Missing planes

[AndyC]

Thanks, chaps. I look forward to seeing your theories in short order. I suppose you're not waiting for the papers to tell you what to believe?

says the man regergating twitter conspiracys

Regurgitating. Conspiracies. Doh...

PS Tonieiey (in honour of your spelling), I have at least applied a modicum of critical thought to this, and what I find the media telling us is at best 30% of the story. I suppose you've also read around, or are you just saying "Ah, Twitter..."?

My point was you are still taking someone else's views whilst chastising others for erm taking someone else's views

I've been quite interested in this story and read dozens and dozens of websites and seen some very credible theories ... The Diego Garcia one though just isn't credible for reasons I've already explained ( the source saying no plane hit the pentagon )... But despite all the suggestions of hijack and landings I gave my opinion some time back that it would only be found at the bottom of the ocean ...

Suicide has been touted again in the last few hours but I just can't buy that one either ( 6 hrs is a long time ) ... It's a puzzler alright but if I had to hazard a guess I'd go with the on board fire being the most likely

I knew after pulling someone up on a grammar error earlier today that id regret it ... No idea what word I've spelt there , it's not even close

I suppose my point is this - and I've not tried to articulate it before, just felt it, so excuse me if it doesn't come across as fully formed.

We know very well that our governments lie to us, both because they think its in our interest and for self preservation,and to cover up corruption. I think we all know that, as a very basic level of comprehension.

Your dismissal of Diego Garcia is because someone posted a link to a theory you dismiss about an event 13 years ago. Not because you have considered the theory. That's a bit odd. Do you have nothing to say about it the remarkable coincidences about Diego Garcia in this story?

I think the DG line is interesting. I'm still waiting for someone to unpick it and disprove it, rather than post almost amusing would-be putdowns on the lines of "you must be mad to think that our government would ever lie to us".

I'm still waiting for someone to unpick the Sunday sport story about a b-52 on the moon ... The DG story stemmed from a Russian report , the sept 11th link IS important because it's the same source that claimed America kidnapped one of its own planes and made it disappear whilst pretending it had hit the pentagon ... It's in the SAME article that started the DG rumours and therefore for exactly that reason carries zero credibility

You're an intelligent bloke you can't seriously give any credence to the DG stories , I like a conspiracy as much as the next man but These are nothing to do with our governments lying to us ... These are the views of people that make David Icke look sane...

Governments lie about unemployment figures , about why we go to war in Iraq and about involvement in torture of "suspects "...What they don't do is blow up their own twin towers and kidnap 777's out the sky

Spot on with that last statement Tony. I don't particularly like the government's, but to blame people in power for every single disaster man made or natural is getting kind of boring now.

[Electric Avenue]

When I was based in the Middle East, gulf air went down off the coast of Bahrain. No survivors. I remember reading the letter that gulf air sent to the families of the deceased and it was very laissez faire in its tone and content as if this is just one of those things dust yourselves down and move on folks.

It's just how different cultures roll. And maybe some translation issues.

[chrisp65]

I was involved in a building contract in Libya that had Algerian plasterers and renderers (!)

 

When one fell from a flat roof and was killed, the official report basically said 'you should be more careful if you're going to work on a roof, but at least he was earning top dollar for a while'.

[CrackpotForeigner]

 

Steven Seagal should play the lead role in every film about everything. He knows karate.

 

So does my Nan.

 

 

Ah, but does you NAN have an uncanny knack for appearing to be the biggest clearing in the woods on the face of the earth? I don't think so.

[peterms]

You're an intelligent bloke you can't seriously give any credence to the DG stories , I like a conspiracy as much as the next man but These are nothing to do with our governments lying to us ... These are the views of people that make David Icke look sane...

Governments lie about unemployment figures , about why we go to war in Iraq and about involvement in torture of "suspects "...What they don't do is blow up their own twin towers and kidnap 777's out the sky

 

 

Quite the opposite: my objection to the DG theory is that you're far too credible of the US Air Force, Peter.

The primary evidence would appear to be the facebook post to the effect of "none of the planes leaving DG have extra passenger spots available," which does not appear to be an irregular occurrence. If one looks at other posts, one sees that planes are listed as having tentative spots; would it not be easier and surely attract less notice if they were to lie and say that there was a normal complement of flights, and if any personnel called up to try to book a seat, just say "sorry, sold out"?

What I really don't believe is that the plane would not have been spotted by the US facility on Diego Garcia.  Monitoring everything that's going on in the area is after all a very large part of the purpose of this large and well-equipped base.

 

All the accounts that I've seen say the plane turned towards Diego Garcia and maintained that course for a period of time.  That is supported by eye witness accounts.

 

I had thought that the explanation of a fire sounded the most likely, but the more that's been discussed, the less likely it now seems.  It also seems credible that the plane diverted intentionally, since we are told that the change of direction was programmed in to the autopilot several minutes before the "all right, good night" message, which if true, means it's not a response to a sudden emergency.

 

I suppose it's possible the plane was shot down after coming into airspace deemed sensitive.  It's happened before.  It's also possible that it landed at Diego Garcia.

 

What seems hardest to believe is what we are being told, which is that it flew towards Diego Garcia for a while, then diverted again and flew south for a very long way, all without being detected by anyone.  I simply don't believe it.

 

 

[Kwan]

It did not fly towards DG. There are no confirmed eye witnesses of anything.

It turned west and crossed over land and then no one knows where it went except for estimates by the satellite company.

And like I said, the most likely explanation is a series of malfunctions. No one could believe that the copilot in air France 447 pitched up into a stall the whole time. No one could believe that they missed an open seal three times in flight pre check for the Hello flight. It happens.

The whole plane might have already been dead as it was cruising towards the Indian Ocean.

Edited March 25, 2014 by Kwan

[tonyh29]

 

What seems hardest to believe is what we are being told, which is that it flew towards Diego Garcia for a while, then diverted again and flew south for a very long way, all without being detected by anyone.  I simply don't believe it.

 

 

 

there doesn't seem to be any evidence that the plane flew towards DG based on all the possible arcs the plane could have flown  .. that they seem to have found the plane inside one of these arcs , would give the map some credibility as well ,wouldn't it ?

 

 

 

[Electric Avenue]

Would welcome more info on the 5 passengers who checked in but didn't board the flight? Did they merely get carried away in the airside weatherspoons or is there something more sinister?

[bickster]

.. that they seem to have found the plane inside one of these arcs

They haven't found the plane… They haven't even recovered any debris yet let alone identified if the item the are trying to locate is actually part of the aircraft.

Just saying….

Also its not hard to take part of the plane, then chuck it out the back door of a transporter over the sea

[tonyh29]

 

.. that they seem to have found the plane inside one of these arcs

They haven't found the plane… They haven't even recovered any debris yet let alone identified if the item the are trying to locate is actually part of the aircraft.

Just saying….

Also its not hard to take part of the plane, then chuck it out the back door of a transporter over the sea

 

Imarsat all but confirmed where the plane went down   ... The company said it was able to provide a location with a margin of error of about 100 miles

 

unless they are in on the cover up as well

[peterms]

It did not fly towards DG. There are no confirmed eye witnesses of anything.

It turned west and crossed over land and then no one knows where it went except for estimates by the satellite company.

And like I said, the most likely explanation is a series of malfunctions. No one could believe that the copilot in air France 447 pitched up into a stall the whole time. No one could believe that they missed an open seal three times in flight pre check for the Hello flight. It happens.

The whole plane might have already been dead as it was cruising towards the Indian Ocean.

I haven't seen it disputed that the plane turned in a direction which was taking it towards Diego Garcia. As you say, it turned west. The official account is that it then made a further change of direction.

As for the eye witness accounts, what I haven't seen is any account of which plane they saw, if not this one. Unless you think they're just making it up, of course, and didn't see any plane at all.

Regarding malfunctions, we are told that the change in direction was deliberately programmed in, and was not done in response to an emergency. Do you think that is untrue? Yes, malfunctions happen. But we are presented with an account which means that this change of direction was deliberate, which does rather undermine the case that a series of malfunctions was the issue here.

Don't you find it a little hard to believe that the country with the best capability for observing what is happening has no information on strange and unusual movements of a plane in a sensitive area? Do you think that although they can apparently gather vast amounts of all sorts of other data, they can't spot a plane flying in an unapproved direction in an area where they have a spying base? Does it really sound in the slightest bit credible?

I would suggest it's pretty obvious the US has information which they aren't sharing. Which is why people are exploring ideas about what that might be, and why.

[Eames]

 

It did not fly towards DG. There are no confirmed eye witnesses of anything.

It turned west and crossed over land and then no one knows where it went except for estimates by the satellite company.

And like I said, the most likely explanation is a series of malfunctions. No one could believe that the copilot in air France 447 pitched up into a stall the whole time. No one could believe that they missed an open seal three times in flight pre check for the Hello flight. It happens.

The whole plane might have already been dead as it was cruising towards the Indian Ocean.

I haven't seen it disputed that the plane turned in a direction which was taking it towards Diego Garcia. As you say, it turned west. The official account is that it then made a further change of direction.

As for the eye witness accounts, what I haven't seen is any account of which plane they saw, if not this one. Unless you think they're just making it up, of course, and didn't see any plane at all.

Regarding malfunctions, we are told that the change in direction was deliberately programmed in, and was not done in response to an emergency. Do you think that is untrue? Yes, malfunctions happen. But we are presented with an account which means that this change of direction was deliberate, which does rather undermine the case that a series of malfunctions was the issue here.

Don't you find it a little hard to believe that the country with the best capability for observing what is happening has no information on strange and unusual movements of a plane in a sensitive area? Do you think that although they can apparently gather vast amounts of all sorts of other data, they can't spot a plane flying in an unapproved direction in an area where they have a spying base? Does it really sound in the slightest bit credible?

I would suggest it's pretty obvious the US has information which they aren't sharing. Which is why people are exploring ideas about what that might be, and wh

It is certainly possible that the plane was picked up by the base at DG, and if it failed to response to requests for contact for whatever reason, I would imagine eventually the USAF could have taken the decision to shoot it down. I wouldn't imagine that terrorists generally jump on the radio and say "yes we've captured a plane full of Chinese nationals and are going to land it on top of your control tower you yankee pigs!"

 

If the above theory is true, you can certainly understand the US silence, because they are no way going to own up to shooting down a plane full of Chinese intentionally or otherwise.

[peterms]

It is certainly possible that the plane was picked up by the base at DG, and if it failed to response to requests for contact for whatever reason, I would imagine eventually the USAF could have taken the decision to shoot it down. I wouldn't imagine that terrorists generally jump on the radio and say "yes we've captured a plane full of Chinese nationals and are going to land it on top of your control tower you yankee pigs!"

 

If the above theory is true, you can certainly understand the US silence, because they are no way going to own up to shooting down a plane full of Chinese intentionally or otherwise.

Yes, that's one explanation that's credible.

It would also explain why despite their vast resources they have committed less to searching for the plane than, say, India or South Korea.

[Kwan]

There are no accounts thay say it turned towards DG. It turned west and either took a Northern or southern route. There are no credible sources that say it turned towards DG. If you could find one, I'd be glad to read it but nowhere have I read that it changed direction specifically to DG.

And sadly, the US does not have an all seeing eye of the world. It would be nice to think they did but in reality, they have no radars in that area. Active radars are limited in distance. Satellites that are not pointed towards a specific area are close to useless.

Yes, there exists a subset of possibilities that the US has kidnapped a plane and killed everyone to whatever nefarious purposes.

Just as there exists the possibility that Con is right and Barry Bannan has been subjected to discriminatory tactics by Lambert and Pulis and no one has seen his true talent as a champions league caliber player.

What is far more likely is that a malfunction took away their ability to communicate and they either diverted in lieu of a fire or deptessurzed or they diverted once they realized they couldn't communicate. The plane does a Helios and autopilots to death with everyone already dead on board.

[tonyh29]

 

It did not fly towards DG. There are no confirmed eye witnesses of anything.

It turned west and crossed over land and then no one knows where it went except for estimates by the satellite company.

And like I said, the most likely explanation is a series of malfunctions. No one could believe that the copilot in air France 447 pitched up into a stall the whole time. No one could believe that they missed an open seal three times in flight pre check for the Hello flight. It happens.

The whole plane might have already been dead as it was cruising towards the Indian Ocean.

I haven't seen it disputed that the plane turned in a direction which was taking it towards Diego Garcia. As you say, it turned west. The official account is that it then made a further change of direction.

 

 

 

as leaps go that is one giant one for man kind

 

that's akin to saying someone in Sofia heading West must be heading to America

 

 

where exactly is this evidence that the plane headed towards DG  ?

[peterms]

There are no accounts thay say it turned towards DG. It turned west and either took a Northern or southern route. There are no credible sources that say it turned towards DG. If you could find one, I'd be glad to read it but nowhere have I read that it changed direction specifically to DG.

And sadly, the US does not have an all seeing eye of the world. It would be nice to think they did but in reality, they have no radars in that area. Active radars are limited in distance. Satellites that are not pointed towards a specific area are close to useless.

Yes, there exists a subset of possibilities that the US has kidnapped a plane and killed everyone to whatever nefarious purposes.

Just as there exists the possibility that Con is right and Barry Bannan has been subjected to discriminatory tactics by Lambert and Pulis and no one has seen his true talent as a champions league caliber player.

What is far more likely is that a malfunction took away their ability to communicate and they either diverted in lieu of a fire or deptessurzed or they diverted once they realized they couldn't communicate. The plane does a Helios and autopilots to death with everyone already dead on board.

I think all accounts say that it headed west to the Malacca Straits, where military radar lost contact. This from CNN is one example.

 

 

 

Diego Garcia lies in the direction of the continuation of that line.

 

I suppose when you say you've seen no evidence that it changed direction "specifically to DG" you mean there's no evidence that was its intended destination, rather than that you dispute the direction of travel.

 

But tell me - do you think that programming the change of direction westwards several minutes before the "all right, good night" exchange is consistent with your explanation of the diversion being because of a technical fault or other emergency?  And if so, how?

[Kwan]

The programming direction has been thrown in question as no one has actually confirmed that. The timing of when the transponders were turned off and when the change of direction occurred has not been confirmed. Just the last communication.

In part, incompetence by the Malaysian government in confirming and debunking information has been a reason for all the speculation.

As for it turning West, there are a lot of different placed out West. Don't you think it's a bit of stretch to say it went to DG just because it turned west?

And do you not believe any of the satellite information? Neither of the tracks take it anywhere close to DG.

Edited March 25, 2014 by Kwan

[CrackpotForeigner]

But even in the absence of foul play by the US or anyone else, I don't think we should be too quick to condemn the Malaysians. It is almost certain that they would have to run a tightrope between public disclosure and military secrecy. The US govt has been very quiet about all this. I'm not saying that's because they're responsible, but I'd bet anything that they know more than they've ever allowed to be disclosed publicly.

[Kwan]

Just in case anyone is wondering the technical breakdown of how they tracked it

 

INFORMATION PROVIDED TO MH370 INVESTIGATION BY UK AIR ACCIDENTS INVESTIGATION BRANCH (AAIB)

25/03/14

 

On 13 March we received information from UK satellite company Inmarsat indicating that routine automatic communications between one of its satellites and the aircraft could be used to determine several possible flight paths.

 

Inmarsat UK has continued to refine this analysis and yesterday the AAIB presented its most recent findings, which indicate that the aircraft flew along the southern corridor.

As you have heard, an aircraft is able to communicate with ground stations via satellite.

 

If the ground station has not heard from an aircraft for an hour it will transmit a 'log on / log off' message, sometimes referred to as a ‘ping’, using the aircraft’s unique identifier. If the aircraft receives its unique identifier it returns a short message indicating that it is still logged on. This process has been described as a “handshake” and takes place automatically.

From the ground station log it was established that after ACARS stopped sending messages, 6 complete handshakes took place.

 

The position of the satellite is known, and the time that it takes the signal to be sent and received, via the satellite, to the ground station can be used to establish the range of the aircraft from the satellite. This information was used to generate arcs of possible positions from which the Northern and Southern corridors were established.

 

Refined analysis from Inmarsat

 

In recent days Inmarsat developed a second innovative technique which considers the velocity of the aircraft relative to the satellite. Depending on this relative movement, the frequency received and transmitted will differ from its normal value, in much the same way that the sound of a passing car changes as it approaches and passes by. This is called the Doppler effect. The Inmarsat technique analyses the difference between the frequency that the ground station expects to receive and that actually measured. This difference is the result of the Doppler effect and is known as the Burst Frequency Offset.

 

The Burst Frequency Offset changes depending on the location of the aircraft on an arc of possible positions, its direction of travel, and its speed. In order to establish confidence in its theory, Inmarsat checked its predictions using information obtained from six other B777 aircraft flying on the same day in various directions. There was good agreement.

While on the ground at Kuala Lumpur airport, and during the early stage of the flight, MH370 transmitted several messages. At this stage the location of the aircraft and the satellite were known, so it was possible to calculate system characteristics for the aircraft, satellite, and ground station.

 

During the flight the ground station logged the transmitted and received pulse frequencies at each handshake. Knowing the system characteristics and position of the satellite it was possible, considering aircraft performance, to determine where on each arc the calculated burst frequency offset fit best.

 

The analysis showed poor correlation with the Northern corridor, but good correlation with the Southern corridor, and depending on the ground speed of the aircraft it was then possible to estimate positions at 0011 UTC, at which the last complete handshake took place. I must emphasise that this is not the final position of the aircraft.

 

There is evidence of a partial handshake between the aircraft and ground station at 0019 UTC. At this time this transmission is not understood and is subject to further ongoing work.

No response was received from the aircraft at 0115 UTC, when the ground earth station sent the next log on / log off message. This indicates that the aircraft was no longer logged on to the network.

 

Therefore, some time between 0011 UTC and 0115 UTC the aircraft was no longer able to communicate with the ground station. This is consistent with the maximum endurance of the aircraft.

This analysis by Inmarsat forms the basis for further study to attempt to determine the final position of the aircraft. Accordingly, the Malaysian investigation has set up an international working group, comprising agencies with expertise in satellite communications and aircraft performance, to take this work forward.

 

In Annex I (attached) there are three diagrams, showing:

 

Doppler correction contributions Image

This diagram shows the Doppler contributions to the burst frequency offset.

 

MH370 measured data against predicted tracks Image

The blue line is the burst frequency offset measured at the ground station for MH370.

The green line is the predicted burst frequency offset for the southern route, which over the last 6 handshakes show close correlation with the measured values for MH370.

The red line is the predicted burst frequency offset for the northern route, which over the last 6 handshakes does not correlate with the measured values for MH370.

 

Example southern tracks Image

This shows the southern tracks for a ground speed of 400 and 450 knots ground speed. It should be noted that further work is required to determine the aircraft speed and final position.

 

Source: Malaysian Official Page

[blandy]

 

...As for the eye witness accounts, what I haven't seen is any account of which plane they saw, if not this one. Unless you think they're just making it up, of course, and didn't see any plane at all.

Well the NZ oil rig worker you mentioned a few days ago with his description of seeing a plane on fire heading in a straight line and so on... Seemed very credible, but clearly he didn't see the MH370 plane. Not necessarily making it up, but mistaken, perhaps.

Almost by definition, eye witness accounts of an aircraft some height and distance away are going to be unrelaible - how does the witness know which aircraft they are observing?

Looking at interests. Surely the largest US interest is in finding out what happened to a US built Boeing aircraft? Technical issues or malicious action. Either way, there's a very powerful reason to say the US would want to find and recover the plane, to gain evidence. They and other nations may wish to not reveal the extent of military surveillance data they might hold, but there's interest all round in finding the plane, and none in not finding it.

It's almost certainly where the satellite data says it is. It's almost certainly at that point due to conscious action by whoever was in control of it last, to set it to fly there. Technical failure and/or fire are unlikely to be the cause of that action being chosen.

The least unlikely thing, for me, is malicious action by someone on the plane, perhaps resisted. Passengers killed via asphyxiation at altitude, and cockpit actions which resulted in the aircraft being set oon a final course out to the middle of nowehere, deliberately away from land, so that whenever it either ran out of fuel or exploded or otherwise was destroyed or fell apart, no-one underneath would be affected.