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RoyGBiv wrote:I'm sticking with a breach of the fuselage leading to sequential loss of systems and the death of passengers and crew. The direction change happened at the time of the initial event, probably the pilot trying to return to land, and the aircraft continued to fly on the new heading until it ran out of fuel. Engines continued to report ACARS data until the end, somewhere in the Indian ocean.

Occam's razor.

I keep rereading this report:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/ ... DG20140314" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

And asking myself the question....
Does Reuters have proof (radar data and or ACARS data that included location) that the path of what they are claiming is MH370 was CHANGING to follow established flight corridors? And if yes, that this behavior is not possible to program into the autopilot during an emergency?

The article alludes to the aircraft changing directions multiple times to follow established way-points, buy the article does not specifically state that the aircraft made multiple course changes to follow these way-points (it gives information that would need to be plotted to confirm any direction changes, but fails to provide the plot) nor does it state whether it's possible to program such a flight path into the autopilot.

ETA: Map of Waypoints still Inconclusive, IMO. Did the aircraft TURN during it's westward journey? and.. Could this path have been programmed into the autopilot before the pilots demise?

mojo84 wrote:This is wild speculation but is a scary scenario to contemplate. I've heard a couple theories that speculate the plane was hijacked and taken so it can be used later in a terrorist attack. I'm wondering if it could be used as a delivery system for some type of large nuclear or other weapon of mass destruction. I've heard one of the main problems some of the countries have delivering such a weapon is they don't have the capability of delivering it long range. Speculation yes but something to think about.

Revealing my ignorance here, but I assume that in order to reach a developed area that the aircraft would have to be reequipped with legitimate credentials along with defeating any existing equipment that would indentfy her as the missing aircraft (transmitters from the engines). How difficult would it be to accomplish this? Can the transponder be reprogrammed? Would the plane need to take the identity of a planned flight? Too many flights for ATC to recognize a random identifier? Assuming the plane landed, what would be required to prep it for flight again? This isn't a Cessna.
Seems like a major undertaking that would require a lot of organization and placement of people in key roles to help pull off the "identity theft" in order to put the aircraft in a position to hit a target.

Yeah, lots of good questions jmra. Not sure how it would work. I'm not even sure how long a range the plane has.

Friend of mine has a supposedly informed theory that it was diverted to Pakistan to be retrofitted to crash into Mumbai's financial district.

Looks to me like one or more involved parties is participating in a disinformation campaign.

jmra wrote: Revealing my ignorance here, but I assume that in order to reach a developed area that the aircraft would have to be reequipped with legitimate credentials along with defeating any existing equipment that would indentfy her as the missing aircraft (transmitters from the engines). How difficult would it be to accomplish this? Can the transponder be reprogrammed? Would the plane need to take the identity of a planned flight? Too many flights for ATC to recognize a random identifier? Assuming the plane landed, what would be required to prep it for flight again? This isn't a Cessna.
Seems like a major undertaking that would require a lot of organization and placement of people in key roles to help pull off the "identity theft" in order to put the aircraft in a position to hit a target.

I was hoping you'd be able to answer... Discussion:
Apparently the 777 can start from on-board APU, so you'd simply need to refuel it, fire up the APU and it can start without ground assist.
In regard to "legitimate credentials" - I assume that most other places in the world are very much like the USA, you're not going to shoot down what you can't identify unless you're pre-notified of an inbound threat or you're a country on constant alert like N. Korea. Now that everyone knows that the engines broadcast data, point an engineer at the right box and that problem is solved.

I agree that it would be quite an undertaking to hijack it, land it somewhere without radar track, and re-launch it without having someone in international intelligence knowing about it.
Apparently the 777 needs around 9000' of runway to take off.. My guess is that there are quite a few roads in that part of the world that would work in a pinch...

Someone knows where that thing is, not just the people that might have taken it.

mojo84 wrote:This is wild speculation but is a scary scenario to contemplate. I've heard a couple theories that speculate the plane was hijacked and taken so it can be used later in a terrorist attack. I'm wondering if it could be used as a delivery system for some type of large nuclear or other weapon of mass destruction. I've heard one of the main problems some of the countries have delivering such a weapon is they don't have the capability of delivering it long range. Speculation yes but something to think about.

Maybe but Los Angeles, New York City and Washington D.C. are all accessible by ship.

It has seen the ground or the oceans somewhere, you can bet on that.

I'm just dumbfounded that you can lose a plane in this day and age.

These poor family members are stuck between fear and hope.

Why didn't other pilots see this plane in the air? Someone's radar had to have seen it. If not, I guess China is not watching as much as we think they are...

CHLLady wrote:I'm just dumbfounded that you can lose a plane in this day and age.

These poor family members are stuck between fear and hope.

Why didn't other pilots see this plane in the air? Someone's radar had to have seen it. If not, I guess China is not watching as much as we think they are...

I believe most commercial planes only have weather radar. There's TCAS, but that can be turned off.

OK, I'll fess up. The plane is sitting in my garage and my house is REALLY crowded right now.

Recent stories with more information and one conclusion of "piracy".

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2014/0314/ ... ner-Piracy" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/worl ... 051288.cms" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

So it could be in Pawpaw's garage. Argh!

Or headed for some islands that have a large enough runway.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/14/world/asi ... es9aVODtop" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

It is officially a hijacking
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/malaysia-ai ... ing-plane/
"A Malaysian government official says investigators have concluded that one of the pilots or someone else with flying experience hijacked the missing Malaysia Airlines jet."

I told you, it was stolen!
Now, the 1-billion dollars questions:
Why in the world the US classified satellite network could not track it!
Where is NORAD?

Beiruty wrote:I told you, it was stolen!
Now, the 1-billion dollars questions:
Why in the world the US classified satellite network could not track it!
Where is NORAD?

that's what I've been wondering? I can be on the highway and the gps will know which lane I'm in....why did no one know that this PLANE was going the wrong direction???