Category: MH 370

The Malaysian Insider
March 17, 2014

The investigation into the lost Malaysia Airlines (MAS) flight MH370 has yet to throw up a persuasive fact that the pilots could have deliberately taken the Boeing 777-200ER to an unknown destination, the Daily Beast reported today.

In an article headlined “The baseless rush to blame the pilots of Flight 370”, the online portal’s journalist Clive Irving noted that “what little evidence there is has been contaminated by the performance of the Malaysian authorities”.

“They resemble a bunch of dumb cops blundering over a crime scene, arguing over what it reveals and what it does not and competing for attention.

“In a sadly familiar ploy of the pursued, the prime minister himself was put up to float a theory so far lacking in any persuasive facts: the pilots did it. Dead men have no defense,” he wrote today in the online portal.

US intelligence officials and the Malaysian government have said that someone in the cockpit had deliberately changed the flight’s course after it vanished from radar screens early March 8 when the passenger jet with 239 people on board was bound for Beijing.

It never arrived and is still missing for the past 10 days. Continue reading “No facts to blame pilots of MH370 yet, says report”

The Malay Mail Online
March 17, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 17 — Investigators initially took the words “Good night” — the last words sent from Malaysia Airlines (MAS) flight MH370 — to mean all had then been well aboard the plane.

But a revelation now shows that the final transmission was made after someone onboard disabled the Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS) that conveyed the plane’s health to MAS is raising questions about who was in control of the Beijing-bound plane that is missing along with its 239 passengers.

The chronology indicates that the person who last contacted Subang Air Traffic Control (ATC) was aware that the critical communications system was no longer functional at the time, the Guardian reported yesterday.

Moments after the ACARS link was lost, the plane’s transponder was switched off at 1.22am on March 8, rendering it invisible to commercial radar as it turned around off the coast of Kelantan and made its way back—as military radar has confirmed—across the peninsula and into the Straits of Malacca.

The sequence is reinforcing the hypothesis that MH370 went missing due to possible hijacking, after the Malaysian government said on Saturday that it was all but certain that the plane was diverted from its flight path to Beijing through “deliberate action”.

The government said it was now directing its investigation towards the two pilots, 10 crew members and 227 passengers onboard the flight. Continue reading “Final MH370 radio contact made after data link killed”

The Malay Mail Online
March 16, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 16 — A Pakistani official today dismissed reports suggesting that missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 may have landed in the South Asian country.

Pakistan’s Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Aviation Shujaat Azeem told news portal Dawn.com that the country’s military did not observe the Boeing 777-200ER approach or enter its airspace.

“It’s wrong, (the) plane never came towards Pakistan,” he was quoted as saying in the report.

India today similarly discounted the possibility of the plane entering its airspace.

Yesterday, Malaysia revealed that satellite data has allowed investigators to arrive at two “corridors” where the plane could possibly be located: a northern arc from northern Thailand to the border of Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan in central Asia, or a southern one from Indonesia to the southern Indian Ocean.

The northern corridor would have brought the plane towards South Asia. Continue reading “Pakistan says MH370 did not land there”

The Malaysian Insider
March 16, 2014

Investigators are puzzled over Malaysian military’s inaction in responding to an unidentified blip on their radar screens that was later said to be the missing flight MH370, the New York Times reported today.

It reported that the plane flew past three military radars and over Penang but nothing was done to identify it, which would have helped prevent its disappearance.

“The watch team never noticed the blip, it was as though the airspace was his,” a person with detailed knowledge of the investigation reportedly told the NYT.

Still, the report said that this was not the first, nor would it be the last of the long series of errors the Malaysian government has made, which complicated the task of finding the missing Boeing 777-200ER (9M-MRO) with239 onboard.

Today is the eight day since the plane disappeared from radar and the trail had gotten weaker as the search expands to Kazakhstan to the vast Indian Ocean. Continue reading “Why didn’t Malaysian military react to MH370 blip on radar screens, ask investigators”

This is the ninth day of the MHI 370 tragedy.

It is highly regrettable that while Malaysians, regardless of race, religion or politics, are praying hard for the safety of the 239 passengers and crew members on board the Malaysian airline, there are people like the former Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir who seemed more interested in continuing to spew lies and communal poison to pit race against race and religion against religion in Malaysia to further their petty political agenda.

This is what Mahathir did on Thursday, 13th March, the sixth day of the MH 370 tragedy, in his blog campaigning for the MCA candidate in the Kajang by-election – a most irresponsible and reckless act as it is such incessant spewing of lies and communal poison which had been the major cause of the worst racial and religious polarization in the nation’s history.

In his blog-post on Thursday, Mahathir continued to make baseless accusations against the DAP and the Pakatan Rakyat, alleging that DAP wanted “complete” Chinese political and economic dominance in Malaysia. Continue reading “Highly regrettable on 6th day of MH 370 tragedy, while Malaysians prayed hard for safety of 239 passengers and crew members on board, Mahathir was only interested in spewing lies and communal poison”

The Malaysian Insider
March 16, 2014

Indian military authorities have dismissed the possibility that the Malaysia Airlines (MAS) flight MH370, which mysteriously disappeared eight days ago en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur, could have flown over India on its way to Kazakhstan-Turkmenistan in Central Asia, the Times of India reported.

“If the jetliner had tried to cross the Indian mainland, our primary radars (which bounce radio signals off targets) would have picked it up despite its transponders being switched off (secondary radars beam signals that request information from a plane’s transponders),” said a top Indian Air Force (IAF) officer.

If an “unidentified” plane had been picked up flouting prescribed procedures or with switched-off transponders or not “squawking” IFF (identification, friend or foe) codes, a series of “air defence measures” would have kicked in – including the scrambling of fighters – to “detect, identify, intercept and destroy” the intruder, the newspaper reported. Continue reading “MAS jet couldn’t have flown over our airspace, says India’s military”

The Malaysian Insider
March 15, 2014

The week-long search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 took a major new turn today as evidence indicated that its communication systems were manually switched off and the airliner was deliberately diverted.

The first concrete, verified lead as to the possible reason behind the disappearance has fuelled speculation over how and why MH370 might have been commandeered – and its likely fate.

Here are some of the possible scenarios being weighed up by experts.

Theory: Terror attack

Why: As the theory that the plane was deliberately taken over gains traction, questions over the involvement of terrorist organisations have come back to the fore. Continue reading “What could have happened to flight MH370?”

The Malay Mail Online
March 16, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 16 — Malaysia repeatedly rejected Interpol’s offers to help investigate Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 even as the government now believes the plane went missing due to “deliberate action”, a Western law enforcement agent has alleged.

Speaking to ABC News in the United States, the official who went unnamed accused Malaysia of jealously guarding its information to the point of turning away the aid offered by the intergovernmental police agency.

“It’s the old pre-9/11 approach: close-hold information, don’t share anything,” the anonymous official was quoted as saying by ABC News on its website yesterday, referring to the September 11, 2001 terror attacks.

ABC News quoted other unidentified law enforcement officials who expressed concern that the alleged refusal by Malaysia to take up Interpol’s offer may have caused leads into the mysterious disappearance of MH370 to grow cold.

The allegations raised the ABC News report that Malaysia was unwilling to share information appeared at odds, however, with Putrajaya’s action in releasing highly-confidential raw data from its military radars to countries assisting in the search, including China and the US.

Such data is often among a country’s most closely-guarded secrets as it can be used to ascertain its defensive strengths and vulnerabilities; no country willingly divulges such information if it can be avoided. Continue reading “Official: Interpol snubbed even as foul play seen in MH370”

The Malaysian Insider
March 15, 2014

Classified intelligence analysis of electronic and satellite data has indicated that the missing Malaysia Airlines (MAS) flight 370 likely crashed either in the Bay of Bengal or somewhere in the Indian Ocean, an exclusive report by the CNN said.

If this information is true, it would offer the first glimpse of concrete details about what happened to the Beijing-bound flight which went off the radar early last Saturday.

It had enough credibility for the United States to move its guided missile destroyer, the USS Kidd, into the Indian Ocean, and Indian officials to expand its search effort into the Bay of Bengal.

An aviation industry source told CNN that the flight’s automated communications system appeared to be intact for up to five hours, because “pings” from the system were received after the transponder last emitted a signal.

The CNN report said taken together, the data points toward speculation in a dark scenario in which someone took the plane for some unknown purpose, perhaps terrorism.

That theory is buoyed by a New York Times (NYT) report that the MAS plane made several significant altitude changes after losing transponder contact.

The paper said MH370 altered its course more than once as though it was still under the command of a pilot. Continue reading “Classified data shows plane may have crashed in Bay of Bengal or Indian Ocean”

The Malay Mail Online
March 15, 2014

WASHINGTON, March 15 ― A US naval ship and surveillance plane are heading to the Andaman Sea and Bay of Bengal to search for a missing Malaysian airliner that vanished a week ago, officials said yesterday.

US media reports, meanwhile, suggested the plane experienced marked changes in altitude after it lost contact with ground control, and altered its course more than once as if still under the command of a pilot.

A P-8 Poseidon aircraft and a guided missile destroyer, the USS Kidd, were due to aid the international hunt for the jet as the search effort extended further west, Pentagon spokesman Colonel Steven Warren said.

“At Malaysia’s request, the USS Kidd is north of the Straits of Malacca in what we’re calling the western search area,” Warren told reporters in Washington.

The Kidd was preparing to search the Andaman Sea and the Bay of Bengal for the Malaysia Airlines plane. Continue reading “US ship, plane to search Bay of Bengal for missing jet”

The Malay Mail Online
March 15, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 15 ― With new evidence suggesting the possibility that missing jetliner MH370 had been deliberately piloted towards the Andaman Islands, another theory has now emerged out of the woodwork ― could someone have landed aircraft?

Reuters cited two sources yesterday as saying that investigators believe the plane had been directed between navigational waypoints after it lost contact with ground control, which indicated it was being flown by someone with aviation training.

It cited another source as saying that investigations are now looking at the possibility of foul play, with signs pointing increasingly to the likelihood that a person who knew how to fly a plane had deliberately swung the aircraft hundred of miles off its original course from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, towards the Andaman Islands.

“What we can say is we are looking at sabotage, with hijack still on the cards,” Reuters had quoted a “a senior Malaysian police official” as saying.

Although this is at best just conjecture for now, it may be one of the few working theories that could finally expose more conclusive leads to what experts have described as the most baffling of mysteries in aviation history.

But if the Malaysia Airlines aircraft had truly made the air turn-back as suspected, if it had headed to the Andaman Islands as satellite data and US officials have suggested, and if it indeed had landed, where in the remote Indian archipelago could it have parked itself so stealthily out of sight? Continue reading “Could MH370 have landed?”

The Malaysian Insider
March 15, 2014

With evidence showing a missing Malaysia Airlines (MAS) Boeing 777-200ER could still be intact, US officials have not ruled out that flight MH370 was flown to a secret site so that it could be used at a later date.

There has been no trace or debris field on land or sea that is linked to the plane carrying 239 people, which vanished while on a red-eye flight to Beijing last Saturday.

“I am keenly interested in resolving this mystery so we can discard the possibility, however remote, that the airplane can be used for nefarious purposes against us in the future,” ABC News quoted a US official as saying.

The official added that “all our intelligence assets” are being used to try to figure this out.

Investigators searching for the missing MAS passenger jet said that they could not rule out hijacking and are looking at whether one of the plane’s pilots or crew could have been involved. Continue reading “MH370 hijack theory includes intent to use plane for ‘nefarious purposes’, say US officials”

The Malaysian Insider
March 15, 2014

An unprecedented international effort is under way from space to track the missing Malaysia passenger jet as satellite operators, government agencies and rival nations sweep their gaze across two oceans in search of elusive debris or data.

Six days after the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 went missing with 239 people on board, the search has widened to the Andaman Sea, northwest of the Malay Peninsula, with only one precious clue – an ephemeral “ping” detected five or six times after the plane lost contact – picked up in orbit.

Disaster relief agencies and governments are co-operating across political divides, and in the absence of a formal probe are finding informal ways to share information, including via China’s weather agency, a person involved in the search said.

“I haven’t seen this sort of level of involvement of satellites in accident investigation before,” said Matthew Greaves, head of the Safety and Accident Investigation Centre at Cranfield University in Bedford, England. “It is only going to get more important until they find some wreckage.”

Several governments are using imagery satellites – platforms that take high definition photos – while data from private sector communications satellites is also being examined. Continue reading “Satellites scour earth for clues as missing jet mystery deepens”

The Malaysian Insider
March 14, 2014

Indian aircraft combed Andaman and Nicobar, made up of more than 500 mostly uninhabited islands, for signs of the missing Malaysia Airlines MH370 jetliner that evidence suggests was last headed towards the heavily forested archipelago.

Popular with tourists and anthropologists alike, the islands form India’s most isolated state. They are best known for dense rainforests, coral reefs and hunter-gatherer tribes who have long resisted contact with outsiders.

The search for flight MH370 turned west toward the islands after Malaysia’s air force chief said military radar had detected an unidentified aircraft suspected to be the lost Boeing 777 to the west of Malaysia early on Saturday.

Two sources yesterday told Reuters the unidentified aircraft appeared to be following a commonly used navigational route that would take it over the islands.

The Indian navy has deployed two Dornier planes to fly across the island chain, a total area of 720 km by 52 km, Indian military spokesman Harmeet Singh said in the state capital, Port Blair. So far the planes, and a helicopter searching the coast, had found nothing.

“This operation is like finding a needle in a haystack,” said Singh, who is the spokesman for joint air force, navy and army command in the Andaman and Nicobar islands. Continue reading “India scours uninhabited jungle islands for lost MH370 jetliner”

The Malay Mail Online
March 14, 2014

KUALA LUMPUR, March 14 — Global satellite company Inmarsat revealed today that it had registered “routine, automated signals” from missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 during its flight from Kuala Lumpur.

The news adds to the intrigue surrounding the aircraft’s disappearance, particularly as it appears to corroborate reports that said satellites had picked up faint, electronic pulses or “pings” from MH370 hours after it was last heard from.

Inmarsat, a London-based firm, reported its findings in a statement on its website but did not elaborate on when or how long the signals were received.

“This information was provided to our partner SITA, which in turn has shared it with Malaysia Airlines,” it said in the statement, adding that further information should be obtained from MAS, the owner of the Boeing 777 aircraft that went missing.

SITA is a global specialist in air transport communications and information technology. Continue reading “London-based satellite firm says MH370 registered signals on its network”

The Malaysian Insider
March 14, 2014

Military radar-tracking evidence suggests that the Malaysia Airlines MH370 jetliner missing for nearly a week was deliberately flown across the Malay peninsula toward the Andaman Islands, sources familiar with the investigation told Reuters today.

Two sources said an unidentified aircraft that investigators believe was Flight MH370 was following a route between navigational waypoints – indicating it was being flown by someone with aviation training – when it was last plotted on military radar off the country’s northwest coast.

The last plot on the military radar’s tracking suggested the plane was flying toward India’s Andaman Islands, a chain of isles between the Andaman Sea and the Bay of Bengal, they said.

Waypoints are geographic locations, worked out by calculating longitude and latitude, that help pilots navigate along established air corridors.

A third source familiar with the investigation said inquiries were focusing increasingly on the theory that someone who knew how to fly a plane deliberately diverted the flight, with 239 people on board, hundreds of miles off its intended course from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

“What we can say is we are looking at sabotage, with hijack still on the cards,” said that source, a senior Malaysian police official.

All three sources declined to be identified because they were not authorised to speak to the media and due to the sensitivity of the investigation. Continue reading “Radar data suggests MH370 plane flown deliberately toward Andaman Islands”