Malaysian airlines plane missing

[yardbird78]

The pprune site that ALF18 referenced is now up to 221 pages. There is a TON of information there if you have a couple of hours to sift through it all.

Darwin

[Stratospheremodels]

The more time passes, the more this story almost feels like a sci-fi story i read years ago where a commercial jet aircraft gets hijacked to a small island in the South Atlantic ocean. But Bob Morane stories aside and with all due respect and my sincere wishes to all the families of that flight that may have lost loved ones, there are of few things here that just don't add up, and i would like the opinions of professional military pilots and reconnaissance and radar specialists.

If there was indeed a hijacking of flight MH 370 by one or both of its pilots or by someone else on board with pilot experience, i have a little bit of difficulty believing that they would have flown the airplane for 4 more hours on a new course to the Adaman Islands only to run out of fuel before reaching land. It seems to me that if you plan a hijacking and you are a professional pilot, you at least calculate enough fuel to reach your target. However, at the very low altitude they might have been flying, above the waves, the possibility of a slight error might have precipitated them into the water in a second, or a collision with a flock of birds. Still, ignoring a potential accident or a bad luck such as these, i would like to know from pilots how difficult it might have been to fly such a large aircraft below the radar cover over the sea. I know there is another phenomenon that can creep in if you fly low above the sea, a form of hypnotism due to the monotonous nature of what the pilots are seeing (but it was night time, so it kinds of eliminate that) or simply falling asleep and plowing the aircraft into a wave. Still, with today`s automatic pilot systems, i have a hard time believing that this might have happened, and if they had decided to fly low level above the sea on autopilot, such types of accidents might have been nearly impossible. So that leaves a bird strike in one or both engines at low level or into the cockpit.

Just as a side note, the Adamman Islands have often been used as a temporary base by sea pirates during centuries. It is also an archipelago that counts one of the most primitive (and the most aggressive) tribal population on Earth, so aggressive in fact that the almost systematically greet foreigners and helicopters with volleys of arrows and spears.

Now the other thing that really bothers me. The Chinese say they found some debris on photos from one of their reconnaissance satellite. Then they declare it was released by mistake. Meaning, in clear terms, they were not supposed to SHARE these photos to avoid showing they military reconnaissance capabilities... and those responsible for releasing them are probably on their way to Sajiatun as a result of that mistake...

Now the US NAVY, USAF and NRO have satellites all over the globe. There are radar satellites, SLAR, IR sats, visual wavelenght satellites, all of which monitor everything that moves. To me, losing an aircraft the size of a 777 seems to be in the domain of the impossible. One of the mottos of the NRO about some of its satellites is: Nothing escapes our reach. Now are those empty words or is it that easy to escape satellite reconnaissance and radar, by just flying right above the waves ?? There seems to be more than enough detection methods up there in space to detect something. As well as above the horizon radar systems (like the ones that were used during the Sri-Lanka conflict to detect cargo vessels movements). So the question is: why with all these military detection systems nothing have been found yet ? And what about the data sent from the Rolls Royce engines to the manufacturer. Are these sent via satellites (as i think it would have to be), in such case, someone obviously Knows where or when the aircraft stopped flying. But would they know where ?

Edited March 16, 2014 by Stratospheremodels

[Stratospheremodels]

A Very important piece of the puzzle, from the PPRuNe professional pilots forum (that`s on page 150, now its going well beyond 200 pages, i will go read the more recent infos:

First this, about the ACARS data to give a bit of background info:

Here are what now seem to be almost facts.

The ACARS system for the airframe did not have a satellite subscription.

The ACARS system for the engines did have a satellite subscription.

The satellite path is used when there is no VHF path available.

The engine ACARS only sends when a significant event takes place. There was no event after the top of climb and so no further messages were sent.

The Engine ACARS satellite coms system "pings" the satellite every 30 mins.

Therefore:- Since about 8 pings were received and logged the engines ran for a further 4 hours after last message at top of climb since a shutdown would have resulted in an ACARS message. The exact time is not known of course.

By the way. I am far from satisfied that the satellite system used is Iridium. Due to the low earth orbit and rapidly changing overhead satellites I would have thought that the ping might need to be more frequent.

Another pîece:

General aviation aircraft have been doing this for years. I know of at least 3 vendors who offer such service at modest cost: Spidertracks, Spot, and InReach.

Basically, a unit on the a/c sends its GPS coordinates every 10 minutes or to so a satellite which relays it to the tracking company's servers.

The airborne unit often goes on the glareshield, and it includes its own battery that lasts for a few hours if power is lost.

And the 3rd piece and most interesting one:

Well, since a lot of people here doesn't seem to understand what's going on regarding the ACARS/SATCOM stories in the press, let's recap what's going on regarding the new information from the US.

- MAS ACARS comms only work thru VHF since they chose not to pay for the extra fee for ACARS SATCOM link

- That 777-200 is SATCOM equipped

- What was found by US Government services (NSA, or maybe they asked Iridium directly to check the logs) is that, since the a/c ACARS system was out of VHF coverage, the system tried to connect thru SATCOM. But since MAS doesn't have a contract for that, connection was rejected, but remains a trace in their logs.

- That means that what they actually found is the log indicating every time the aircraft ACARS system tried to log in thru SATCOM and failed due to the lack of contract for that. Since the ACARS system onboard that specific aircraft tried for 4 hours after its disappearance to connect via SATCOM to the ACARS network, it means the aircraft was, at least, powered on and, since not found anywhere yet, probably flying.

Sorry if I wasn't clear enough, I tried to write everything down ASAP...

I have an IT background, and according to all the available sources, this is my interpretation of what's going on.

Edited March 16, 2014 by Stratospheremodels

[Stratospheremodels]

Page 211:

The indicated track indicated by the Malaysian authorities puzzle me. If this information is well correct of course.

At 1721UTC/07 - 0121/08 Malaysian time - MAS370 is at, or by IGARI, and on a 25° heading. A right turn is then initiated towards BITOD, about 37NM away. Mag heading from IGARI to BITOD is 59°. Last recorded heading is 40°. Because the FR24 history playback is accelerated at a x12 speed, I believe that MAS370 was established on course to BITOD, because the recorded position is not precise enough. From there the military PSR is the only source of information, seemingly. We learn that, afterwards, the aircraft performed a right or left turn towards VAMPI. IGARI-VAMPI direct route is a 263° heading for about a 45 minutes flight time (361 NM-470 kts). At VAMPI, MAS370 initates a 125° right turn to the heading 28°and less than 7 minutes after, a 80°left turn to IGREX 268 NM away. I do believe this. But...

Professionnals pilots in command IMHO, not possible. Something else happened. My opinion is that someone tried to enter a routeing inside the FMS and could not because not familiar with the how to and/or having the wrong WPT entered. It would explain such erratics and incredible heading changes. Or the crew was under threat and tried to gain time...

I had thought that someone was trying to enter GIVAG instead of GIVAL to go back to KUL but for what reason, and why VAMPI then.

This flight was only less than 45 minutes on its way when the squawk was switched off. I do not know what sort of services MAS provides to its passengers on this route, but I believe that it was the dinner time or the aperitif just before. Learning what already happened with the F/O on a previous flight, may be that some nice looking person(s)ask to have a little visit to the flight deck and it was accepted... Or someone irrupted in the cockpit while one of the crew member was going in/out.

Roger that? Acknowledging a frequency change this way seems strange to me.

Edited March 16, 2014 by Stratospheremodels

[Stratospheremodels]

Page 221:

(A small side note from me, it seems the senior pilot of flight MH 370 had the same hobby as us, he was a scale modeler. He had also built his own flight simulator at home. The flight simulator of the pilot is mentionned in the call for help to several nations that the Malaysian gov`t have published today).

http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/535538-malaysian-airlines-mh370-contact-lost-222.html

wow... Just stumbled upon something that I had completely missed until now

Quote:

"We informed Malaysia on the day we lost contact with the flight that we noticed the flight turned back west but Malaysia did not respond,"

That is Vietnam’s deputy minister of transport, Pham Quy Tieu, and the quote was reported at least 4 days ago

(as can be seen here Vietnam suspends air search for missing Malaysian jet | NDTV.com )

So that means

A) Vietnam has the plane on radar turning around, and tried to tell Malaysia that day

B)/>/>/>/> Malaysia knew they had it on their radar at 2:40 in the Straights anyway

...yet still they let 14 countries waste 8 days in the Gulf looking for a plane that wasn't ever there.

Unbelievable

Edited March 16, 2014 by Stratospheremodels

[Stratospheremodels]

And page 222:

The New Straits Times is reporting that the Malaysians have flown a 777 on a course to re-enact the likely scenario of MH370 turning west across the Malay peninsula and to see if the same primary radar and satellite data could be reproduced. They are satisfied this is the case.

[bashace]

Someone needs to send a drone with airborne cellular service to fly over Somalia to see if any of the passengers cell phones ping the network.

[Stratospheremodels]

It`s kind of strange too that no interceptors seems to have been scrambled to check on that flight from any of the neighboring countries (didn't hear about any yet so far), starting with Vietnam which had already notified Malaysia of the change of course. Many countries in the region regularly conduct joint military air exercises. I would expect they do have some contact and coordination when something odd occurs. Or the aircraft simply appeared to everyone to have vanished from radars soon after the change of course, with everyone concluding (early) to a disintegration in flight...?

Or like some people are thinking, airplanes got scrambled, and they might have shot-down a non-responding aircraft that flew in their airspace, and nobody wants to admit they shot-down a civilian aircraft full of passengers.

Edited March 16, 2014 by Stratospheremodels

[Scooby]

Interesting theories on this being used as a Terrorist "dry run" or trial before a larger operation.

What will world governments do when they are faced with the choice to shoot down an airliner to potentially save a larger population from the crash or detonation?

I was thinking dry run too within days of the incident. Why else would anyone not taking credit for it?

We still train and have aircraft on quick reaction duty to shoot down airliners. I use to deploy often to man our Q. They a manned 24/7/365.

[Scooby]

First this, about the ACARS data to give a bit of background info:

Here are what now seem to be almost facts.

The ACARS system for the airframe did not have a satellite subscription.

The ACARS system for the engines did have a satellite subscription.

The satellite path is used when there is no VHF path available.

The engine ACARS only sends when a significant event takes place. There was no event after the top of climb and so no further messages were sent.

The Engine ACARS satellite coms system "pings" the satellite every 30 mins.

Therefore:- Since about 8 pings were received and logged the engines ran for a further 4 hours after last message at top of climb since a shutdown would have resulted in an ACARS message. The exact time is not known of course.

By the way. I am far from satisfied that the satellite system used is Iridium. Due to the low earth orbit and rapidly changing overhead satellites I would have thought that the ping might need to be more frequent.

And the 3rd piece and most interesting one:

Well, since a lot of people here doesn't seem to understand what's going on regarding the ACARS/SATCOM stories in the press, let's recap what's going on regarding the new information from the US.

- MAS ACARS comms only work thru VHF since they chose not to pay for the extra fee for ACARS SATCOM link

- That 777-200 is SATCOM equipped

- What was found by US Government services (NSA, or maybe they asked Iridium directly to check the logs) is that, since the a/c ACARS system was out of VHF coverage, the system tried to connect thru SATCOM. But since MAS doesn't have a contract for that, connection was rejected, but remains a trace in their logs.

- That means that what they actually found is the log indicating every time the aircraft ACARS system tried to log in thru SATCOM and failed due to the lack of contract for that. Since the ACARS system onboard that specific aircraft tried for 4 hours after its disappearance to connect via SATCOM to the ACARS network, it means the aircraft was, at least, powered on and, since not found anywhere yet, probably flying.

Sorry if I wasn't clear enough, I tried to write everything down ASAP...

I have an IT background, and according to all the available sources, this is my interpretation of what's going on.

Of course the system would be communicating via satcom, VHF only has a roughly 260 mile line of site range. Not in your detail, but most of the ACAR info was convered in this thread.

You may have your ACARS subscription information reversed. What was initially reported was Malaysian airlines didn't subscribe to ACARS for the airframe and then it was reported they did. It has been reported they didn't have the engine subscription. If it is true they had the airframe subscription and not the engine subscription, that would explain why the group/person involved in this take-over missed disabling the engine ACARS. Had they known, a very important part of this puzzle would have been missed, the 7-8 hours of engine operation after contact was lost. It was a failure on the bad guys part to miss that detail.

I have a sneaky suspicion that Maylasian airlines did not have an engine subscription and that Roll's Royce was monitoring the engines anyhow. They were doing this to make sure their product was being used properly or to monitor the health of their products. It appears the US State department knew of these pings before Malaysian Airlines brass, which lead me to believe Rolls Royce revealed to US intelligence that they may have some important information to share.

I would also be willing to bet the engine ACARS is not on any aircraft wiring diagrams, if it is it labeled as diabled, or it does not reveal the internal schematics of the components mounted on the engine to collect ACARS. I have seen this all too often on aircraft where manufacturers do not want to share proprietary information. The secret data collection by Rolls Royce would be much the same as what Microsoft does with their software when they include spyware.

I bet there is a lot of information not being shared that US intelligence knows. But I already think they revealed too much, I don't think they should have released the engine ACARS info to the press, they should have made up some other bogus story stating how they knew the aircraft flew for another 7-8 hours. The bad guys will know to disable more stuff next time.

I think this is a new form of terror, that this was a trial run and the reason the aircraft was flown for so long was they didn't want any of the evidence found so the next event can't be prevented.

I have 25 plus years avionics engineering background.

[Scooby]

It`s kind of strange too that no interceptors seems to have been scrambled to check on that flight from any of the neighboring countries (didn't hear about any yet so far), starting with Vietnam which had already notified Malaysia of the change of course. Many countries in the region regularly conduct joint military air exercises. I would expect they do have some contact and coordination when something odd occurs. Or the aircraft simply appeared to everyone to have vanished from radars soon after the change of course, with everyone concluding (early) to a disintegration in flight...?

Or like some people are thinking, airplanes got scrambled, and they might have shot-down a non-responding aircraft that flew in their airspace, and nobody wants to admit they shot-down a civilian aircraft full of passengers.

You really think they have aircraft on quick reaction duty in that part of the world? Until 911 we didn't even have that in North America and to the best of my knowledge we are one of the few that still do.

It has been reported that most of the radar sites in those regions are turned off at night.

Most the fighter pilots in those countries were probably sleeping.

[Scooby]

There's got to be some sort of letter of agreement (LOA) between the Malaysian and Vietnamese ATC authorities as to handoffs in oceanic sectors, regardless of whether they are radar or non-radar.

John Hairell (tpn18@yahoo.com)

The handover apparently didn't occur and it didn't follow the protocol you suggest. They were to leave their zone and report into the next zone.

They should have read-back the instructions/radio frequency/callsign to the Malaysian controller and then reported into the next zone, instead they said, "thanks good night," and didn't report in. They didn't use standard radio protocol.

[vince14]

Someone needs to send a drone with airborne cellular service to fly over Somalia to see if any of the passengers cell phones ping the network.

I'd assume that if the aircraft was indeed hijacked and is sitting on the tarmac at some remote airfield, then the hijackers would have taken the cell phones off the passengers and had them turned off/destroyed.

Vince

[vince14]

I bet there is a lot of information not being shared that US intelligence knows. But I already think they revealed too much, I don't think they should have released the engine ACARS info to the press, they should have made up some other bogus story stating how they knew the aircraft flew for another 7-8 hours. The bad guys will know to disable more stuff next time.

Unless, of course, the engine ACARS info is bogus and has been made up to prevent revealing some other secret aircraft surveillance capability...

Vince

[Don]

It just seems to be an awful lot of work to go through for terrorists to hijack an airliner filled with 239 passengers and then not take credit for it. Dry run or not, generally speaking terrorists don't do a whole lot of things without jumping in front of some camera bursting to take credit for it. If it's an aircraft they want, there are easier targets then a civilian airliner filled with passengers (and which would attract less attention in the media... that is if they are not looking to take credit for the hijacking as has been speculated). A FedEx, UPS, or some other cargo aircraft would probably be easier. Heck, stealing John Travolta's 707 would probably be less hassle (or any other privately owned large aircraft that is sitting on any one of the hundreds of tarmacs around the globe or for sale or otherwise). Now, if it was terrorists, then perhaps it wasn't the aircraft they wanted at all, but someone or something that was on the aircraft? For that matter, what if the aircraft was taken down by the "good-guys" because there was something on the aircraft that would have been devastating had it been allowed to fly it's route (biological weapon? Radiological weapon?)? Who knows? Until we get some definitive proof either way we are all merely speculating. It must be absolutely horrible for the families who had loved ones onboard. I cannot imagine what they are going through.

.

Don.

[Jennings]

For one thing, every airport in the world that's big enough to land a 777 at is well known. For another, you can bet that the NRO has already tasked satellite assets to image each and every one of them. If there's a hangar big enough for a 777, and you stash a missing 777 in it, *somebody* on the ground is going to snoop it out and spill the beans. And don't forget the airplane would have been very low in fuel, so you'd have to refuel it to do anything nefarious with it. You don't fuel a 777 with 5 gallon gas cans. There would have to be fuel infrastructure at whatever airfield this is.

And you could go on and on.

My guess: for whatever reason it's at the bottom of the Indian Ocean.

[11bee]

For theories, I'm discounting flight crew suicide. If you want to off yourself, why go to the trouble of shutting down comms, mulitple course changes, etc. Just push the stick forward and get it over with. If hijacking, simply put a gun to the head of the pilot and you fly to the nearest friendly airport, land and issue your demands. Only thing that comes to my mind was a 9/11 type suicide crash that somehow ended up crashing into the ocean before it reached it's target. Given the range of the plane, the list of targets is nearly infinite. Could have been something in China, could have been a US carrier tied up in port somewhere in the Pacific, could have been downtown Tokyo.

No way this was a "dry run". The 9/11 hijackers did dry runs by flying on the United / American flights as regular passengers. You don't take over a plane just to see if it can be done and try it again in a few months "for real". You've already tipped your hand and security will be orders of magnitude heavier when you try the next attempt.

[82Whitey51]

The BEST case scenario at this point...is that they find the thing spread all over the Indian Ocean.

[shadoweng]

Could they already have already bought the planes they need, have them ready... And have used this as a diversion? I mean look at what the world has out there looking for it..... Everyone is distracted and immersed in looking for this...

[SERNAK]

Here's another thought-scenario.

What if the Malaysian Air Defense had identified the aircraft as an unidentified flying object / threat and shot it down? Especially since there was a radio silence and probably the aircraft was flying very low.

Could this also be the case or, am I mumbling?

[shadoweng]

This is all so surreal to be honest. Nothing is really fitting. So many scenerios and so few facts to back any of them. However they are all saying Suicide was not a causal factor, but what if that is what he wanted us to believe? There are alot of things their family would lose out on if it was proven to be Suicide, this puts alot of reasonable doubt to that theory... So if you thought it out enough, this may be the perfect suicide while still perseving all the benefits left for your family. But then again, almost anything is possible at this point.........

[TaiidanTomcat]

Swiss jets not scrambled over hijacked plane because 'airbases closed at night'

http://rt.com/news/swiss-fighters-office-hours-514/

Damn I joined the wrong service!!! those are better than banker hours.

[nerdling]

Damn I joined the wrong service!!! those are better than banker hours. :woot.gif:/>

Of course that comes from RT news. Most of their articles are pretty laughable at best.

[11bee]

Damn I joined the wrong service!!! those are better than banker hours. :woot.gif:/>

M-F, 0800 - 1200 & 1330 - 1700

Those are better than banker's hours.

Maybe they could hire the USAF as temp's to help with off-hours hijacked planes, full fledged attacks, etc.

[nerdling]

The western media is better?

Where did I say anything about the western media being better. All I said was that from what I have seen RT news seems to be laughable at best. Have you ever really read any of the comments they have in there. Way way out there.