Malaysian Airlines Plane Missing Over Vietnam

[WorldFun]

ah yes the precious flying carpet sellers in the zouks of the middle east...

[Flashermac]

New Evidence Suggests That Plane Disappearance Was A Deliberate Act

 

 

Two U.S. officials believe the shutdown of two separate communications systems from the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 happened at different times, indicating the disappearance was less likely the result of a catastrophic failure and more the result of a "deliberate act," according to a new report from ABC News.

 

Sources speaking with ABC believe the data reporting system was shut down at 1:07 a.m., while the transponder — sending out location and altitude data — was shut down at 1:21 a.m.

 

U.S. investigators are "convinced that there was manual intervention," one source told ABC, indicating an accident is not the reason the plane vanished.

 

If the disappearance of the plane were a result of a catastrophic failure, such as an explosion or engine malfunction, the systems likely would have stopped transmitting at the same time or within a much shorter period. But a 14-minute delay raises even more questions.

 

Further, investigators suspect the missing flight stayed in the air for about four hours after it reached its last confirmed location, according to Andy Pasztor of The Wall Street Journal. While the main systems were shut down, satellites picked up faint electronic "pings" of technical data from the flight, then on a path far off its original course to Beijing, according to Reuters.

 

That's led the search-and-rescue effort for the missing aircraft to now expand to the Indian Ocean, where there is "a strong likelihood" the flight may ultimately be found at the bottom, according to CNN Pentagon Correspondent Barbara Starr, citing a senior U.S. official.

 

'A Number Of Possible Scenarios'

 

"It's my understanding that based on some new information that's not necessarily conclusive, but new information, an additional search area may be opened in the Indian Ocean and we are consulting with international partners about the appropriate assets to deploy," White House spokesman Jay Carney told the WSJ. "There are a number of possible scenarios that are being investigated as to what happened to the flight, and we are not in a position at this time to make conclusions about what happened, unfortunately."

 

With an accident becoming less likely (but not entirely ruled out), the scenarios for what happened could come down to a hijacking or actions taken by rogue crew members. One person close to the investigation told The Wall Street Journal that there could be a third possibility: The plane could have been diverted "with the intention of using it later for another purpose."

 

"That's been a possibility right from the start," Patrick Smith, an airline pilot and author, told Business Insider's Michael Kelley. "It's very unlikely, but I suppose it's conceivable."

 

 

http://www.businessi...rate-act-2014-3

[Bangkoktraveler]

If only the NSA would reveal what happened............

 

but one person told me that the jet turned back and landed at the airport of origin. Why nobody has

seen it is because it is parked on a tarmac nobody uses and is

invisible to the common eye because of the attics of a David Copperfield wannabe.

[bust]

Oil rig worker says he saw Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 burst into flames

IN what could be the last chilling sighting of missing Flight MH370, an oil rig worker believes he spotted the Malaysia Airlines jetliner burst into flames on Saturday morning.

New Zealander Mike McKay, who is working on a rig operating in the Gulf of Thailand, was so certain he saw the ill-fated flight on fire that he emailed his employers, urging them to pass the information onto authorities.

“Gentlemen. I believe I saw the Malaysian Airlines flight come down. The timing is right,†he wrote.

“I tried to contact Malaysian and Vietnamese officials days ago. But I do not know if the message has been received.

“I am on the oil ring Songa-Mercur off the coast of Vung Tau.

“The surface location of the observation is Lat 08 22’ 30.20†N Lat 108 42.22.26†E.

“I observed (the plane?) burning at high altitude at a compass bearing of 265* to 275*â€

Mr McKay is working on the oil rig Songa Mercur off Vung Tau, on the south east coast of Vietnam. This would put the plane in the same general area where a Chinese satellite has spotted a suspected crash site.

 

In his email to his employers on March 12 he claims he saw flames in the sky which quickly extinguished.

“From when I first saw the burning (plane) until the flames went out (still at high altitude) was 10-15 seconds. There was no lateral movement, so it was either coming toward our location, stationary, or going away from our location,†he wrote.

“The general position of the observation was perpendicular/south west of the normal flight paths.â€

Mr McKay said the possible plane appeared to be in one piece.

 

 

 

 

I spotted it ... the letter written by oil rig worker Mike McKay. Source: AAP

“It is very difficult to judge the distance but I would say 50 to 70 kms along the compass bearing 260-277,†he wrote.

“The sea surface current at our location is 2-2.3 knots in the direction of 225-230.

“The wind direction has been E-ENE averaging 15-20 knots.

“(We see the con trails every day) and at a lower altitude than the normal flight paths or on the compass bearing 265 to 275 intersecting the normal flight paths at normal altitude but further away.â€

Michael Jerome McKay signed off with “Good Luckâ€.

 

 

 

 

Near the crash site? ... the Songa Mecur oil rig off Vung Tau, Vietnam. Source: Supplied

Vietnam’s air traffic management deputy general director Doan Huu Giasaid has reportedly confirmed they received Mr McKay’s original email.

“He said he spotted a burning [object] at that location, some 300km southeast of Vung Tau,†he reportedly said.

Other Vietnamese officials have reportedly since dismissed the account after not finding anything in the water.

 

 

 

 

 

US ABC News anchor Bob Woodruff confirmed he spoke with Richard Beaton at Japanese Idemitsu Oil & Gas Co, who hired Songa Mercur to drill, and confirms Mr McKay’s email is real.

Vietnamese naval officer Le Minh Thanh told America’s ABC News that Vietnamese officials sent a plane to the area to investigate the man’s claims, but the search was fruitless.

 

http://www.news.com.au/world/oil-rig-worker-says-he-saw-malaysia-airlines-flight-mh370-burst-into-flames/story-fndir2ev-1226853302184

[bust]

Investigators conclude missing jet hijacked, steered off course, official say

 

Investigators trying to solve the disappearance of a Malaysia Airlines jetliner have concluded that one of the pilots or someone else with flying experience hijacked the missing Boeing 777 and steered it off course, according to a Malaysian government official.

The official, who is involved in the investigation, told The Associated Press on Saturday that no motive has been established, and it is not yet clear where the plane was taken. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.

The official said that hijacking was no longer a theory. "It is conclusive," he said.

He said evidence that led to the conclusion were signs that the plane's communications were switched off deliberately, data about the flight path and indications the plane was steered in a way to avoid detection by radar.

The jet's communication with the ground was severed under one hour into a flight March 8 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Malaysian officials have said radar data suggest it may have turned back and crossed back over the Malaysian peninsula westward, after setting out toward the Chinese capital.

Earlier, a senior U.S. official told Fox News that the search effort will broaden deep into the Indian Ocean, based on new intelligence assessments that there is a "higher probability" the aircraft went down in that region.

As a consequence of shared U.S.-Malaysian intelligence assessments, it is understood that the U.S. Navy destroyer USS Kidd will expand its search into a southern quadrant of the ocean, while Indian authorities will cover a northern quadrant.

The development comes as authorities speculate that the disappearance may have been an "act of piracy,†and more evidence suggests the plane was diverted by a skilled pilot before it vanished, U.S. and Malaysian officials familiar with the investigation said Friday.

A Malaysian government official involved in the mysterious case said only a skilled person could navigate the Boeing 777 the way it was flown after its last confirmed location over the South China Sea, the Associated Press reported earlier Friday.

The official declined to be identified because he is not authorized to brief the media.

Key evidence for "human intervention" in the plane's disappearance is that contact with its transponder stopped about 12 minutes before a messaging system quit, an unidentified American official told the Associated Press. The official -- also not authorized to speak publicly -- said it's also possible the plane may have landed somewhere.

ABC News quoted two unidentified American officials as saying the U.S. believes the plane's data reporting system and transponder were shut down separately, at 1:07 a.m. and 1:21 a.m. Such a scenario would indicate the plane did not disappear due to some kind of catastrophic failure.

A source familiar with the investigation but not authorized to speak on the record told Fox News that flight 370 continued to send "periodic pushes" of data after the transponder went dark for about four hours after contact was lost with the aircraft, suggesting the jet continued to fly. This was described to Fox News as signals data that, in isolation, would not provide location data.

While the systems were no longer transmitting maintenance data, the satellite communication link was still active. Once an hour, the system sent out a “handshake†-- a form of reset, like a cell phone searching for an antenna tower.

The “handshake†allows the satellite to work out how much tilt or arc was needed to be in range of the plane's signal. It therefore provides a scope or range for the aircraft, but it does not provide altitude, speed or location.

If the plane had disintegrated during flight or had suffered some other catastrophic failure, all signals — the pings to the satellite, the data messages and the transponder — would be expected to stop at the same time.

Analysis of the Malaysia flight data suggests the plane diverted from its intended northeast route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing and instead flew west, using airline flight paths normally taken to the Middle East and Europe, Reuters reported Friday.

This points to the theory that the plane was being flown by the pilots or possibly someone familiar with those routes, according to sources in the Reuters report.

Details such as these are leading investigators to sharpen their focus the possibility of sabotage, The Wall Street Journal reported late Friday.

Mike Glynn, a committee member of the Australian and International Pilots Association, said he considers pilot suicide to be the most likely explanation for the disappearance, as was suspected in a SilkAir crash during a flight from Singapore to Jakarta in 1997 and an EgyptAir flight from Los Angeles to Cairo in 1999.

"A pilot rather than a hijacker is more likely to be able to switch off the communications equipment," Glynn said. "The last thing that I, as a pilot, want is suspicion to fall on the crew, but it's happened twice before."

"What we can say is we are looking at sabotage, with hijack still on the cards," said that source, a senior Malaysian police official.

Malaysian police have previously said they were checking whether any passengers or crew had personal or psychological problems that might offer clues to why the plane vanished, along with the possibility of a hijacking, sabotage or mechanical failure.

Speaking earlier Friday, acting Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said the country had yet to determine what happened to the plane after it dropped off civilian radar and ceased communicating with the ground around 40 minutes into the flight to Beijing.

He said investigators were still trying to establish with certainty that military radar records of a blip moving west across the Malay Peninsula into the Strait of Malacca showed Malaysia Airlines flight 370.

"I will be the most happiest person if we can actually confirm that it is the MH370, then we can move all (search) assets from the South China Sea to the Strait of Malacca," he told reporters. Until then, he said, the international search effort would continue expanding east and west from the plane's last confirmed location.

The Malaysian official said it had now been established with a "more than 50 percent" degree of certainty that military radar had picked up the missing plane.

Scores of plane and aircraft from 12 countries are currently involved in the search, which currently reaches into the eastern stretches of the South China Sea and on the western side of the Malay Peninsula, northwest into the Andaman Sea and further into the India Ocean.

 

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/03/14/malaysia-airlines-search-heads-toward-indian-ocean/

[Flashermac]

Missing MH370: Investigators conclude plane was hijacked, reports say

 

 

KUALA LUMPUR: A Malaysian government official has confirmed that investigators have concluded that one of the pilots or someone else with flying experience hijacked the missing Malaysia Airlines (MAS) flight MH370, wire services are reporting.

 

The official, who is involved in the investigation, says no motive has been established and it is not yet clear where the plane was taken.

 

According to reports, the official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to brief the media.

 

The official said that hijacking was no longer a theory: "It is conclusive."

 

The aircraft's communication with the ground was severed under one hour into its flight on March 8 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

 

 

http://www.nationmul...j-30229304.html

[WorldFun]

lol so many clues and dead leads thats it turning into an amazing thriller of sorts...only its dead real especially for the relatives involved

[dean]

If it turns out that one or more of the pilots were responsible, I don't think that I'll ever fly with an airline based in a Muslim country.

[Flashermac]

I was told long ago that the safest airline to fly is El Al. First rate security and nobody fucks with the Israelis.

 

p.s. Remember this flight?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gameel_Al-Batouti

[bust]

There is a strong rumour circulating around refugee advocates that the plane was diverted to Manus Island where all 239 passengers plus the crew are seeking asylum.

 

According to inside sources this has all be kept clasified in line with the Abbott Government's asylum seeker policy. The new dfaft policy "Turn The Planes Back" is being drawn up at the moment.