Monday 17 March 2014

Where Do You Hide A Boeing 777?

The Malaysian Airlines jet mystery would be an interesting intellectual problem, were it not for the fact that it had 239 people on board. It is an agony not knowing, not knowing that someone is dead and grieving or whether to have hope that they are still alive, even though it can be dashed in  a moment.

But all we can do currently is speculate in an effort to find it and answer the questions. So what do we appear to know? That the aircraft was completely 'normal' in its crew, fuelling and all other issues relating to its flight to Beijing. That it turned soon after crossing over the sea, back towards Malaysia, crossed the peninsular and turned off the devices most likely to give away its location.

Reports now suggest that it flew low, at 5000 feet. All of this suggests two things, that the aircraft was deliberately taken in this direction and that it was trying to hide its intentions. This further suggests a third, that dying was not part of the equation. If crashing the plane into the sea, or just blowing it up were the objectives then these actions would only make knowing about it and finding the wreckage more difficult and why would that ever matter?

But if you wanted to land somewhere, unobserved then this would be what you would need to do. The question then, how on earth can you land something as big, noisy and obvious as a Malaysian airliner without someone noticing. Someone at least, inclined to mention it?

Naturally, countries run by idiots, like North Korea fit the bill, but what would be the agenda, for North Korea let alone the pilot? The easiest place to hide something of course, is in plain sight. A Malaysian aircraft landing in Malaysia is hardly news, but you would hope that the airfield receiving it would have had some filed flight plan, to allow it to land, and then when the story broke, mention it.

Maybe a fictitious flight was invented? Not sure how easy that is, in Malaysia. But then, how to explain 239 passengers in the wrong place, who are not allowed to contact anyone?

No, it seems most likely that the plane has landed somewhere and some nation, or elements within it are hiding it. But as above, a motive for such an action is unclear and would have to have involved at least both pilots and the conviction to carry it out with some threat to the passengers. The pilots could have been coerced by a terrorist taking over the plane, or who had the ability to fly it himself, but that doesn't change anything, other than blame and detail.

For me, the plane has been landed somewhere West of Malaysia, where no-one would report or notice the aircraft. But it is still the most bizarre of actions.

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