 1.18F, p. 33ff.
@Jeff
Would this be helpful:
SSR – station at Khao Mai Tao Sib Song,Phuket Province
075244.7N 0981909.3E(WGS84)
range 220 NM
http://www.aisthai.aviation.go.th/webais/pdf/ENR/ENR1.6Radarservicesandprocedures
But there seems to be a problem as 220Nm works out to roughly 137 miles but you state the distance as 150 miles
http://www.aisthai.aviation.go.th/webais/pdf/ENR/ENR 1.6 Radar services and procedures
@wazir you might like to take another look at those numbers – NM / statute miles / kms???
@Paul Smithson
Nautical miles
@all
Justify the need for new radar system
April 4, 2014
The public is given an impression that the Malaysian military’s radar capability is inadequate.
By Kua Kia Soong
As the Global Day against Military Spending (GDAMS, April 14, 2014) approaches, it is wise for Malaysian taxpayers to scrutinise the next big budget military procurement of the government’s.
Apart from the multi-role combat aircraft and other multi-million weapons of war the Defence Ministry plans to acquire, the Defence Minister and Acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Tun Hussein is now talking about “a need to strengthen the nation’s military assets” following the disappearance of the Malaysian Airlines Flight MH370.
According to the official state news agency, Hishammuddin said that our radar surveillance should be reviewed to equip the Malaysian military.
The public is given a (false) impression that the Malaysian military’s radar capability is inadequate and that is presumably the reason the military failed to trace MH370 as it turned back and traversed the northern part of the peninsula on that fateful night on March 8.
In the early 1990s, Dr Mahathir Mohamad signed a RM5 billion arms deal MOU with Margaret Thatcher.
This may have again slipped his memory but let me remind him from my speech during the parliamentary debate on the Supplementary Supply Bill 1992:
“It has been alleged that the Marconi radar sold to us under the MOU – costing RM1.2 billion – is four times more expensive than the compatible US system which costs only RM300 million. This Marcello radar (by GEC Marconi) was to be integrated with the RMAF system, but it doesn’t work! It seems the RMAF prefers the US Raytheon system, a proven system. Furthermore, it seems the British themselves do not want this system! The RAF has given it up for the US Boeing system…”
Marconi was also given the contract for the Nautis II combat management system for the KD Lekiu frigate as well as the command, control and communication systems for the four RMN guided missile corvettes which Malaysia purchased from Italy in 1998.
In 1994, Alenia-Marconi (A-M) was also awarded the contract to supply five primary and seven secondary radars for the Civil Aviation Department at Kuching, Kota Kinabalu, Johor, Subang, Langkawi, Labuan and Sepang.
A-M also upgraded Malaysia’s network of civil aviation radar in 1999, “thus ensuring comprehensive air traffic control”.
Then in 2010, the Defence Ministry announced in the Dewan Negara that it had bought two Czech-made Vera-E passive surveillance radars for RM7.2 million in 2007.
Then Deputy Defence Minister Dr Abdul Latiff Ahmad said the purchase of the Vera-E, a highly advanced sensor that can detect aircraft, ships and ground vehicles from signals emitted by their radar, communications and other onboard electronic systems, was “to protect the country’s air space.”
National command system in 2013
More recently on Feb 20, 2013, ThalesRaytheonSystems (TRS) announced “full system acceptance has been finalized with the Royal Malaysian Air Force for the Malaysian Air Defense Ground Environment Sector Operations Center III (MADGE) Program. ThalesRaytheonSystems provided the Malaysian Ministry of Defence an enhanced national command and control system.”
“The C2 system we’ve executed in Malaysia represents technological integration at its best,” said Kim Kerry, CEO of US Operations for ThalesRaytheonSystems.
“We worked with our Malaysian customers to integrate their legacy system and have augmented it with proven technologies, such as the Sentry® command and control system and the Ground Master 400 (GM 400) radar. The result is a system that reliably and effectively meets their requirements.”
The MADGE system operates in real-time and features multi-radar tracking and a flexible human-machine interface.
The GM 400 radar will provide additional long-range surveillance capabilities for the Royal Malaysian Air Force. (source: http://www.deagel.com/news/Malaysian-Ministry-of-Defence-Accepts-MADGE-Command-and-Control-System_n000011248.aspx)
So, is 2013 recent enough for a reasonably advanced radar system for Malaysia?
According to Defence Review Asia, May 26, 2010:
“As a whole, the RMAF currently possesses total radar coverage save for some gaps at certain height levels, details of which are classified.
“The Sistem Pertahanan Udara Nasional (SPUN-National Air Defence System) is said to be currently between stage one and two of its three stage development goals, with stage one being full coverage of Malaysian airspace, stage two being the full integration and networking of all armed forces radar coverage along with the Malaysian Department of Civil Aviation while the third and final stage would be the addition of satellite coverage, AEW&C aircraft and surface-to-air missile systems into the air defence network.”
RMAF personnel sleeping on the job?
With the vast budget that has been given to procure radar facilities through the years, there is no excuse for failing to trace MH370.
From the statement by the RMAF chief the day following MH370’s disappearance, RMAF radar did trace MH370’s turn back.
Otherwise, on what evidence was RMAF chief General Rodzali Daud’s statement that the military radars had detected a possible turn back of flight MH370 based?
But Malaysian military operators took no action even when their radar detected an unidentified aircraft traveling across the country!
Now when we bear in mind that in 2011 Malaysia claimed that there were 2,058 incidents of airspace violations by Singapore’s air force since 2008, how could they miss one MH370 on March 8, 2014?
Apart from the millions spent on our radar systems, MH370’s erratic route should have activated our Sukhois and F18s to be scrambled to prove their worth.
Unfortunately, they were idle when they were most needed. The only action they have seen so far has been against a “rag tag army” of Suluks in Sabah last year.
Will there ever be a need for Malaysian taxpayers to foot the bill for the more advanced and multi-million Typhoon or Rafael or Gripen fighter jets?
Form a select committee
By trying to blame our failure to trace MH370 on inadequate radar facilities, Hishammuddin has tried to justify the need for more military procurements:
“And now, Najib (Malaysia’s Prime Minister) has got to find me the money to change our radar system because the whole world now knows our defence capabilities, in terms of radar.”
Let a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) led by an Opposition member decide whether the defence minister’s claim is valid.
First, the PSC must find out:
How did our fabulously expensive radar capabilities procured through the years fail on that fateful night on March 8, 2014?
Was all that expensive radar equipment wasted on the RMAF personnel who were sleeping on the job?
Or was it a case of yet another expensive military equipment that was not maintained properly?
http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/opinion/2014/04/04/justify-the-need-for-new-radar-system/
um, 220Nm = 137 miles?
@Wazir
Paul is right. 220Nm is greater than 250 miles.
@ Susie @Anyone “There are 2 other major issues that IMO should be continually addressed.
(1) The cargo and still withheld full manifest”
Yes, that is a point which has puzzled me. Perhaps there has been (is) an investigation into the circumstances of the ‘missing’ cargo and this has resulted in a dead end. Perhaps not.
It would be nice to know:
1. Was any ‘last’ minute cargo loaded that does not show on the manifest/waybills that have been released? (the crew would require this for a final W&B check)
2. Is it possible that the plane could have landed somewhere briefly to off-load cargo and perhaps take on fuel? By ‘possible’ I mean a landing/takeoff consistent with generally accepted satellite data (BFO/BTO) and any known radar data.
I think it is worthwhile to note that a diversion to take the cargo could go unclaimed by the perpetrator and possibly covered up by the Malays if such cargo were in some way illicit.
The logistics of such an act (was Z involved and/or betrayed at some point, who flew from such a landing to the end point, how was the cargo handled, ….) only become important if such a landing was possible given the known constraints.
@paul Smithson
My sincere apologies. Its my mistake. It should be
220Nm= 252.89 miles or roughly 407 kilometers
and hence within range as Jeff estimated 150 miles or so.
Note it is SSR=Secondary Surveillance Radar that operates 24 hours as per their notes at
http://www.aisthai.aviation.go.th/webais/pdf/ENR/ENR%201.6%20Radar%20services%20and%20procedures
@DennisW
thank you for the alert.
Additionally, the article I appended above intimates to us that incursions are relatively well tolerated by Malaysia which plausibly explains why the pilot flew from IGARI the way he did.
for its “disappearance”, I wonder if there was another aircraft with its transponder turned off approaching MH370. just past IGARI MH370 performed its “chandelle” to apparently disappear. all the turn back radar was captured from the other aircraft. there was some radar hits in the GoT heading North but I wonder if that was closely checked making sure it was not MH370.
@all
A few months ago someone on here posted a pic of Capt Zaharie at the airport terminal (I presume at KL) standing with 2 other people.
I think it was claimed to be one of the last pics of Zaharie taken in the lead-up to the disappearance (?)
If anyone knows what I’m on about, can you please provide the link again if you have it. I think many new posters who probably don’t even know about the pic may find it quite interesting.
Thanks
@Jeff:
The sky could probably be expected to be empty by the rouge pilot, who must have been very experienced as it seems. A triple-7 has no rearview-mirrors. Would it be equipped as a standard wirh instruments that could detect other planes in the vicinity? Was such an instrument functional between Igari and FMT?
Is it known exactly (I suppose it is) what other commercial, freight, private and military planes were in the area at the same time? And if he would have been limited by any time frames in that respect? (If flight this and that crossed his path 15 minutes later etc.)
@MH
Could well be. It would also support one of the most compelling reasons for the ~18:25 logon – that it was not 9M-MRO.
However, opening that can of worms is not something anyone should relish doing.
Let’s make that just “pilot” in the first line.
@Johan
EK343 was flying a similar route (from Kuala Lumpur to Dubai), slightly after MH370.
Position at 18:22 UTC
6.1826 97.0953
http://uk.flightaware.com/live/flight/UAE343/history/20140307/1710Z/WMKK/OMDB
Jeff,
Frankly speaking again very disappointing article. You again repeat the same mistakes as before: (1) interpret observations in the way that fit your own current narrative; (2) forgetting to mention other possible interpretations of the same observations; (3) presenting assumptions instead of conclusions; (4) discussing only fragments of the whole picture.
Some points:
Re “The fact that such an aggressive maneuver was flown suggests that whoever was at the controls was highly motivated to change their direction of flight.”
I can name a number of alternative explanations, for example:
-Inaccurate radar data;
-ADIRU failure/malfunction;
-Manual piloting by an unexperienced pilot.
Re: “Then, at 18:22:12, another blip was recorded, 160 miles to the northwest.”
I am lost with regard to your current interpretation of the famous Lido image. A long time ago Victor suggested that ATSB simply drew a straight line to explain the difference between the Lido image, FI report and ATSB 2014 report. After it was revealed that DSTG received only one data point at 18:22, it became clear why ATSB showed a straight line in their 2014 report.
Re: “Post diversion, the plane was traveling at high speed, faster than normal cruise flight.”
I agree with Gysbreght. How do you know that? Even so, interpretations of high speed are quite ambiguous.
Re: “It is possible that the turn at 18:22 resulted from a compromise between two goals: to stay beyond the detection range of the radar station at Phuket, and to travel in a northwesterly direction.”
Why would someone care about Phuket radar, but totally ignore Lhokseumawe radar? And why SDU reboot occurred exactly at this time (do remember it takes approximately 2 minutes or so for IFE to send its first message). What purpose could be achieved by doing that? Chances of such a coincidence are astronomically low.
Re: “The fact that they did not suggests that, whatever ultimately transpired aboard the plane, the goal prior to the “final major turn” was a destination to the northwest, and that the reason the plane flew southwest from IGARI before turning northwest was to avoid Thai airspace and radar surveillance.”
Where did you get it that a destination was to the NW? Avoid radar surveillance? Potential hijackers would have to be very well aware of non-working radars and characteristics of Malaysian, Thai, Indonesian and Indian air defence systems.
@Gysbreght, @Jeffwise
For what it’s worth, I made the average airspeed between turnaround and 18:22 to be not less than Mach 0.86, taking winds and temperature into account.
Has there been prior discussion about Moonset at IGARI?
Assuming no errors I calc a 50% moon setting at 16:34 7-March UTC I am adding +7 min. to adjust for 38,000-ft altitude Moon is setting 16:41 vs. 17:22 UTC at lost signal, so about 40-min past Moonset. MH370 probably never catches up as it would be about 60-min behind Moonset at around IGREX.
By the next day I think the Moon would have been brighter and up over the horizon at the same flight times especially if there had been any delay.
@Nederland:
Ouch. That looks like something like 53 miles (85 km) and 7 minutes behind. That is a close shave. He must have been aware of that flight coming. Could be a reason he stepped on it?
Would he have adapted to that when chosing his (previous and) next moves (slowing down, turning left or right, loitering out of sight)? He must have known what flightpath it would follow (maybe he could guess its speed). If he turned at the wrong angle or (Jeff) climbed and dived he might have risked being spotted, or?
I won’t ask about that plane’s BFO etc. values or appearance on secondary radar because I assume that to have been threshed.
Nice picture of the “rogue pilot” (excuse my gallow’s humour).
@Jeff Wise
good idea to go over all that early information again from the beginning. In search of a simple solution using the ISAT data and the proposed find of the recorders all not so fitting data were thrown overboard and excluded from further discussions. Lets start with the assumption that all those early informations, radar data, sightings, hints from interviews …… provide some clues and lets test them with new information gained in the last two years.
@ Wazir Roslan
Note it is SSR=Secondary Surveillance Radar that operates 24 hours as per their notes at……
Secondary radar can only detect aircraft with operating transponder. MH370 hd its transponders turned off after IGARI.
@ Johan
“The sky could probably be expected to be empty by the rouge pilot, who must have been very experienced as it seems. A triple-7 has no rearview-mirrors. Would it be equipped as a standard wirh instruments that could detect other planes in the vicinity? Was such an instrument functional between Igari and FMT?”
You could probably fly random circles in the sky outside of congested local terminal control areas and never hit other traffic, even when blindfolded. Whoever flew MH370, other traffic was none of his concern.
@Jeff
Yep, that’s the one! Many thanks!
@all
Found this picture extremely interesting when I first saw it. Looking at it again, its quite interesting how the younger pilot (a junior) to the left of Zaharie is almost deferential when listening to the words of his superior (guy to Z’s right), yet Zaharie’s seems pre-occupied in his own thoughts. The junior is full of almost child-like eagerness yet Zaharie seems ‘distracted’ and not totally engaged with the conversation in hand.
“DennisW
Posted September 19, 2016 at 1:31 PM
@MH
Could well be. It would also support one of the most compelling reasons for the ~18:25 logon – that it was not 9M-MRO.
However, opening that can of worms is not something anyone should relish doing.”
if this can of worms hasn’t been previously opened, maybe someone could confirm with certainty before its forgotten.
And yes, he would have had to think about contrails and flight level — in relation to the aircraft behind, wouldn’t he?
@MH, There has been extensive discussion of the idea that after MH370 vanished from primary radar, another plane (or drone) in the vicinity logged on with Inmarsat using its identifier, then flew down into the southern Indian Ocean while 9M-MRO flew on to wherever. This idea has the appealing feature of allowing the perpetrators, who seem from the flight behavior to be highly knowledgeable and motivated, to not be going through all this trouble just for the sake of offing themselves. But it does present some technical challenges, as well as just striking many people as being too Tom-Clancyesque for their tastes.
I’m not fundamentally opposed to the discussion of such ideas but they can eventually start to run in circles, with the vehemence of opinion overtaking the investigative rigor, and I have to put the kibosh on things for a while.
@Retired4:
Are you sure? I realize the sky is big, but I didn’t necessarily mean hitting someone, but being spotted. Anyone up there would figure that that plane is not supposed be there right now, heading in that direction, behaving like that. And he would have been a radio call away from being caught up. It has to do with planning and the likelyhood of premeditation etc. I suppose he had lanterns/position lights turned off too, but still. Of course if it is pitch black and cloudy then there won’t be much to see.
@Sajid & @Jeff:
Is it known exactly when that picture was taken?
@Johan
MH370 approached EK343 from the right hand side and may well have spotted it (it is reasonable to presume that MH370’s own position and other lights were switched off). It must have joined EK343’s flight path at VAMPI (at around 2:13) perhaps with a view to confusing the Indonesian radar operator. Not impossible I think that MH370 did some loitering in the Andaman area once it thought it had evaded Penang radar (restoring power to the left AC bus and assuming Campbell Bay’s radar was turned off) before turning south, avoiding line of sight with EK343 or shadowing it for a short while.
Wild speculation, of course.
@All
Just a couple of thoughts..
If the Malaysian military radar operated from Butterworth Air Base, is situated at the southern end of Penang Island, he would have been flying directly away from it as he proceeded up the Malacca Strait – a stealth tactic, possibly?
The FMT was in my opinion, most likely made at IGOGU or ANOKO, essentially on the KL/CHENNAI FIR boundary, to avoid being seen entering Indian ATC airspace. Does that make any sense?
@Sajid That is amazing. You can deduce that from this photo!!?? Perhaps you can also deduce what Zaharie is thinking? Could be useful to know that.
@Johan
if you think that pilots are checking their flightpath by looking out of the window when flying at cruise altitude then I must disappoint you. Now after 911 they can concentrate on other things without being caught by an entering cabin crew. But spare me with details. For traffic avoidance they rely on TACS and a flightpath deconflicted by flightplanning and ATC monitoring. TACS though is transponder related, therefore it will not detect aircraft with transponders off.
@jw – I was hoping to find out if that manoeuvre could disappear mh370 without any support of drones etc. Just that maybe another aircraft might have provided temp shadowing of mh370 from radar.
Typically which direction would mh370 be oriented right after the manoeuvre ?
Thanks!