Mystery Malaysia flight may have been hundreds of miles off course (CNN Breaking)

CNN ^ | 3-11-2014 | Michael Pearson and Jethro Mullen

[tcrlaf]

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 was hundreds of miles off course, traveling in the opposite direction from its original destination and had stopped sending identifying transponder codes before it disappeared, a senior Malaysian Air Force official told CNN Tuesday.

If correct, these are ominous signs that could call into question whether someone in the cockpit might have deliberately steered the plane away from its intended destination, a former U.S. aviation investigator said.

"This kind of deviation in course is simply inexplicable," said Paul Goelz, former managing director of the National Transportation Safety Board.

(snip) The Malaysian Air Force lost track of the plane over Pulau Perak, a tiny island in the Straits of Malacca -- many hundreds of miles from the usual flight path for aircraft traveling between Kuala Lumpur and Beijing, the official said.

[plain talk]

No way this involved a hijacking with breaking into a cockpit and zero radio contact. That makes no sense. The only way the hijacking scenario works is IF the pilots were involved. Even then I don’t buy there was no radar or visual observation. Not ruling it out but much more likely to be massive explosion. Its a large ocean.

[Lazamataz]

Apparently most flights are unknowns until approaching American airspace. After this, I bet that changes.

[Capt. Tom]

This is so weird. If they tracked the plane on radar to the Straits of Malacca, why are they still looking in the Gulf of Siam?

No doubt the reporting is screwed up whether by design or incompetence.
They started looking hundreds of miles away from where the plane had it's last contact because of an oil slick that turned out not to be from the plane.
Then there was a muddled report the plane may have turned around.
Now the story is another radar tracked it flying to a new location and then disappearing off he radar in the Sstraights of Mallaca on the other side of the Island it took off from.
Time makes all things clear. - tom

[harwood]

lol; you on a roll, Laz

[Lazamataz]

(don’t enocourage him)

[Blood of Tyrants]

On commercial aircraft, oxygen masks will automatically deploy if the altitude inside the aircraft exceeds 15,000 feet IIRC. Plus the aircraft changed directions fro northeast to due west. Also, the pilots have separate self contained O2 masks. Plenty of time to get below 10,000 feet.

[Bronzewound]

I think cellphone signals on commercial airliners are sent via the plane's communication system, which in this case, seems to have been off.

Please correct me if I have this wrong. Thanks.

[MarMema]

They’re just too incompetent or not imaginative enough to begin with an outlier.

[rxsid]

"Doors to the cockpit are locked after takeoff.

You must have missed the story where this same pilot let two hot chicks in the cockpit for the entire flight.

=============================================================================================

Malaysia Airlines says it is investigating an Australia television report that the co-pilot on its missing flight had invited two women to stay in the cockpit for a flight two years ago.

Jonti Roos described the encounter on the program "A Current Affair." It aired multiple still photographs from Roos that showed the women inside the cockpit and the pilots apparently working the plane's controls.

The airline said it wouldn't comment about the report until its investigation into it is complete.

Roos said Fariq Abdul Hamid and the second pilot talked to her and her friend in the cockpit during the entire flight in December 2011 from Phuket, Thailand, to Kuala Lumpur.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/malaysia/10687223/Malaysia-Airlines-MH370-plane-crash-live.html

Jonti Roos (in pink) and missing MH370 pilot Fariq Abdul Hamid. (A Current Affair)

Jonti Roos, who lives in Melbourne, came forward with photos of her posing with a man she claims is 27-year-old Fariq Abdul Hamid - the first officer on missing flight MH370.

She told A Current Affair she and a friend were ready to board a flight from Phuket to Kuala Lumpur in 2011 when the two pilots asked if they would spend the duration of the international flight in the cockpit.

Ms Roos says they were seated in the cockpit during takeoff and landing and that the pilots even asked the girls to stay a few nights in Kuala Lumpur with them.

"Throughout the entire flight they were talking to us and they were actually smoking throughout the flight, which I don't think they're allowed to do," Ms Roos said.

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/2014/03/11/19/08/woman-remembers-cockpit-fun-with-missing-pilot"

 

Perhaps he simply let someone in the cockpit that shouldn't have been there in the first place (again).

[maggief]

http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/hq/en/mh-experience/business-class.html

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http://travellingidea.wordpress.com/tag/malaysia-airline/

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Boeing 777-200

http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/my/en/mh-experience/our-fleet/boeing-777-200.html

[Obadiah]

Thank you.

[CivilWarBrewing]

Commercial pilot John Lucich on Fox is saying a hijacking of the aircraft for landing in a remote area, then using the passengers in some sort of ransom demand or other terrorist plot is a strong possibility here. Wow.

[MarMema]

well this is interesting

[hosepipe]

It’s a possibility someone hijacked the plane ... but how did they keep over 200 persons from using their phones?... surely someone could have notified a family member.

---

ONLY sattelite phones would work...
all others would not...

[Gen.Blather]

“That is the most treasonous thing any president has ever said!! He practically invited a foreign power to attack us!”

It certainly is heartless. And if GWB had said it the press would be saying, “It is now 1,339 days since President Bush invited a foreign attack on US soil that could kill CHILDREN and kittens and possibly a puppy named “Rover.”” I’m thinking charitably that what he meant was the US could take time to respond “appropriately” possibly with a sharply worded letter. But it was an incredibly idiotic thing to say. Bush would have said, and in fact did, “Anybody who attacks the US is going to die.” (He may have worded it more diplomatically, I can’t recall.)

[Personal Responsibility]

It’s not inexplicable. That means there is no explanation.

It was hijacked, the hijackers made it turn toward some other destination and at some point, blew it up.

Occam’s razor. The simplest explanation is usually the right one. Fake passports, unused tickets, Iranians...The math here is not difficult unless one is intentionally blinding themselves from it.

[Tijeras_Slim]

I remember the Dawson’s Field Hijackings in 1970.

[rdl6989]

This was terrorism, and the terrorists might have the plane, and possibly more than 200 hostages.

[bigdaddy45]

There are lots of place from which to buy a plane. You don’t have to buy them straight from the manufacturer. Sheesh.

[bigdaddy45]

What if it went straight in? Not sure there would be much left.