A jetliner vanished from Earth: 10 years later, 3 intriguing theories about flight MH370

Gepubliceerd op 13 maart 2024 om 08:24
Malaysia MH370 disappeared

How can a massive Boeing 777 vanish from radar? And why has the plane never been found? Over 10 years ago, Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 suddenly disappeared from radar.

Countless theories circulate about what happened to the plane, none completely ruled out, as the puzzle remains unsolved. Read and go through the lens of 3 intriguing theories.

Planes go up, planes go down.
What they don’t do is just vanish of the face of the Earth.

Jeff Wise in the Netlfix-docu: MH370: The Plane That Disappeared

What you need to know:

On March 8, 2014, Flight MH370 departed from Kuala Lumpur heading to Beijing with 227 passengers and 12 crew members on board. Piloting were Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah and First Officer Fariq Abdul Hamid.

The enormous Boeing 777 took off as planned around 00:41 local time and headed towards the South China Sea. The initial phase of the flight proceeded smoothly, and the plane quickly reached its cruising altitude.

MH370 flight path

As the aircraft left Malaysian airspace, Captain Zaharie bid farewell to Malaysian air traffic control with the friendly greeting: Good night Malaysian three seven zero.

Before entering Vietnamese airspace, the plane found itself in a kind of no-man's-land, an airspace where no communication with the aircraft occurred. Shortly before the plane was supposed to establish contact with Vietnamese air traffic control, it abruptly disappeared from radar.

Malaysia flight path

Searching for answers

What happened to the plane? The most obvious explanation would be a fatal crash, where the plane disintegrated, and there was no time for communication. However, extensive searches at the location of the last radar contact by 40 ships and 34 planes, the plane has still not been found, and the 239 occupants never returned home…

Day by day, the search shifted between the east and west. No answers are provided to the families grappling with numerous questions. Can this story be compared to the Belgian Bende van Nijvel scandal? Is information deliberately being withheld to keep the mystery from being solved? I don't know. These theories circulate, each possibly true but all with loose ends:

3 THEORIES:

THEORY 1: mass murder by the pilot

Cockpit Malaysia

Theory 1 in detail:

What if the pilot intentionally changed the plane’s flight path with the intention of hijacking, mass murder, and eventual suicide? Captain Zaharie became the focus of intensive media attention, with hostile campaigns spreading about his private life, despite little concrete evidence for such allegations. 

The seizure of his flight simulator contributed to speculation about his potential actions. Authorities investigated whether similar flights were simulated in the pilot's online simulator world. How would such a hijacking have occurred?

A small sketch: In the grey zone between Malaysian and Vietnamese airspace, Captain Zaharie took control of the plane. He turned off all electronics that made the plane visible to the outside world. Then, he depressurized the cabin, causing oxygen masks to drop down.

These masks only work for about twelve minutes, so after a quarter of an hour, the cabin fell silent. After six hours of flying, he pushed the control stick down to crash the plane.

PERSONAL:

Personally, I have little confidence in this theory from aviation journalist Jeff Wise. Since there are no compelling reasons why the pilot would commit mass murder, and he was seen as one of the best pilots at Malaysia Airlines, I consider him innocent.

THEORY 2: hijacking by passengers

Hijacking plane
Avionics bay

Theory 2 in detail:

The brain of the Boeing 777 is in the avionics bay, a room full of the plane's electronic equipment. How can this room be accessed? Under the carpet in the cabin is a hatch between the cockpit and first class. This hatch made everyone on board suspicious, as anyone could access the avionics bay through it.

According to Jeff Wise's hypothesis, three Russians on board, including a first-class passenger, initiated a coordinated operation during the night flight. One of them lifted the carpet in first class and gained access to the avionics bay through the hatch.

At the moment the plane was in no-man's-land, between Malaysian and Vietnamese airspace, its visibility to the outside world was completely disabled from the avionics bay. Additionally, communication equipment in the cockpit was deactivated, and finally, oxygen supply to both the cabin and cockpit was cut off. Again, it became silent in the cabin after some time when oxygen ran out…

PERSONAL:

While Jeff Wise's theory may initially seem far-fetched, this hijacking could indeed have taken place. It becomes more intriguing when considering events less than six months later, where Russian forces were responsible for shooting down Flight MH17, another Boeing 777 from Malaysia Airlines heading from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.

This ominous connection casts doubt on the original disappearance of MH370 and raises the question of possible Russian involvement in a new light.

THEORY 3: Suspicious Chinese cargo led to U.S. interception

AWACS plane
AWACS plane

Theory 3 in detail:

 In the cargo section of the plane was an unscreened load of 2.5 tons of electronics. This suspicious cargo, possibly espionage equipment for China, suggests that the U.S. wanted to block this plane.

How would the U.S. do this? An AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System) plane can completely block signals. 

One AWACS plane flew above the Malaysia Airlines B777, and one flew below, making the plane completely disappear from radar. According to de Changy, this happened over no-man's-land, the uncontrolled airspace where the plane was during the disappearance. The uncontrolled scan of this mysterious cargo opens the possibility of this interception.

PERSONAL:

In my opinion, Florence de Changy's theory is the most plausible. She raises critical questions about the credibility of the official story based on Inmarsat data from authorities regarding the disappearance of Flight MH370.

After disappearing from radar, the plane allegedly made a U-turn and traversed six different countries. According to the official story, the huge Boeing 777 flew unseen over the airspace of Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, and Australia before crashing into the Indian Ocean, which is highly astonishing anno 2014.

Additionally, the aircraft would have flown over the Butterworth military base. "How can a gigantic Boeing 777 fly unnoticed over a military base?" de Changy questions the credibility of the official story in the Netflix documentary MH370: The Plane That Disappeared. The credibility of the official story is very low, according to de Changy.

What really happened? 

Malaysia MH370 flight path

While all three of these theories could be plausible, none are proven correct as the truth has not been established. How can the plane disappear from radar? In my opinion, there is one possibility:

  1. Flight MH370 disappeared from radar due to a fatal crash, but the search area was not extensive enough or insufficiently explored.

Am I wrong? No. Am I right? We don't know.

What we do know is that the search for Flight MH370 remains the biggest unsolved mystery in aviation history.

Possible breakthrough

Malaysia MH370 breakthrough

Now, 10 years later, the puzzle is still not solved. But there is hope. According to experts, the recovered debris could be the key to this puzzle. Currently, research is being conducted on the barnacles found on the wreckage. By analyzing the chemical composition of these barnacles, the journey in seawater can be reconstructed.

Whether this research leads to the discovery of the Boeing 777 that disappeared from the face of the Earth in 2014 remains to be seen.


By: Rico Valkenborgh | March 13, 2024


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