Wouldn't surprise me at all. This whole thing is about chasing ghosts, nobody seems to know anything for sure. That is why we should stick with the backrounds of all the people involved, the hardware answers just don't seem to be working out.Originally Posted by TheCurmudgeon
I would agree with you. I will admit I am, perhaps unnecessarily, interested in this incident. I wish I knew more about the key players, but I also realize that I am just a spectator.
I keep coming back to what I term my "worst case scenario" - that the plane was stolen (and all aboard who were not in on the plan, killed) in order to use it to fly something big and nasty into the US. The saving grace seems to be that, from what I can tell, even if fully refueled, it could not make it to the US from, lets say, Pakistan. (Sorry to everyone in London, I am pretty sure it could reach you.)
Again, it is probably just the Irish Whiskey speaking, but I do have a small concern that this plane could be used to devastating effect as part of a larger plan.
Last edited by TheCurmudgeon; 03-17-2014 at 09:55 PM.
"I can change almost anything ... but I can't change human nature."
Jon Osterman/Dr. Manhattan
---
More news that makes things less clear.
Malaysian authorities, in the latest of a series of U-turns, reversed themselves Monday on a key detail of what happened in the cockpit of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 in the minutes before it vanished from civilian radar nine days ago.
The government had previously said that a key satellite communications system had been disabled some time before the cockpit made final radio contact with air traffic control — and before the plane disappeared from civilian radar contact with 239 passengers and crew on board.
That sequence of events suggested that something suspicious was already underway before that final radio call was made, and that one or both pilots were either involved in a plot to commandeer the Boeing 777 or acting under duress.
But authorities acknowledged Monday that they do not know exactly when that data system went dark, making it harder to pinpoint when the suspected act of hijacking or sabotage was initiated.
The new disclosure does not change the criminal nature of the probe into the missing airliner — an investigation that now has countries from Australia to Kazakhstan scouring radar and satellite data for signs of the plane, and deploying sea and air search teams to hunt for evidence of the aircraft. It still appears likely that somebody was trying to cover their tracks as the plane was deliberately flown off-course.
True enough, though if anything really interesting or suspect has been found out about any of the people, it has yet to be revealed... which is of course not surprising.
I just can't see how you'd get it to Pakistan, or any similar place. To fly it to Pakistan you'd have to cross India and/or China, and how do you do that without triggering some kind of alert? Given the combination of having to fly through heavily watched airspace, finding a place to land, refuel, and take off again undetected... it just doesn't come off as very probable, at least not without active complicity from one or more governments..
If I had to guess, I'd guess somebody had a plan, and it failed catastrophically, leading to the plane cruising off over and eventually into the ocean. It would not be a guess with a very high confidence level, but at this point none of them have a very high confidence level.
“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary”
H.L. Mencken
You would have to trace the route of a normal commercial airline. For all intents and purposes it would look like a normal commercial airline. Flown close enough to a plane already on that route, it could look like an echo.
Yes, there would be complicity from Pakistan (or elements in the Pakistani security services who are pissed about the murder of bin Laden), but I am not sure that is really a stretch.
"I can change almost anything ... but I can't change human nature."
Jon Osterman/Dr. Manhattan
---
Re: possibility of the pilot being homosexual. Somewhere earlier today I read that his wife and children moved out of their home the day before the flight disappeared, but as with everything surrounding this, hard facts seem tough to come by.
ETA: Wife and kids moving out mentioned here:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...detection.html
Maybe he came out, they moved out and instead of going to prison he ended it in protest? Although, it's curious that it has been disclosed that they had moved out, but no explanation is given. Why the secrecy?
I have been catching up on this discussion in bits and pieces so forgive me if it has already been mentioned, but has anyone mentioned possibility of testing an exploit of whatever the exact vulnerability mentioned here is:
https://www.federalregister.gov/arti...ctronic-system
Last edited by anotherguy; 03-18-2014 at 12:39 AM.
3-4 Tonnes of Mangosteens and Terrorist Hijackers?
Is air freight the best way to ship such a quantity of mangosteens? This seems rather odd. Smells more like smuggling than terror to me
Why should one take the last Malaysian military report so seriously? the heading could easily be exactly 180 degrees wrong, if it even was the right aircraft.
Simple answer for the lack of passenger contacts--they and the cabin crew all were killed--either gassed or died of anoxia when cabin was depressurized and no O2 flowed from masks.
My guess is that the first officer (maybe the captain was also involved) got paid off to deliver something somewhere that was loaded as mangosteens--gold or drugs, for example. Perhaps Malaysian radar post was also paid off. Once delivery was made the airplane was no longer needed.
I seem to remember that the western Sahara has been the site of many "lost" aircraft landings from drug smugglers flying over from South America.
Vir prudens non contra ventum mingit
The greatest educational dogma is also its greatest fallacy: the belief that what must be learned can necessarily be taught. — Sydney J. Harris
I don't think it would be that simple. A radar contact without transponder data or contact with air traffic controllers is an anomaly and would trigger a response almost anywhere, even on a standard route: people do remember 9/11. Biggus would know more about it than I, but I don't think you could fly close enough to another plane to look like an echo without triggering some serious alarm and complaint from the pilots of the plane you were shadowing.
You'd still have to get it across India or China, and hide it. It's not the easiest thing to hide.
London tabloids are notoriously unreliable sources.
The only reason anyone has suggested for believing that the pilot is gay was that someone somewhere extrapolated support for Anwar Ibrahim into "support for homosexuality", which of course we all know means you must be gay. If support for the PKR makes someone gay, there's a whole lot of gay people in KL.
Of course it's not impossible (few things are at this point), but there's also been no even marginally credible basis proposed for the theory.
It's the only way; they are perishable. This is very very common, there's high demand for tropical fruit in NE Asia, and flights from SE Asia to Japan, Korea, and northern China routinely carry large shipments of fruit.
Seems a very complicated way to smuggle something, and very risky as well.
“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary”
H.L. Mencken
Absolutely. That's not where I originally saw it. just can't find the original link and don't recall the source.
Unless they had independent comms equipment. Then they'd have feedback, the adequacy of which I can't really say - I haven't thought too hard about it.
I disagree that logic an reason aren't relevant, particularly if someone is calculatedly stealing an aircraft and disappearing. It doesn't account for every single possibility, but it's a good place to start.Finally somebody gets it. You are absolutely correct!!!!! trying to use logic when dealing with criminals,terrorist,etc. is total foolishness. To try and use logic and reason on a criminal is just totally "rancid"
You sure about that? The hardware answers are incredibly compelling. We now know that the ACARS radio links were not disabled before last voice contact. We've got a radar track that shows the aircraft turning off to the best possible shot at a safe landing at Langkawi and a bunch of stuff that looks like shutting down systems in the cockpit to eliminate a fire, which they may have managed to do, but not before succumbing to asphyxia or hypoxia.
The hardware answers look far less like terrorism.
This is what I was saying yesterday. ACARS radio links weren't disabled prior to last voice contact.
Wouldn't happen. The transponder not only squawks a pre-designated code for the flight based upon the ATC's instruction, but it also has it's own embedded identification that can't be changed. If there's an aircraft on my primary radar without a transponder, I'm going to make contact one way or another. Normally, you'd expect voice and then either compliance or a declared emergency. If declared emergency, I'd be getting the ACARS data.
If we're talking about flying in close formation to hide your blip inside someone else's blip, that's marginally more likely than being abducted by aliens. It's physically possible to formate on another airliner-type airframe (ever seen a KC-135 refuelling an E-3?), but to hold it there for hours would be difficult, and primary radar would show an even bigger return. To use a crude analogy, the return that the radar operators would see wouldn't be like the normal Rosie O'Donnell sized blip, it'd look like Rosie O'Donnell carrying another Rosie O'Donnell on her shoulders. If I were Malaysia or Thailand, I might not be scrambling my interceptors, but if I were Vietnam, China, India and possibly even Pakistan, I'd be doing something about it.
Yo Dude, long time no see (or hear) ! How goes the war ?
Ain't that the truth. How many air frames vegetate in Africa, either sold or cannibalized.
Given that scenario however would require a few in flight refueling (or one hell of a tail wind)
If you want to blend in, take the bus
Interesting take on the situation from a pilot:
http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/03...ectrical-fire/
Depends on what is being smuggled and how far it needed to move. Might have been on the plane when it left Kuala Lumpur.Yo Dude, long time no see (or hear) ! How goes the war ?
Ain't that the truth. How many air frames vegetate in Africa, either sold or cannibalized.
Given that scenario however would require a few in flight refueling (or one hell of a tail wind)
Vir prudens non contra ventum mingit
The greatest educational dogma is also its greatest fallacy: the belief that what must be learned can necessarily be taught. — Sydney J. Harris
And calling all ships at sea ...
Answer in first paragraph of Airplane Hijacking - Wiki:
Legalisms are in footnote 3.Aircraft hijacking (also known as aircraft piracy, especially within the special aircraft jurisdiction of the United States, and informally as skyjacking) is the unlawful seizure of an aircraft by an individual or a group. In most cases, the pilot is forced to fly according to the orders of the hijackers. Occasionally, however, the hijackers have flown the aircraft themselves, such as the September 11 attacks of 2001. In at least three cases, the plane was hijacked by the official pilot or co-pilot.[1][2][3][4]
1. China Airlines Flight 334
2. "Air China pilot hijacks his own jet to Taiwan". CNN. 1998-10-28. Archived from the original on 2008-03-21. Retrieved 2007-01-25.
3. B. Raman (2000-01-02). "PLANE HIJACKING: IN PERSPECTIVE". South Asia Analysis Group. Retrieved 2007-01-25.
4. Ethiopian Airlines ET702 hijacking
Regards
Mike
I Am The One You Are Looking For...
I brought that up based upon some reports coming from other sources. I believed then and still do this was a Pilot suicide. He was either extremely embarrassed or possibly being blackmailed based upon some deep personal secret he has (homosexuality,etc.).
anotherguy Also don't feel bad about joining the thread late, more points of view are always good for discussion, which is what the council is all about. So keep contributing.
Of course that's not impossible (not much is, at this point) but there seems to be no publicly available evidence at all to suggest such a problem. The allegation that his family moved out seems to go back to a subdivision security guard saying that they'd left the house and a tabloid reporter spinning a story out of it. There's no reason at all to suppose he's gay... so it really doesn't get us anywhere beyond idle speculation.
“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary”
H.L. Mencken
Except the jailed political leader is now admitting he is related to the pilot. Which doesn't make him guilty of anything but why keep it secret for so long?
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