All of these posts concerning different eras of history made me want to bring up an interesting topic that has been extremely controversial and talked about over the past couple of months. As of March 8th, 2014, a Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 that held 239 people on board (Flight 370- heading from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to Beijing), has been missing and is believed to be at the bottom of the south Indian Ocean. Like the JFK assassination, there are conspiracies made about what happened onboard that caused this dramatic incident. Now I am not going to go into detail about every conspiracy, I thought I would just make a historical connection there. This has become quite a mystery, as planes virtually never vanish off radar and simply just disappear without a digital fingerprint.
An update from nytimes.com as of today, May 22:
"SYDNEY, Australia — The deep-sea underwater search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 resumed overnight on Thursday with a remote-controlled submersible scouring the seabed in an area where searchers still believe they detected acoustic signals from the jet’s flight data recorders."
I have a couple of theories however, that point toward the idea that the plane has been landed on perhaps a remote island or an area where it could not have been picked up by radar. One main point that suggests the aircraft did not encounter a water landing is that there is a lack of a large debris field. A Boeing 777 is a massive aircraft, and considering the momentum of hitting the water at an expected speed would have left the plane in disaster, scattering a very large debris field that would have been picked up within days of disappearance. Another theory complimenting the previous, and one that really makes the situation more confusing, is that a Boeing 777 contains several emergency water beacons, that are activated by water. The signals form these beacons would have been detected rather quickly. The fact that these are activated by water suggests that the aircraft could be on land somewhere, and another theory comes into place. The plane could have been hijacked similar to that of the 9/11 attack, and is on an island awaiting a time to strike. Obviously these are just ideas stemming from outside information I received. This is definitely something to think about as the search continues.
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/23/world/asia/search-for-missing-malaysia-airlines-plane-resumes.html?_r=0
The topic of the missing Boeing 777 has caught my eye as of late, and these conspiracy theories that you bring up only further sparked my interest. I did some further research and a "startling simple" explanation popped up about an electrical fire. The article can be found here: http://www.wired.com/2014/03/mh370-electrical-fire/
ReplyDeleteWhen the issue of the missing 777 came up in the media, I was initially shocked by how quickly everyone jumped to negative conclusions as well, and I am glad that you shared this link to a more reasonable and fact based answer.
DeleteIn the article, Chris points out that there isn't any proof one way or another, and Maya sums it up nicely with her comment that "we are literally grasping at air". The reason I like Chris' explanation of things is that it uses the few facts we do know to come up with a logical answer. Conspiracy theories generally don't do this, but rather take evidence and start asking "what if?" rather than "what happened?"
Chris' explanation of an electrical fire, a wheel fire or a combination of both utilize the facts and his previous knowledge as a pilot to piece together a likely story for what has happened. He manages to include all the known facts in his reasoning and clearly explains why it is most likely the fire scenario and not an incident of foul play. He points out that if the plane had been hijacked it probably would not have made such an abrupt turn, and that the ACARS is difficult to disable manually making the likelihood of a fire (know from previous incidents to dismantle the ACARS) the most believable situation.
I am glad I read this article because it changed my view on the issue of the 777 and reminded me to not always look for the worst in people.
The missing Boeing 777 case has a lot of room for conspiracy theorists given the fact that the plane has yet to be found. Hopefully when the plane is found, a lot will be cleared up. However, given the fact that so much time has passed, who knows what will be found, if ever. In the JFK assassination, at least there was a body that people could speculate about -- in this case, however, we are literally just grasping at thin air.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with your comments, Maya! I would also like to point out, however, that there have been significant technological improvements since the JFK assassination and the fact that there was communication, however minimal, between the plane and radio towers could suggest that there is still hope of finding the lost plane. Perhaps once more evidence is found, the theories of conspiracy will begin to lose plausibility.
DeleteIt was really interesting to me to read about the different theories behind the plane's disappearance, but the one thing that really stuck out to me was the fact that these theories exist. In a world full of amazing technology, it just seems hard to grasp that an entire plane went missing. It's interesting to see how far recent innovations have gone, and then to realize that despite the fact that technology may seem to give us access to every bit of information out there, there is still so much we don't know.
ReplyDeleteTo me this whole situation baffles me to say the least. It really comes to question of what really could have happened? I believe that the most logical reasoning behind its disappearance is that it is somewhere in the ocean somewhere. The sheer ability for nobody to know any substantial information makes me feel that it was just a very sad tragedy. We have only explored 3% of the worlds oceans so it just seems very likely that we could not cover enough ground to see exactly where it had landed. I just seems hard to believe that a government would want this flight, for moral and from an interest standpoint. I'm sorry conspiracy theorists, I can't believe this is one of them
ReplyDeleteSo, because I hang out at the airport all the time talking with pilots, this topic often came up. Even pilots disagree to the extremes about this situation and what could have happened to the missing Boeing 777. However, I found this article that I think you will appreciate. As the title suggests, it presents a simple, logical theory from the mind of an airline pilot. http://www.wired.com/2014/03/mh370-electrical-fire/
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting to see that there are many speculative but no solution has arrived to locate the missing plane. What strikes me as odd is that the Malaysian airline is a government owned airline. Wouldn't you think that the Malaysian government would have done something to save its own reputation sooner?
ReplyDeleteI find it funny that the media had put up a lot of speculation about the fate of flight MH370, but there is very little evidence of what actually happened to the plane. This, of course, gives way to a wide range of conspiracy theories. One of the most popular theories is that the Malaysian military accidentally shot down the plane and is covering it up. This reminds me of the conspiracy theories about TWA Flight 800, which some believe to have been shot down by the U.S.
ReplyDeleteI find it really interesting to read through all of the different theories for the disappearance of the 777. Many of them seem to hold water, such as the argument that the Boeing has multiple water beacons set to activate if its hits water. However, the more extreme one, that it has been hijacked by terrorists, seems ridiculous. Such an act generates publicity, as is seen by the very existence of this post, which is not good for terrorists who aspire to launch a surprise attack.
ReplyDelete