
Radar data suggests missing Malaysia plane flown deliberately toward Andamans  - ghosh
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/14/us-malaysia-airlines-radar-exclusive-idUSBREA2D0DG20140314?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews&utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter&dlvrit=992637
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mschuster91
The problem still remains: where the fuck did that machine vanish?

I mean, you can't exactly land a big fat Boeing on a strip of bush without any
ground tech support... you need a full-featured airport unless you want to
risk the machine going up in a huge pile of burning mess upon the landing.
Obviously no airport in the region (or planespotters) have noticed the machine
landing...

Then, no "oh yeah, we blew up" confessions from terrorists or ransom demands
either.

Something smells like fish. Weeks-old rotten fish.

edit: Okay, you _can_ land a Boeing on an improvised landing strip. But
preparing a 2km long, 45m wide strip in the middle of nowhere needs lots of
manpower to prepare and certainly attracts attention. Unless a nation state
sponsored this, no way that this plane was hijacked for passengers/cargo.

~~~
masklinn
> I mean, you can't exactly land a big fat Boeing on a strip of bush without
> any ground tech support...

A 777 needs between 800m (dry runway and low weight at sea level) and 2000m
(altitude, loaded, wet runway) excluding security buffer. You do need a flat
and clean-ish surface (definitely not bush strips), but you don't need a
"full-featured airport" just to land a plane, especially if you don't expect
to get it in the air again.

~~~
mschuster91
We can assume the plane was half-loaded (after hours of flight, the fuel
should be mostly used up, so the passengers+cargo remain as freight).

The point is (as I wrote one post further down): you'll need a ~1.5km-2km long
runway to get the plane down in one piece or with everyone alive (depends on
what you actually want with that plane). And that is what smells here.
Something like this (or even setting up a 2km landing strip _broad enough_ to
allow a Boeing to land!) would definitely not go unnoticed.

~~~
masklinn
> you'll need a ~1.5km-2km long runway to get the plane down in one piece or
> with everyone alive

You'll need a ~1500m long piece of hard and flat-ish ground, a good road will
do (again especially if you don't need the plane to get up in the air again,
at least on short order). With risks, granted, but it'll do.

> Something like this (or even setting up a 2km landing strip broad enough to
> allow a Boeing to land!)

Width would probably be a bigger issue than length actually.

~~~
mschuster91
>You'll need a ~1500m long piece of hard and flat-ish ground, a good road will
do

We're not exactly talking about developed countries here, a 45m wide strip is
a German Autobahn - and thus bound to be having at least one driver a hour, so
I don't see a viable way of putting down a plane in these relatively poor
countries fully unnoticed.

~~~
masklinn
The road itself needs not be as wide as the plane's wingspan though, only
wider than the track (11m[0]).

Granted finding a good-quality 15~20m wide road with 20~30m of nothing
whatsoever on either side remains a difficulty, but still a much lower one
than having a fully equipped airport on hands (basically, you're looking for a
4 lane road)

[0]
[http://www.aerospaceweb.org/aircraft/jetliner/b777/b777_sche...](http://www.aerospaceweb.org/aircraft/jetliner/b777/b777_schem_01.gif)

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bambax
Stealing a plane with 237 people on board is a great story but no version that
I have read address the question of how you prevent every one of those 237
people from texting about it?

Even if you're willing to kill them all it takes some time that they could use
to try and make some sort of signal.

This plane fell into the sea and we'll find it eventually. The sea is vast.

~~~
lotsofmangos
Make them fall asleep by reducing cabin pressure while you fly with an oxygen
mask.

edit - yes, I did nick this from "The Langoliers"

~~~
epochwolf
Which would cause the oxygen masks to deploy.

~~~
lotsofmangos
If you first trigger a fire alarm, it wouldn't.

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DanielBMarkham
There are a series of topics that TV shows love to go over, unsolved
mysteries. What happened to Amelia Earhart? How about that Navy flight that
took off and disappeared?

I think we're now seeing, in realtime, another one of these stories begin.
Very interesting.

I have a simple question that I haven't seen addressed anywhere: assuming that
somebody on the plane left their cell phone on and forgot to turn it off, or
that somebody tried to use their phone in-flight, wouldn't there be a record
on the ground cell towers of that particular phone's SID "pinging" the tower
as the plane flew overhead? Might be something to look into.

~~~
davedx
I thought it was supposed to have flown over the sea?

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ccozan
The latest development is that the Chinese have measured a small earth quake
in the sea, 1.5h after the plane has vanished. Which kind of explains why we
don't find it or we shouldn't seek where it could land: it's on sea floor.

EDIT: source
[http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2014planemissing/2014-03/...](http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2014planemissing/2014-03/14/content_17346768.htm)

~~~
josephlord
Surely a plane is too low density to cause even a "small earth quake" when it
sinks to the bottom of the sea (probably in many pieces). Could a shockwave
from the impact on the surface of the sea be measured as a small earthquake?

~~~
rjsw
It doesn't have to impact the sea floor, the Kursk explosion was detected by
seismographs.

~~~
masklinn
The initial explosion was barely detectable from nearby Finnmark[0] (and
undetected from Svalbard or Hedmark) yet was 500kg of concentrated H2O2 and
1000kg of kerosene blowing up.

[0]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:NOSAR_Kursk_sesmic_reading...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:NOSAR_Kursk_sesmic_readings.png)

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userbinator
All these "we think it went that way!" and then a short while later "no it
didn't, it might've went _that_ way!" articles in the news are almost
facepalm-worthy. I'm not one to believe in most conspiracy theories, but it
really makes me wonder if they already know what happened to the plane but
just want to stretch this process out for some reason...

~~~
gus_massa
Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by linkbaits.

People will read whatever "new" about the plane is there. They will read the
new, the correction, and the new correct version the correction, and the ...
If your newspaper don't publish today's version, the people will go to another
paper to read it.

To solve the problem, you must find a business model where the newspapers are
rewarded for publishing correct information, and not the most recent gossip.

~~~
knowaveragejoe
And to solve _that_ problem, you must find an alternate societal mindset.

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ajarmst
Radar can detect mental states like "deliberately" now? That's mighty good
radar. Further, any story with the phrase "sources familiar with" should be
immediately discounted, and its author told to feel shame.

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zokier
This story desperately needs some sort of map or chart.

~~~
TillE
Via The Guardian's live updates:

[https://twitter.com/sgify/status/444421777280614400/photo/1](https://twitter.com/sgify/status/444421777280614400/photo/1)

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tomelders
Port Blair Airport is on that island.

~~~
sentenza
But then it is also on the video footage collected by various spy satellites.
If anything remotely looking like a plane this size had landed there in the
correct timeframe, there'd be police/military personel kicking in doors down
there right now.

Since we haven't heared of any such operation (which would be extremely
difficult to keep secret, given the circumstances), the reasonable assumption
remains that the plane fell into the sea.

~~~
lotsofmangos
Spy satellites only see what they are pointed at and there are not enough of
them to constantly watch all airports.

~~~
sentenza
Admittedly, I don't know enough about the number of spy satellites out there.
My assumption was that at this point, everything is being watched, because if
they could they would and who is to say they can't.

In thinking so, I might have underestimated the size of the planet a bit.

~~~
lotsofmangos
heh :)

it is worth reflecting that it is far easier to convince people that you are
in control than it is to actually be in control, and for most purposes they
are almost the same thing

also, if you have to fire missiles at stuff, you probably aren't in control,
given that if you are in control you do not need to and missiles are expensive

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junto
So much conjecture and media picking at slivers of 2nd hand evidence.

Occam's Razor. The plane fell in the sea. It is a very very big space to
search.

~~~
twistedpair
If you want the what ifs in detail, see the _Airliners.net_ forum. 4000+ posts
so far from pilots and other aviation professionals that are far more
knowledgeable than HN readers. Every technical aspect of this disaster that
you could want to know.

[http://www.airliners.net/aviation-
forums/general_aviation/re...](http://www.airliners.net/aviation-
forums/general_aviation/read.main/6022602/)

