FORBES SAYS

One of the questions Ive been asked repeatedly since word emerged that a Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777 had disappeared, is how can a modern airliner flying at 35,000 feet suddenly lose all contact? First, there needs to be an understanding of the type of contact that an airliner in flight typically has. Airline crews communicate with air traffic control both by verbal instructions over radios and through automatic transmissions from various aircraft systems, such as a transponder which relays information about the flight (e.g. altitude) to ground radar stations. The transponder information is then displayed on an air traffic controllers screen as an alpha-numeric readout. Crews also have the ability to communicate with their airline through discrete radio channels. There is usually at least one other back up communication system that allows communication between the ground stations and the flight crew. Other aircraft systems commonly used by many airlines also communicate with commercial services that monitor other parts of the aircraft, such as engines, and report that data back to the airline. This data is then used to monitor and improve aircraft system performance. For all communication to suddenly cease without a distress signal usually indicates a catastrophic failure of the aircraft, not allowing time for the crew to communicate either by radio or through the aircraft transponder. Modern airliners have multiple radios for voice communication and the transponder can be used to send signals that indicate different problems with the aircraft (for example a discrete code for hijacking). A complete electrical failure is extremely unlikely because of redundancies in the system, especially the ram air turbine which uses the power of the wind generated by the aircrafts motion in flight to generate electricity which would power critical navigation and communication systems, as well as flight controls. But even if the aircraft had a complete electrical failure, the aircraft could have continued to fly. If the aircraft was out of radar range when a failure occurred but able to fly it would eventually fly to an area with radar coverage and be picked up by air traffic control radar. It is too early to speculate on what could have caused a catastrophic failure to the aircraft, if that is in fact what occurred.

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SO WHERE IS MH 370? FRANKLY, NO ONE REALLY HAS THE ANSWER.

With so much technological advancement and scientific know-how, who would ever believe that an airplane could just vanish without a trace? That an umbrella of satellites that can track even the movement of a car would fail to detect a Boeing 777, that radars, sensors and satellite imagery, nothing would work. If there was an explosion in the sky, it will be caught, it will be known and the debris will be found. If it crashed into the ocean, there will be debris around. But nothing like this has been seen or found. Did some UFO take the plane to some other planet? Is it the handiwork of some terror group that has hijacked the plane with a target in it and taken it to an undisclosed location? Has the plane been shot down by a missile and there is diplomatic silence over it? Is news being muffled from becoming unpleasant for the public? If none of these look true, then there has to be some proper scientific explanation to the sudden disappearance of the jet. Airplanes are sophisticated machines. A Boeing 777 is a huge and a solid aircraft. It simply cannot vanish. There has to be an explanation. The world is waiting in anticipation to hear of some news. The incident has baffled even aviation experts the world over, for even they have no sure answer. Relatives of the passengers on board are in a state of anxious suspense. So even as various countries along with India are trying their level best to spot or get some clue about the missing Malaysian Airlines plane, we, at Headlines, try to put together the various possibilities of what could have happened with the machine that had a good track record and the one that wouldn't just perish unless something very unusual happened that gave absolutely no chance for the experienced pilots to react. Let's analyse a few possibilities and answer a few questions. One, there was no bad weather condition and the pilots too were experienced. This is what we have learnt through various news reports. So now let's just think of technical reasons.

WHAT IF THERE WAS AN ENGINE FAILURE? Experts say first and foremost, if there was a technical problem or the engines failed, the pilots would have called for help. Some distress signal would have been sent. Additionally, Boeing 777 has automatic systems that
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give out data on engine performance.

WHY CAN'T THE AGENCIES FIND THE BLACK BOXES?

Experts say black boxes could be discovered only if the plane was in water. "Pingers", which emit a tone, would have been activated. Pingers are however audible only in a limited area. So either the plane isn't in water at all or if it is, then it isn't being looked at the right place by the authorities. The plane could have deviated from its flight path as well. An aircraft cruising at 35,000 feet can glide up to 80 to 90 miles even after losing power if the pilots have control. At the first place, the maintenance base would have known of the same or for that matter any other technical failure. The systems send the signals. So the base would have known the location of the aircraft at the time of distress

WHY DIDN'T THE RADAR COVER THE AIRPLANE?

Here's the catch. Experts say that radar coverage isn't great over water. In such a scenario, pilots generally radio in their position at regular intervals to the ATC to avoid collision with other aircrafts. But the question that remains unanswered is why didn't the pilots call for help if there was a major technical fault? Clearly something so sudden and so huge happened that the pilots couldn't even call for help.

DID THE PILOT COMMIT SUICIDE?

Reports say the plane had 7.5 hours of fuel left at the time of its disappearance. Even if the plane was descending, the pilot would make an emergency call. But there was none. Location couldn't be ascertained as probably the transponder was also turned off. Experts say that the entire transponder can be turned off. It is switched on for take off and while on cruise. It looks like a blip .The radar blip is however visible to the ATC.

DID THE PLANE BECOME UNCONTROLLABLE?

Experts say if there was rapid depressurisation, then the pilots would have donned their oxygen masks, descended and made a call. If there was an explosion that didn't blow the entire plane, then too the pilots would have communicated that they are going down.

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WAS IT A COCKPIT BREAK-IN? Many say it is a possibility but experts opine turning off the transponder wouldn't be enough. The intruder would have to put out all circuit breakers. Till the aircraft descended, it would be visible to the ATC. Reports say the four terrorists that hijacked American Airlines on September 11, 2001, turned off their transponders once they were in the plane. And so the ATC couldn't get in touch with them. But the military could see them in primary radar.
Military and the ATC had no direct communication then. The ATC uses secondary radar that tracks the transponders for signals. Put in simple terms, if there are no signals, then either the plane has crashed or the switch has been made.

DID THE PLANE CHANGE ITS TRACK? Reports say the military now believes that the plane changed its course. Even to the extent that they are searching the Indian Ocean. If the primary radar had indeed known of this, then why the delay of so many hours? Airbourne Communications and Addressing Systems (ACARS) sends links of the health of the aircraft. This system is within the aircraft. But not much has been said on this front. Are facts being hidden? WAS IT LIKE 9/11?
Lastly, did the intruder try another 9/11 like episode but the pilot descended straight down, saving thousands of lives on ground. All the above are mere speculations and nothing is concrete. But the finding of MH 370 is going to be one big learning experience. So whether the aircraft is found today or some days later, there will be lots to debate and a whole new avenue will be opened for research and coordination.
INDIA TIMES

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KUALA LUMPUR, MALAYSIA (CNN)

Nine days in, things have gotten a whole lot more difficult in the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. "This is a significant recalibration of the search," Malaysia's acting Transportation Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said Sunday. "The number of countries involved in the search and rescue operation has increased from 14 to 25, which brings new challenges of coordination and diplomacy to the search effort." The new developments come as U.S. intelligence officials are leaning toward the theory that "those in the cockpit" -- the captain and co-pilot of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 -- were responsible for the mysterious disappearance of the commercial jetliner, a U.S. official with direct knowledge of the latest thinking told CNN. The official emphasized no final conclusions have been drawn and all the internal intelligence discussions are based on preliminary assessments of what is known to date. Other scenarios could still emerge. The notion of a hijacking has not been ruled out, the official said Saturday. The Boeing 777-200 ER disappeared on March 8, en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. The airline's CEO Ahmad Jauhari Yahya said Sunday the missing passenger jet took off with its normal amount of fuel needed for the route, and did not have extra fuel on board that could have extended its range. A study of the flight's cargo manifest showed there were no dangerous materials on board that concerned investigators, he told reporters. Investigators are still looking into the backgrounds of the passengers to see if any of them were trained pilots. "There are still a few countries who have yet to respond to our request for a background check," said Khalid Abu Bakar, inspector general of the Royal Malaysian Police Force. "But there are a few ... foreign intelligence agencies who have cleared all the(ir) passengers." Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak told reporters on Saturday that the plane veered off course due to apparent deliberate action taken by somebody on board.

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'SOMEONE ACTING DELIBERATELY' The first clue that the captain or co-pilot may have been involved stems from when the plane made a sharp, deliberate turn just after it last communicated with Kuala Lumpur air traffic controllers, and before it would have to communicate with Vietnamese controllers, according to the U.S. official with knowledge of the latest intelligence thinking.
"This is the perfect place to start to disappear," the official said. Adding to the intrigue, ABC News reported that the dramatic left turn was preprogramed into the plane's navigation computer. It's a task that would have required extensive piloting experience. Two senior law enforcement officials also told ABC that new information revealed the plane performed "tactical evasion maneuvers" after it disappeared from radar. CNN was unable to confirm these reports. Military radar showed the jetliner flew in a westerly direction back over the Malaysian peninsula, Najib said. It is then believed to have either turned northwest toward the Bay of Bengal or southwest elsewhere in the Indian Ocean, he said. "Evidence is consistent with someone acting deliberately from inside the plane," the Prime Minister said, officially confirming the plane's disappearance was not caused by an accident. "Despite media reports that the plane was hijacked, we are investigating all major possibilities on what caused MH370 to deviate."

KAZAKHSTAN TO INDIAN OCEAN As the focus of the investigation has shifted, so, too, has the focus of the search.
Information from international and Malaysian officials indicates that the jet may have flown for more than seven hours after the last contact with the pilots. Flight 370 took off from Kuala Lumpur at 12:41 a.m. on March 8. The last satellite communication from the plane occurred at 8:11 a.m., Najib said, well past the scheduled arrival time in Beijing. It is possible this contact could have been made from the ground, as long as the airplane still had electrical power, Malaysia's civil aviation chief Azharuddin Abdul Rahman said Sunday. That last communication, Najib said, was in one of two possible traffic corridors shown on a map released to the press. A northern arc stretches
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from the border of Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan to northern Thailand, and a southern arc spans from Indonesia to the southern Indian Ocean. "Due to the type of satellite data, we are unable to confirm the precise location of the plane when it last made contact with the satellite," Najib said. Because the northern parts of the traffic corridor include some tightly guarded airspace over India, Pakistan, and even some U.S. installations in Afghanistan, U.S. authorities believe it more likely the aircraft crashed into waters outside of the reach of radar south of India, a U.S. official told CNN. If it had flown farther north, it's likely it would have been detected by radar.

THE PILOTS On Saturday, Malaysian police searched the home of pilot Zaharie Ahmad Shah, 53. Shah lives in an upscale gated community in Shah Alam, outside Malaysia's capital, Kuala Lumpur.
The Ministry of Transport said Sunday that police were examining a flight simulator found at the pilot's house a day earlier. Two vans were loaded with small bags, similar to shopping bags, at the home of the co-pilot, 27-year-old Fariq Ab Hamid, according to a CNN crew who observed activities at the residence. It was unclear whether the bags were taken from the home, and police made no comment about their activities there. Najib made clear in a press conference that in light of the latest developments, authorities have refocused their investigation to the crew, ground staff and passengers on board. Hussein, the transportation minister, told reporters the pilots didn't request to work together. Peter Chong, a friend of Shah's, said he had been in the pilot's house and tried the simulator. "It's a reflection of his love for people -- because he wants to share the joy of flying with his friends," Chong said. He was bothered by speculation about the captain's credibility and questions about possible ties to terrorism. "I think it is a little bit insensitive and unfair to the family," he said, adding he thought there was no evidence to suggest any ulterior motives on Shah's part.
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Undoubtedly, authorities will scour through the flight manifest and look further to see whether any of the passengers on board had flight training or connections to terror groups. According to The New York Times, one of the passengers was an aviation engineer on his way to Beijing to work for a private-jet company. A senior U.S. law enforcement official told CNN that investigators are carefully reviewing the information so far collected on the pilots to determine whether there is something to indicate a plan or a motive. That would seem supported by preliminary U.S. intelligence reports, which the U.S. official said show the jetliner was in some form of controlled flight at a relatively stable altitude and path when it changed

THE SEARCH Malaysia's Ministry of Transport said Sunday that both the northern and southern corridors are being treated with equal importance. Malaysian officials are working with 25 countries, many of them along the corridors. They include Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, China, Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Australia, France, the United Kingdom and the United States.
Afghanistan's Ministry of Transport said it has joined the search, but said there is no evidence the plane flew over Afghan soil. Separately, India has "temporarily halted" its search for the missing plane while Malaysian authorities reassess the situation, according to a top military official. "We are conserving our assets for now," Rear Adm. Sudhir Pillai, the chief of staff of India's joint Andaman and Nicobar command, said Sunday. "We are on a standby." He said the Malaysians are reviewing India's deployment. Meanwhile, according to Najib, new satellite information leads authorities to be fairly certain that someone disabled the Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System, or ACARS, just before the aircraft reached the east coast of peninsular Malaysia. ACARS is the system that routinely transmits information like turbulence and fuel load back to the airline. "Shortly afterward, near the border between Malaysian and Vietnamese air traffic control," Najib said, "the aircraft's transponder was switched off."

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A transponder is a system controlled from the cockpit that transmits data about the plane via radio signals to air traffic controllers. It combines with ground radar to provide air traffic controllers with details about the plane, including its identification, speed, position and altitude. The last voice communication from the cockpit more than a week ago was these words: "All right, good night." They were uttered at the Vietnam air traffic control border at about the same time the transponder was shut off, Najib said. That suggests the incident on the plane began sooner than initially thought. But some have questioned the Prime Minister's account, given the dearth of information available.

MALAYSIA INVESTIGATION CRITICIZED In the days since the flight disappeared, the Malaysian government has been under intense scrutiny for its handling of the investigation. The government has been criticized by some U.S. officials for not sharing information or accepting more offers of help.
Shortly after Najib delivered his remarks, China demanded Malaysia provide more information on the investigation. Of the 239 people aboard the plane, 154 were Chinese. "Today is the 8th day of the missing MH370, and the plane is still yet to be found," said a statement from the Foreign Ministry. "Time is life." The criticism was more pointed in an editorial published by China's staterun news agency Xinhua. "And due to the absence -- or at least lack -- of timely authoritative information, massive efforts have been squandered, and numerous rumors have been spawned, repeatedly racking the nerves of the awaiting families," the editorial said. Malaysia Airlines defended its actions, saying there has never been a case where information gleaned from satellite signals alone could potentially be used to find the location of a missing airliner. "Given the nature of the situation and its extreme sensitivity, it was critical that the raw satellite signals were verified and analyzed by the relevant authorities so that their significance could be properly understood," the airline said in a statement. "This naturally took some time, during which we were unable to publicly confirm their existence."
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FAMILIES AT BOILING POINT For the families and loved ones of those aboard Flight 370, tensions boiled over Sunday in Beijing at the daily briefing by Malaysia Airlines. Nine days after the plane went missing, patience is running thin with officials. Before a packed room, one man told them that the families have already lost faith. "A liar can lie once, twice or three times, but what's the point (to) keep lying?" he said. "What we ask for is the truth. Don't hide things from us." A majority of the people in the room stood up when the man asked how many had lost trust in the airline and the Malaysian government. Another man rushed the front of the room and tried to throw a punch, but was stopped. The airline has been picking up the tab for families of the 154 Chinese passengers to stay in Beijing during the ordeal. China is sending technical experts to join the investigation, and two Chinese search vessels headed for the Strait of Malacca, according to Xinhua. People are across the world have shown their support for those involved. During his weekly Sunday message following prayers at the Vatican, Pope Francis asked the crowd to pray for the crew members and passengers of the missing Malaysia Airlines plane and their families. "We are close to them in this difficult moment," Pope Francis said.

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SCRUTINIZING by Andrew Eugene is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercialNoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Based on a work at http://www.scribd.com/AndrewEugene

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