A plausible explanation…
Like many people, I’ve been following the events surrounding the loss of the Malaysian B777 with great interest.
I rarely offer any theories, conjecture, or ideas relating to aircraft accidents, mainly because there are simply too many things to consider, and often, too many unknowns. Most often I find it in very poor taste to come up with some short sighted offing before we know anything about what really happened. I very much hate to jump to conclusions.
The media the past few days has been inundated with “experts”, pundits, and just goofy conspiracy theorist coming up with all kinds of ideas all over the map. In the end, they all say they have absolutely no clue as to what could have gone wrong.
As much as I hate to speculate… I feel as a professional pilot, and Captain on the B777, I can offer a very plausible explanation based on my experience in the B777 aircraft, and in the aviation industry, to help quell unsubstantiated rumors, and just outright falsehoods being disseminated in the media.
Seems we need to have a boogeyman to fear… so the terrorism angle gets a lot of play. VERY often on our flights we get passengers with false or incorrect documents… and they are off-loaded before we leave the gate. Occasionally somebody gets by, and they are stopped at immigration at the landing airport, and are summarily sent back to where they came from. It happens.
In the Southeast Asia area, there is an enormous amount of drug trafficking, (a good portion going to China from Thailand) and the current 2 suspects seem to me to fit the bill as nothing more than “mules” running drugs and taking advantage of the 72 hour free visa option when entering China with follow on tickets to other destinations. (In this case the passengers had tickets to Amsterdam and follow-on to Copenhagen and Frankfurt). By utilizing this visa option, they are able to slip into China and “get lost”… and never utilize their “follow-on flights… it’s just a matter of getting the pay… and making their way back to Thailand (or where ever). Make sense? It happens everyday…
As for the aircraft. The B777 is a great airplane, but occasionally things go wrong! I would direct you to an event that occurred in July of 2011 in Cairo, Egypt. Again, a B777-200 while boarding the final passengers, an electrical short resulted in the heating of an oxygen hose and burst into an uncontrolled fire in the cockpit. The cockpit was destroyed in a matter of minutes, though thankfully the plane being on the ground… the passengers were evacuated… and only minimal injuries where incurred.
The following link will direct you to an article on the event, with pictures and explanations…
http://avherald.com/h?article=44078aa7/0000
A sobering comment can be found at the bottom of the page as a “latest comment”.
Much has been speculated as to why no radio call was made…. with the noisy environment inside the cockpit, it’s doubtful anyone would hear an initial “pop” as they did in the Egypt Air ground incident…. so it could be assumed that there was a great possibility an intense and uncontrolled fire could have started and consumed the cockpit in a matter of seconds.
All the communication interfaces we have on the B777 are located within arms reach of us… and in an intense fire, would be completely disabled within a matter of minutes…if not seconds. (refer to the pictures in the article) Transponders (the box that sends ATC our position) would be rendered useless, thus… NO ATC could see the aircraft as it diverted or fell from altitude. ACARS (our “text message” system that we communicate to the ground with… and sends vital aircraft information to the company), would be useless and thus no messages about the aircraft system status’s would be available to transmit. And lastly, trying to make a radio call when all of a sudden the cockpit burst into flames???? Remember, it was 3 AM in the morning… probably quiet from a work standpoint… and most of the time we just fight to stay awake on these late night flights! Imagine how startled you’d be if something like this occurred? Another scenario would be that perhaps there was only one pilot in the cockpit at the time, and the other had gone to the restroom, etc.
The First Officer on the Malaysian flight was a VERY inexperienced cadet pilot….. yes, I fly with them all the time to here at XXXX, and it’s a “less than desirable” situation. But it happens all the time, and in this case, the FO only had 2700 hours…. if he was in the cockpit and something catastrophic happened… who knows the outcome?? (Just a thought)
IF… and IF… a scenario like this was to play out, it would offer a very plausible explanation as to what could have occurred, and also explain why no radio calls where made… or ACARS messages sent, or ATC radar contact, etc. It would also explain that if both pilots were subdued, or forced to evacuate the cockpit, the aircraft could have flown for any number of minutes or hours for that matter (based on the fuel available) in ANY DIFFERENT DIRECTION, until fuel starvation, or autopilot failure.
ATC in this part of the world does NOT have the capability to monitor “raw (radar) targets” with any reliability…(nor does ATC in the US for that matter) and furthermore, an aircraft, basically invisible to radar heading out into the wild blue sea would be very difficult, if ever to be found. It all depends on when the autopilot would fail.
I’m not saying this is what happened to the ill fated Malaysian aircraft, but it is a very plausible explanation, and I’m appalled that the so-called experts are scratching their collective heads and haven’t offered this as a possible explanation.
There are other possibilities…. but because of a limited history of this type problem in the past with the 777 (and other Boeing aircraft)… there is always the possibility that it could occur again… and perhaps in this case… while inflight.
The rush to jump on the terrorism band wagon I believe is ill-advised… and though it should be explored, is probably a wild goose chase based on the ever ongoing drug trade that utilizes these routes all to often…..
There are very few things in the B777 that can get you in a big heap of trouble in a hurry… the explanation and example given above is just one of very few.
I hope this adds to your insight of potential explanations…
Now… back to watching the “experts” scratch their heads….
Capt. Tom
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