Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 is Missing

Re: Malaysia Airlines Plane is Missing



I don't blame their reactions one bit.

Without any piece of hard evidence, any conclusion about the plane's trajectory is just an educated guess. Considering the number of reversals we've seen, it was pretty foolish to make such a definitive-sounding statement.

It could have been handled much better. Instead of drawing a conclusion, the Malaysian government could have simply relayed what they knew. As more evidence mounts, the families would have been able to draw their own conclusions and make their peace.

Re: Malaysia Airlines Plane is Missing

Don't know why, but I always felt they're trying to hide something. Either it's just as simple as trying to hide their incompetency, not wanting to look like idiots in front of world media; or that they are hiding something more sinister, like political scandals.
Somehow and somewhere they're definitely hiding something.

Re: Malaysia Airlines Plane is Missing

The news report was that the military only came to suspect the plane possibly turning back after reviewing the radar recording. So it seems like no one was manning the radar station at the time. However, ATC personnel did say that they contacted the military, the HQ probably, after the disappearance of the plane. I guess Malaysia was overconfident that they do not have any enemies, or they never imagined this sort of incident could ever happen. Anyway, Malaysia wouldn't be the first country that has its military, or part of it, working on a 9 to 5 job, not that I actually know about their military working hours.

Re: Malaysia Airlines Plane is Missing

JsCh said:

It now look very likely that it is the pilot of the plane deliberately trying to hide the plane.
And why would anyone want to do that?
If it is suicide/murder than I guess a logical answer is not required.
However assuming that the pilot is sane, logical and humane, another scenario that I think could be possible, would be thus.
One, all the passenger are dead. Second, the pilot would be hold responsible for their accidental death.
Consider for example that the pilot allow a certain cargo into the plane by his sole discretion, and that cargo caused the death of all the passenger on board.
Upon discovery of his predicament, the pilot might have chosen to hide whatever happen.
It could be called irresponsible, but the captain did go down with the ship.

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This is an interesting theory... I was listening to the news last night and was mentioned investigators questioned Malaysia airlines what were loaded in the airplane cargo but the Malaysian airline refused to answer. Seem to me they could be hiding something that were loaded onboard the plane.

Re: Malaysia Airlines Plane is Missing

delft said:

Some remarks:

Civilian aircraft maintain a cabin pressure equivalent to the atmospheric pressure at 8000 ft altitude. If an aircraft goes over its rated altitude it may not be able to maintain that cabin pressure but their is no reason why it will loose all cabin over pressure unless the hull was breached. This means that no people or only a few would be knocked out by the loss of air pressure.

Looking for floating debris far out at sea might more easily been done using a medium size airship, say about 50 tons or even less, with an endurance of a week or more. When considering producing airships this is one use to think of.

Looking for debris on the bottom of the ocean might take years, as it did in the case of the Air France plane. China might do well to produce a number of autonomous unmanned submersibles to map that area of Indian Ocean bottom using side scan sonar.

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Small unmanned airships are a good and inexpensive solution for blue water observation tasks. They have phenomenal endurance and can dip sonars in flight. Spain is testing an unmanned airship for their navy.
Mapping ocean with submersibles is quite expensive. Using airships for less accurate maps might be more in the Chinese budget. Submersibles are of more use for limited routes such as an underwater communication network. That's an important market of the future of which the Asian nations have almost zero share.
An automated airship with a submersible for deep sea operations might be a combination of use for SAR and hunting submarines (as done with airships during WWII) that is quick to deploy and can be housed away from shore installations. Airships for blue water operations could be stored on Chinese territory in the Himalaya and bordering regions and from there deploy to the Indian Ocean that is China's main traffic artery.

Re: Malaysia Airlines Plane is Missing

Kurt said:

Small unmanned airships are a good and inexpensive solution for blue water observation tasks. They have phenomenal endurance and can dip sonars in flight. Spain is testing an unmanned airship for their navy.
Mapping ocean with submersibles is quite expensive. Using airships for less accurate maps might be more in the Chinese budget. Submersibles are of more use for limited routes such as an underwater communication network. That's an important market of the future of which the Asian nations have almost zero share.
An automated airship with a submersible for deep sea operations might be a combination of use for SAR and hunting submarines (as done with airships during WWII) that is quick to deploy and can be housed away from shore installations. Airships for blue water operations could be stored on Chinese territory in the Himalaya and bordering regions and from there deploy to the Indian Ocean that is China's main traffic artery.

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What about simply having long term airship deployments out in international airspace? They can always be serviced by service ships during calm weather. I think an automated airship with submersible is overly complex. Perhaps an airship with a cache of sonar bouys to launch when needed. The service ship replenishes periodically. In the past, I've mentioned it as surveillance over pirate infested shipping lanes.

Re: Malaysia Airlines Plane is Missing

bluewater2012 said:

This is an interesting theory... I was listening to the news last night and was mentioned investigators questioned Malaysia airlines what were loaded in the airplane cargo but the Malaysian airline refused to answer. Seem to me they could be hiding something that were loaded onboard the plane.

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I think you meant reporters when you said "investigators"? I think the reporters should have known not to ask such questions as above. The officials will never reveal the exact details because doing so could jeopardize the investigation. If you follow the daily press conference, you can almost always tell the kind of questions they always wouldn't answer. It is the same with any police investigation. Actually it is a police investigation. Do the police reveal the details of the investigation before the police has completed it? I don't think so. Ditto the above.

Re: Malaysia Airlines Plane is Missing

Kurt said:

Small unmanned airships are a good and inexpensive solution for blue water observation tasks. They have phenomenal endurance and can dip sonars in flight. Spain is testing an unmanned airship for their navy.
Mapping ocean with submersibles is quite expensive. Using airships for less accurate maps might be more in the Chinese budget. Submersibles are of more use for limited routes such as an underwater communication network. That's an important market of the future of which the Asian nations have almost zero share.
An automated airship with a submersible for deep sea operations might be a combination of use for SAR and hunting submarines (as done with airships during WWII) that is quick to deploy and can be housed away from shore installations. Airships for blue water operations could be stored on Chinese territory in the Himalaya and bordering regions and from there deploy to the Indian Ocean that is China's main traffic artery.

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I was thinking of using airships for fishery inspection say in the South China Sea. It would indeed be advantageous to have them unmanned. If half a dozen were used for this purpose it would be a small matter to send two to Perth. They would be more fitting than the currently used turbo prop and turbo fan aircraft. I was thinking of using liquid hydrogen as fuel for gas turbines or fuel cells and gaseous hydrogen for lift. You can then vary the lift by using more or less hydrogen than you evaporate.
I wouldn't position then in any mountainous region. You might remember the story of the Kriegsmarine height climbers in WWI. They could exceed 8 km altitude and be swept away by the jet stream.

Re: Malaysia Airlines Plane is Missing

bluewater2012 said:

This is an interesting theory... I was listening to the news last night and was mentioned investigators questioned Malaysia airlines what were loaded in the airplane cargo but the Malaysian airline refused to answer. Seem to me they could be hiding something that were loaded onboard the plane.

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All these wild theories promote is wild speculation and anger, there is a cargo manifest on flight 370, it does seem they were likely flying Lithium batteries to China???? At present that cargo/aircraft/crew/passengers are lost, could the batteries have caused the disappearance??? Not likely from the evidence in hand, and further if someone shows up today at X airline with a cargo of Lithium batteries, they will load them and fly them......while the families are in angst and angry at the situation, to exploit that anger, or encourage it is a disservice, to those who at present are likely doing everything they can to solve this mystery and recover whatever they may of the remains/wreckage.

While I pray that this was an accident, not premeditated murder, if we are confronted with the sad possibility of a rogue pilot or crew caused this horrible tragedy, then that person will carry that blood-guiltiness into eternity and be judged accordingly.....

bottom line: flying is a dangerous business, that we are as good at it as we are is testament to honorable men and women who lay it all on the line everyday to provide their passengers/fellow crew members their very best. Yes it is VERY HIGH STRESS, but they do it because they love flying, and take that responsibility as a personal honor, which it is! brat

Re: Malaysia Airlines Plane is Missing

Personally I find it hard to believe anything that's been said. Everything contradicts something that has been said before. For example, if it was these batteries that caught fire as reported on the news, then this aircraft wouldn't have flown 7 hours out to the Indian Ocean. I think the New York Times does a disservice that they report they know that the supposed flight path change after contact was lost was pre-programmed into the computer basically declaring the flight was hi-jacked. If ones believes that someone took over the aircraft, that information really doesn't change anything especially since the media was already going in that direction. How do they know someone programmed the course change? The line is blurred between official information and what the media just throws out there just to get people watching or reading their stuff.