Malaysia Airlines loses contact with plane carrying 239 people

[ShowtimeSBMVP]

Malaysia Airlines says it has lost contact with a plane with 239 aboard enroute from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

The airline said in a statement early Saturday it was attempting to locate the Boeing 777 after it lost contact with Subang Air Traffic Control at 2:40 a.m. It was scheduled to land in Beijing at 6:30 a.m.

China's state-run news agency Xinhua reported the plane was lost in airspace controlled by Vietnam, and did not make contact with Chinese air traffic controllers.

The plane is carrying 227 passengers, including two infants, and 12 crew members. The airline said it is working with authorities to locate the plane.

Boeing said on its Twitter account it is monitoring the situation, and "our thoughts are with everyone on board."



http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/03...ing-23-people/









Malaysian jet probe sharpens focus on passengers, crew as new clues emerge


http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/03...-indian-ocean/

[SAUTO]

Originally Posted by alnorth

I don't understand what you are asking. If you don't want to tip off the ATC while they are letting you go, you'd obviously act as if everything was normal.

edit: the transponder was not shut off until after the co-pilot talked to ATC.

they said the co pilot got on the radio and said something like :"that's it good night" after the plane went off the grid

[kepp]

This seems like the most plausible theory to me: http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/03...ectrical-fire/

not sure if Q

[Rain Man]

Originally Posted by kepp

This seems like the most plausible theory to me: http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/03...ectrical-fire/

not sure if Q

That's a pretty good theory.

[alnorth]

Originally Posted by JASONSAUTO

they said the co pilot got on the radio and said something like :"that's it good night" after the plane went off the grid

They pulled back on that story, and now are saying stuff was not shut off until after he talked to the ATC.

But even if it was before, maybe he thought he was done with the ATC and if the ATC contacts him, he'd want to act normal.

[alnorth]

Originally Posted by kepp

This seems like the most plausible theory to me: http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/03...ectrical-fire/

not sure if Q

That theory looks like a bunch of wishful thinking from a pilot who doesn't want to see a pilot get blamed. First, we would have seen some floating wreckage by now if it crashed in that small area that has been searched for about a week.

Second, according to the satellite, that theory is pretty much impossible.



We know for a fact that the engine was capable of sending a signal for 7 hours (doesn't mean it flew for 7 hours, but it was still NOT underwater 7 hours after last contact so it was probably still flying).

We also know for a fact that the plane is somewhere in that search area which although massive, is well outside that airport and any path to that airport.

edit: woops, never mind. This guy thinks everyone was knocked out by the smoke, and the plane continued on until it ran out of fuel.

[alnorth]

OK, that theory seems plausible, but improbable. I'm assuming they think the lithium ion batteries the plane was hauling just caught on fire somehow, and managed to knock out all communication systems before the pilots could declare an emergency.

[AndChiefs]

Originally Posted by alnorth

OK, that theory seems plausible, but improbable. I'm assuming they think the lithium ion batteries the plane was hauling just caught on fire somehow, and managed to knock out all communication systems before the pilots could declare an emergency.

So the fire was enough to knock everyone out but not enough to bring the plane down in seven hours? That's a very slow burn.

[patteeu]

Originally Posted by alnorth

That theory looks like a bunch of wishful thinking from a pilot who doesn't want to see a pilot get blamed. First, we would have seen some floating wreckage by now if it crashed in that small area that has been searched for about a week.

Second, according to the satellite, that theory is pretty much impossible.



We know for a fact that the engine was capable of sending a signal for 7 hours (doesn't mean it flew for 7 hours, but it was still NOT underwater 7 hours after last contact so it was probably still flying).

We also know for a fact that the plane is somewhere in that search area which although massive, is well outside that airport and any path to that airport.

edit: woops, never mind. This guy thinks everyone was knocked out by the smoke, and the plane continued on until it ran out of fuel.

What I don't understand is why they don't have a better idea of the flight path of the plane. The reason they draw an arc on that graphic is because the last ping was detected by a satellite that can only measure distance, but if they had several of these pings throughout the night, you'd think they could eliminate either the southern route or the northern route unless the plane was traveling along the equidistant arc of the only satellite capable of receiving the ping. If that's the only satellite and if it's in geosynchronous orbit, then I guess I can see the possibility that the plane's path was coincidentally along the arc.

[alnorth]

Originally Posted by patteeu

What I don't understand is why they don't have a better idea of the flight path of the plane. The reason they draw an arc on that graphic is because the last ping was detected by a satellite that can only measure distance, but if they had several of these pings throughout the night, you'd think they could eliminate either the southern route or the northern route unless the plane was traveling along the equidistant arc of the only satellite capable of receiving the ping. If that's the only satellite and if it's in geosynchronous orbit, then I guess I can see the possibility that the plane's path was coincidentally along the arc.

only thing I can think of is maybe that satellite was not geostationary, and only caught the last ping as it was zipping around the earth.

[kepp]

Originally Posted by alnorth

OK, that theory seems plausible, but improbable. I'm assuming they think the lithium ion batteries the plane was hauling just caught on fire somehow, and managed to knock out all communication systems before the pilots could declare an emergency.

He explains that. Communications is last in the order of importance in case of fire. Also, one of the first things they would do in the case of an electrical fire is to pull all the boards, and then replace them one-by-one. This would account for the systems going offline. And if they were overcome by smoke during that time, they wouldn't have been re-enabled.

In reality though, I have no knowledge of any of this stuff. It just seems plausible to me. But the guy does seem to want to direct blame away from the pilot/crew.

[Halfcan]

It was Aliens....

[patteeu]

Originally Posted by alnorth

only thing I can think of is maybe that satellite was not geostationary, and only caught the last ping as it was zipping around the earth.

I'm under the impression that they caught multiple pings, maybe from multiple satellites, which is why I would think they'd have a better idea of the path the plane took. If that's the only ping they received, then the confusion makes total sense.

[kepp]

Originally Posted by Halfcan

It was Aliens....

I switching my official theory to this.

[alnorth]

Originally Posted by kepp

He explains that. Communications is last in the order of importance in case of fire. Also, one of the first things they would do in the case of an electrical fire is to pull all the boards, and then replace them one-by-one. This would account for the systems going offline. And if they were overcome by smoke during that time, they wouldn't have been re-enabled.

In reality though, I have no knowledge of any of this stuff. It just seems plausible to me. But the guy does seem to want to direct blame away from the pilot/crew.

There is some value in having a guy who has a bias for not wanting to blame the pilots wrack his brain on it. We pretty much mostly decided this was a bad pilot/hijack several days ago and stopped thinking of any accident scenario. So if it was an accident, we'd never consider it until we found the black box.

This guy might be completely wrong, but he presents an interesting theory that most of us were no longer willing to think about.

[AndChiefs]

Originally Posted by kepp

He explains that. Communications is last in the order of importance in case of fire. Also, one of the first things they would do in the case of an electrical fire is to pull all the boards, and then replace them one-by-one. This would account for the systems going offline. And if they were overcome by smoke during that time, they wouldn't have been re-enabled.

In reality though, I have no knowledge of any of this stuff. It just seems plausible to me. But the guy does seem to want to direct blame away from the pilot/crew.

You'd think there'd be a quick communication of "Mayday! Fire on Flight MH370" by one captain before the other captain gets to the boards and starts pulling.