How Do You Feel About the Situation of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370?

[Olas]

How the hell do you lose track of an entire airplane in this day and age? If we can accurately track the flight patterns of BIRDS and INSECTS as they migrate you'd think we'd be able to do the same for a huge man-made passenger jet full of people.

It's easy to see why people are jumping to such outlandish theories.

Personally I'm guessing the plane was a Decepticon.

 

[Therumancer]

Chop

OK you clearly know nothing about submarines. The Kilo and Yuan class are diesel electric powered boats. They have to recharge their batteries which involves a process known as snorting. The submarine sits at periscope depth and raises a mast to act as an exhaust for the diesel engines. This is when a diesel boat is most vulnerable, because it is make the most noise, which means it is when it is most likely to come under attack from anti submarine aircraft and helicopters. Air launched torpedoes can only be dropped from low altitude and at close range. The only reason why diesel electric and diesel electric submarines carry short range sams is because the only time that they can be used is when an air threat is in close range and at low altitude. A longer range sam system would require a submarine to sit on the surface and to operate an airsearch radar which will give the position of the submarine away, not something that is a good idea in vessel that relies on stealth. The seawolf class is an nuclear powered class submarine and can basically stay underwater until it runs out of food. SSN have no need of sams because they do not need to snort and never make that much noise.

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[/quote]

I don't? Funny that because I just posted a link earlier going back to 2006 when one of those Yuan class subs managed to pretty much "tag" a US Carrier, proving it could have taken it down. You obviously have not been paying much attention, or have been believing only Chinese propaganda, or something.

That said, we'll have to agree to disagree on the validity of this theory (which is all it is) which again involves China substantially expanding what it considers to be "it's territory" as it's military power rises. I disagree with some of the other "likely scenarios" you mention because again, they would have found the wreckage, bodies, etc... at which point we wouldn't be having this conversation.

 

[Therumancer]

How the hell do you lose track of an entire airplane in this day and age? If we can accurately track the flight patterns of BIRDS and INSECTS as they migrate you'd think we'd be able to do the same for a huge man-made passenger jet full of people.

It's easy to see why people are jumping to such outlandish theories.

Personally I'm guessing the plane was a Decepticon.

That's pretty much it. The thing isn't so much that they lost the plane, but there is no wreckage either. They actually track these planes constantly to within a few hundred meters of their actual position. There are even sites you can check to see the location of a commercial airliner when it's moving. At first they though they found some wreckage (a door and an oil slick) but it turned out to be a false alarm. What's more the more durable components of the plane, like the black box, which are designed to survive this kind of thing specifically so investigators can find the wreckage and determine what happened, are also missing.

This is why you have theories like mine, or a few people talking about aliens here and there, or other off base theories. One of which is oddly enough that there never was a plane and it was intentionally a "ghost" created for
some purpose on the system (hacker, CIA/Spy plot gone wrong, etc...) most of which aren't plausible for one reason or another.

My theory (which people hate) simply come from a process of elimination. If there is a plane, and something happens to it, there is going to be wreckage, and what's more with all of the stuff we have going on it's not going to be that hard to find. That means that if in a situation like this the experts say they can't find wreckage they, the first responders, are probably lying. At which point the question becomes why they would lie, and what kinds of incidents would prompt a cover up.

That said, even if they find the plane tomorrow, I imagine this will be spawning theories about cover ups and such for decades to come... it's really, really, weird.

 

[Krois]

I know it isn't laughing matter when lives are at risk, but watching and hearing what comes out of Malaysia governments and officials, it's just too much of a joke not to laugh at.

They're hiring shaman to look for the missing plane and coming up with ridiculous speculations regarding the situation. Not to add that they're putting the least effort in the search and rescue mission comparing to other countries, it's like the entire matter isn't their problem.

Latest news says the plane could've diverted to the western sea and/or it could've been someone doing this to scam insurance money (according to high ranking police officials).

 

[MetalMagpie]

It does seem pretty strange that no one even got a cellphone call out of the plane unlike in Flight 93. I imagine even if it crashed while the plane's communication equipment was disabled someone could have sent a text before the plane crashed (since planes glide rather than divebomb when their engines fail, that should have provided plenty of time).

If the plane went into a stall (instead of engines failing) it would have dropped out of the sky like a brick.

I'm suggesting that as an option because that's what happened to Air France Flight 447 (which also disappeared during a flight over ocean with no call for help made). It took 3 years to find and retrieve the black boxes. The cause turned out to be pilot error: first climbing unsafely (which caused a stall) and then not following the correct procedure to get out of the stall (he kept trying to pull the nose up when he should have been pushing it down).

 

[Boris Goodenough]

They really were quite a long way away from China. So far in fact, that it's like blaming Iceland for a plane crash over the English Channel!

You mean something like a Eyjafjallajökull scenario?
It could very well happen!

 

[L. Declis]

Snippity snip

So, rather than a simple "plane done messed up and be floating at the bottom of the sea", you believe that China decided to blow up a civilian aircraft in a sea that isn't in the territory, even with the new expanded sea line they want, with no warning, with no public announcement by the Chinese government, who you believe are stupid enough to order someone to shot down aircraft that they see in a territory that they don't have, and possibly start a war with the US who even they know will crush them, and lose all public face for killing another countries civilians, while they were already in a serious political crunch, and those ordered managed to hit the aircraft with perfectly, and everyone found out EXCEPT a single journalist or leaker in both the US and the Chinese governments at least, and rather than use this as the massive political leverage to punish China in the UN legally, everyone involved in the decision was fine to ignore it?

This is your more simple solution? This sounds like the kind of thinking that Americans had about Communists during the Cold War.

 

[Therumancer]

Snippity snip

So, rather than a simple "plane done messed up and be floating at the bottom of the sea", you believe that China decided to blow up a civilian aircraft in a sea that isn't in the territory, even with the new expanded sea line they want, with no warning, with no public announcement by the Chinese government, who you believe are stupid enough to order someone to shot down aircraft that they see in a territory that they don't have, and possibly start a war with the US who even they know will crush them, and lose all public face for killing another countries civilians, while they were already in a serious political crunch, and those ordered managed to hit the aircraft with perfectly, and everyone found out EXCEPT a single journalist or leaker in both the US and the Chinese governments at least, and rather than use this as the massive political leverage to punish China in the UN legally, everyone involved in the decision was fine to ignore it?

This is your more simple solution? This sounds like the kind of thinking that Americans had about Communists during the Cold War.

Sounds like you didn't bother to read what I actually said.

If you paid attention, the gist of the entire thing was that it would explain why there would be a cover up among first responders, including the US, in order to prevent a war. Effectively the very opposite of what your suggesting. But yes, under the circumstances I could see a Chinese hot head or communications error leading to them downing a plane right now. Basically China isn't ready to start a war yet, and the western world is still holding on to a sort of "peace at any price" attitude which has manifested in Obama backing down pretty much every time he's drawn a clear line with just about anyone.

I'll also say that personally, my attitude IS very similar to the one we had towards the USSR during the Cold War when it comes to China and has been for many years now, for reasons that have nothing to do with this incident.

The logic behind my thinking is simply that a plane does not just vanish, if someone downs it there is going to be wreckage. The big mystery is why none of this wreckage despite some earlier reports has been found. My theory is that wreckage was indeed found by the first responders, but they aren't revealing it and going with the disappearance story. Something that makes more sense than say aliens or whatever, given all the possibilities which have already been covered (especially due to wreckage). One would have to wonder WHY such first responders would bother to hide something like this if it was an accident, and so my theory follows that it wasn't an accident. Of the groups likely to down a plane in the region, China, with their increased belligerence in the region and bold claims to the entire South China Sea region, is the most likely culprit of the groups in the area that have the tech to do it.

Not a popular theory mind you, but it's a passable one for the moment whether people like it or not. We'll see what happens and if we ever get answers.

 

[Carrington666]

Snippity snip

So, rather than a simple "plane done messed up and be floating at the bottom of the sea", you believe that China decided to blow up a civilian aircraft in a sea that isn't in the territory, even with the new expanded sea line they want, with no warning, with no public announcement by the Chinese government, who you believe are stupid enough to order someone to shot down aircraft that they see in a territory that they don't have, and possibly start a war with the US who even they know will crush them, and lose all public face for killing another countries civilians, while they were already in a serious political crunch, and those ordered managed to hit the aircraft with perfectly, and everyone found out EXCEPT a single journalist or leaker in both the US and the Chinese governments at least, and rather than use this as the massive political leverage to punish China in the UN legally, everyone involved in the decision was fine to ignore it?

This is your more simple solution? This sounds like the kind of thinking that Americans had about Communists during the Cold War.

Don't forget, his only "prove" for his theory is the absence of wreckage. So in addition to what you pointed out, China had to develope a new weapon, which can accurately hit a target moving at 500mph from a distance of 20.000ft and is strong enough to completly vaporize it (otherwise there would be wreckage) and is able to do this without obvious signs, e.g. flash of light, strong presure wave, radiation etc. And then decided to test it on a civilian plane, because they could, I guess.

In this case, as tragic as it is, I believe the simplest answer is also the most likely. The plane crashed due to a pilot or technical error and since the area in which it could have happened is quite large it will take time to find the wreckage.

Edit: Therumancer: Seems I missed some of your points while skimming through your posts, my bad.
Still, it doesn't change the fact, that it takes time to search for a plane that went missing above the ocean. The search is simply in to early a stage to assume foul play of that magnitude.

 

[TechNoFear]

That's pretty much it. The thing isn't so much that they lost the plane, but there is no wreckage either.

The wreckage of Air France 447 took 5 days to find in 2009.

They actually track these planes constantly to within a few hundred meters of their actual position.

No they don't. You appear not to understand the difference between 'realtime tracking' and 'connectivity'.

The plane updates it's position every few milliseconds, but only records this in the FDR (flight data recorder or Black Box). The plane does not transmit this data in real-time, even though it only requires a few hundred Kbps.

Over the ocean there is limited bandwidth to transmit this data. Communications satellites can allow this data to be streamed when in range (and if they have the spare capacity) and VHF used to send basic updates when no other connection is available.

But a system like this has never been implemented.

This is because collecting, storing, processing and accessing this data from approx 100,000 flights per day is not viewed as a requirement, given that in 2013 there were 105 fatalities on 36,000,000 commercial flights.

like the black box, which are designed to survive this kind of thing specifically so investigators can find the wreckage and determine what happened, are also missing.

The FDR will 'ping' for 30 days at a range of ~3.5 Km (2 miles), but the search area is 1,000s of square kms of ocean with at depths up to 1.5 Km.

This means you will have to be almost on top of the FDR to find it.

When FA 447 crashed in 2009 it took nearly 2 years to find the FDR.

My theory (which people hate) simply come from a process of elimination.

Your logic is weak...

China asserting some claim to the territory is farcical, given that 1,000s of planes fly over that area each day.

You also fail to analyse risk versus reward...

Risk; What would happen if China was caught shooting down a commercial airliner?

Reward; What does China gain from shooting down a commercial airliner full of Chinese nationals (153 of 227) on the way to Beijing?

How can China gain when no one knows China shot the plane down?

 

[Whispering Cynic]

I'm indifferent to all this. There is just not enough information besides "the jet is missing", the rest seems like speculation. And speculation without concrete evidence is a waste of time.

But I won't deny the potential of this little mystery... it might be worth following just to see what it leads to.

 

[dyre]

It does seem pretty strange that no one even got a cellphone call out of the plane unlike in Flight 93. I imagine even if it crashed while the plane's communication equipment was disabled someone could have sent a text before the plane crashed (since planes glide rather than divebomb when their engines fail, that should have provided plenty of time).

If the plane went into a stall (instead of engines failing) it would have dropped out of the sky like a brick.

I'm suggesting that as an option because that's what happened to Air France Flight 447 (which also disappeared during a flight over ocean with no call for help made). It took 3 years to find and retrieve the black boxes. The cause turned out to be pilot error: first climbing unsafely (which caused a stall) and then not following the correct procedure to get out of the stall (he kept trying to pull the nose up when he should have been pushing it down).

Ah, good point. I remember stalling in flight simulators (not that those are totally accurate compared to real life, but still)...it indeed renders my plane into a somewhat brick-like state.

I always imagined it to be more of an issue during either takeoff/landing or fancy flight maneuvers (which I assume passenger jets do not perform), but pilot error can happen anytime I guess.

 

[RedRockRun]

I'm just gonna say what we're all thinking: the plane ended up on The Island.

 

[Amir Kondori]

I doubt this is a terrorism issue. There are plenty of reasons someone in that area might use a fake passport and no terrorist groups have taken credit for it.
I think they had some sort of mechanical or electrical failure, got off course, and eventually crashed far enough away from where they were expected to be that it has made locating the wreckage hard.
I think eventually we will find evidence of the crash.

 

[Therumancer]

Your logic is weak...

China asserting some claim to the territory is farcical, given that 1,000s of planes fly over that area each day.

You also fail to analyse risk versus reward...

Risk; What would happen if China was caught shooting down a commercial airliner?

Reward; What does China gain from shooting down a commercial airliner full of Chinese nationals (153 of 227) on the way to Beijing?

How can China gain when no one knows China shot the plane down?

As I've pretty much explained myself a number of times so far, I'm just going to say "actually read what I've said before commenting" and leave it at that.

Otherwise you might also want to do research onto what tech is used to track planes, a lot has been said about this and what kind of tech is used in various official news sources puzzling over it. Tech you are claiming does not exist apparently does, and was being used in this case.

I'm trying to be as polite as possible here, but seeing as you seem to miss the entire point of my theory (which is that China wouldn't have anything to gain by this, and it's not even China itself doing the cover up) there really isn't anything to talk about.

 

[Crazy Zaul]

I'm not sayin it was aliens but... It was aliens.

A plane disappearing from radar is no big deal but the fact that they can't find any wreckage is weird. Although that article with all the possible explanations sounded like they haven't bothered looking for the planes carcass at the bottom of the sea yet, so they should probably try there.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Either the plane experienced catastrophic mechanical failure that messed up the controls/radar or somehow disintegrated mid-flight. Terrorism? Nope. No one is claiming and recent reports I've seen say that the passport fakers were attempting to seek asylum. China or North Korea? There are too many, way too many military bases for something like that to happen. Heck, there's a near constant stream of satellite covered in the pacific asia area. Any military type of situation would have been thrown out there the moment a military missile/plane would be used.

The one main thing I don't like about the search is that it's too narrow. By limiting their search to one small spot in the ocean, they ignore the fact tat if the plane went water bound, the ocean currents may have moved debris. If the plane went land bound, the wildlife have the possibility of damaging things.

This. It's a non-story compared to the crisis in Ukraine, yet I haven't seen an update on said situation since the night the news broke that the plane had gone down, not on the national news, anyway. The local news and NPR are still talking about it, not that they're giving it enough time to actually do anything but remind everyone "oh yeah, Russia invaded Crimea that one time (and are still there, because it was, like two weeks ago)."

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

It does seem pretty strange that no one even got a cellphone call out of the plane unlike in Flight 93. I imagine even if it crashed while the plane's communication equipment was disabled someone could have sent a text before the plane crashed (since planes glide rather than divebomb when their engines fail, that should have provided plenty of time).

If the plane went into a stall (instead of engines failing) it would have dropped out of the sky like a brick.

I'm suggesting that as an option because that's what happened to Air France Flight 447 (which also disappeared during a flight over ocean with no call for help made). It took 3 years to find and retrieve the black boxes. The cause turned out to be pilot error: first climbing unsafely (which caused a stall) and then not following the correct procedure to get out of the stall (he kept trying to pull the nose up when he should have been pushing it down).

Ah, good point. I remember stalling in flight simulators (not that those are totally accurate compared to real life, but still)...it indeed renders my plane into a somewhat brick-like state.

I always imagined it to be more of an issue during either takeoff/landing or fancy flight maneuvers (which I assume passenger jets do not perform), but pilot error can happen anytime I guess.

This is almost totally off topic, but it bugs me that you /can't/ go into a stall in Pilot Wings Resort. I mean you kind of can, but only in the sense that you can cut off your engines while flying straight up. Makes it that much harder to do the two 180's in short succession you need to do if you miss a ring or something.

 

[Caiphus]

I think it's unlikely that it was terrorism. Still a possibility, but unlikely.

So either pilot suicide, or a large mechanical/electrical fault in the plane. But I'm nowhere near well enough versed in either aircraft design, satellite tracking, or advanced electronics to make any sort of valid speculation.

 

[Mr.Mattress]

I'm thinking it's either Terrorists or the plane just exploded mid-flight. Either way, the plane will not be found in one piece, and neither will most of the civilians that rode it...