MH370: Still a mystery six years on

The media frenzy over the disappearance of the Boeing 777 is reaching a peak again, as it does annually.

SKY News Australia has just released a two-part documentary seeking to explain their viewpoint to the public. Using a number of ‘experts’ including Tony Abbott (who was Prime Minister of Australia at the time of the incident), the network unwaveringly accuses the Captain Zahari Ahmed Shah of planning and executing the disappearance of the aircraft. 

Also weighing in on the controversy is a former colleague of this writer, Byron Bailey. Captain Bailey who now flies executive jets and has a column in The Australian newspaper (also part of the SKY media empire) has long been accusing Capt. Shah of mass murder.

A review of what we know

The facts are well known, as it was the subject of a FT column in September 2019 and can be reviewed on my blog (https://surenratwatte.com/mh370/).

The aircraft, while en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, made an unannounced turn when crossing into Vietnamese airspace. It made a second turn over the Straits of Malacca and then disappeared from radar coverage. 

The radar transponder ceased transmitting as the first turn took place. No radio calls were made to advise Air Traffic Control of a diversion, emergency or any other abnormality.

The aircraft proceeded to fly for some time, while automatic reports on engine performance were sent via satellite to the manufacturer for many hours. The existence of this automated communication system was not well known, and the pilots cannot control it. 

However, no radio calls or other position reports were made for the remainder of the purported flight – which has been calculated to the point of fuel exhaustion, in the absence of any other parameter. 

Probable scenarios

There are an infinite number of possible reasons, but experienced investigators have identified three that are most probable:

• A hijack by unknown persons. 
• A deliberate intervention by one of both pilots.
• A fire on board that incapacitated the entire crew but did not destroy the aircraft immediately.

Hijack

While a hijack remains plausible, it is very unlikely.  There is no precedent for a hijack without a subsequent claim for ransom or political demands. The chances of a huge aircraft being able to land on a runway anywhere in the world without detection are practically non-existent, so a hijack must be ruled out.

The Fox News hypothesis

Sections of the media appear to have wholly accepted this scenario. Accusing the captain has now become routine. Former PM Abbott is quoted in the Fox News documentary as stating that “very high levels of the Malaysian Government” also subscribed to this theory.

The speculation is that one of the pilots (suspicion has concentrated on the captain) locked the other out of the cockpit and proceeded to depressurise the aircraft. Pilots have sufficient oxygen for many hours of flight, but the emergency oxygen supply for passengers is sufficient for only 22 minutes. 

While this is a plausible explanation, it would still mean that the cabin crew, one of the pilots, and approximately 200 passengers, would have been conscious for at least 22 minutes while the cockpit was inaccessible, and the remaining pilot on the flight deck was incommunicado.

To imagine that no one tried to make a call or send a text message by mobile phone during this period when it would have been obvious that something very strange was going on, is hard to imagine.

Depressurising the cabin would have also caused the cabin temperature to drop to a very cold level (outside temperatures at that altitude would have been around minus 50°C) and there is no evidence that either one of the pilots was carrying the warm clothing required to function in that sort of environment.

To add to that, there is no possible motivation for either of the pilots to have carried out such a heinous and meticulously planned intervention. The co-pilot was a young man on the threshold of a great career and about to get married. The captain, though older and divorced, appears to have no history of anxiety, no financial problems, was close to his children and was well-respected in his community. Why would either person go to such great lengths to commit this crime?

An alternative theory

Another of this writer’s ex-colleagues, Captain James Nixon, has published a book titled The Crash of MH370, which lays out an alternative scenario.

Nixon suggests that a catastrophic and violent fire, accompanied by toxic smoke was the cause. He speculates that a ferocious fire would have suddenly broken out in the cockpit, when only one pilot was at the controls. This would have caused the sharp turn, as he tried to return to the nearest airport. But the fire would then have overcome the pilot before he could put on his oxygen mask, and also caused much of the communications equipment to fail.

With the pilot incapacitated in the cockpit and toxic smoke in the cabin causing passengers to be rendered unconscious too, the aircraft flew on into the night.

Is this plausible?

A modern passenger jet is inherently stable. It is entirely possible that the Boeing 777, even with much of its control computers destroyed, would continue to fly. As long as the engines produce thrust, the wings would keep generating lift, and the aircraft would remain airborne. A scenario where a modern airliner is airborne, with no one at the controls and the autopilot system rendered useless, cannot be replicated in a simulator. There is little chance that it would be tried in an actual aircraft, as the risk is too great. But there is no reason it cannot happen.

There is some evidence (as yet unproven) that there were large changes in altitude at later stages of the flight, which could be the result of updrafts on an uncontrolled aircraft. The mysterious turns could also be the effect of thunderstorms – there were plenty in the vicinity – on an aircraft with no one in control.

The wreckage must be found

Speculation does not achieve very much. It is imperative that yet another search be carried out in order to find the location of the wreckage on MH370.

Merely locating the crash site alone would help a great deal. Once this is known, many possibilities can be ruled out. Discovery of the flight recorders (the so called ‘black boxes’) would of course deliver a definitive answer, but locating them in deep water is likely to be challenging.

The southern Indian Ocean, where MH370 probably lies, is an enormous area. Searching it with only a vague idea of the location of the doomed airliner is a daunting task but it must be done, in order to solve the greatest mystery of this century.

(The writer has had a long career as an airline CEO, pilot and researcher. He has over 3500 hours on the Boeing 777 and is very familiar with this type of aircraft. More information is available on his blog 

surenratwatte.com)