Flight MH 370 was a scheduled international flight which operated between Kuala Lampur and Beijing.
The flight MH370 was operated by Boeing 777 type aircraft (9M-MRO). Flight MH370 was operated by a 12 crew team, Captain Z.A Shah, the Commander & Fariq Abdul Hamid, the First Officer, followed by 10 cabin crew.
Brief summary:
March 08, 2014, the Flight MH370 took off from Kuala Lampur Airport with 239 people onboard towards Beijing, China. No incidents were reported before or after takeoff. The flight continued to climb and were on its scheduled path towards Beijing, when it was lost on the radar. This happened after 38 minutes after takeoff. The aircraft was lost in civilian radar, but the military radar were able to track the flight deviating westwards from its scheduled flight path. Again the flight was lost from military radar after 1 hour when it went outside radar range.
The last known details transmitted via ACARS data revealed the aircraft had 43,800 kgs of fuel remaining and the last voice transmission occurred at 0119hrs(LT)
Radar: "Malaysian three seven zero, contact Ho Chi Minh one two zero decimal nine. Good night."
MH370 : "Good night. Malaysian three seven zero."
The flight never made a contact with Ho Chi Minh control radar and considering their request to contact flight 370, another captain tried to contact them using IAD frequency. He claims he could only hear mumbling. Calls made to aircraft at 0239 and 0713hrs were unanswered though it was acknowledged by aircraft SDU.
Government quickly scrambled search team and later many nations around the world extended their arms for search and support. Many nations dispatched their advanced search equipments, Naval support for the search of missing flight MH370. After completing 05 years, and covering a massive area of 200,000 sq km, still investigators have no final words on MH370 case. Later, debris were found on the shores of France, Madagascar, Mauritius, South Africa, Tanzania and Mozambique.The recent search was ended in June 18, where an American Company, Ocean Infinity tried to locate the missing flight 370. While no conclusive evidence has been found as to the cause of MH370’s disappearance, the current official theory is that the plane crashed in the southern Indian Ocean, off the coast of Western Australia.
Details of the aircraft :
The missing flight 370 was operated by Boeing 777-200ER (serial number: 28420) with registration 9M-MRO and was the 404th B777 produced. The airframe was powered by two Rolls-Royce Trent 892 engines and had a total of 7526 cycles. The aircraft was in compliance with all applicable Airworthiness derivatives. No major defects were logged nor were notified by crew to the ground team before departure.
Disappearance:
March 08, 2014, Flight MH370 was scheduled to depart at 0035hrs(Local time) and it took off at 0041hrs(Local time). Takeoff and climbing was without any incident and the ATC received the last voice contact on 0119hrs (LT) when the flight was over south china sea. The last conversation between ATC and the cockpit crew was about the handover of flight to Ho Chi Minh tower of Vietnam. The flight was given instructions for contacting Ho Chi Minh and the crew acknowledged the same. Then it was lost in radar. The information was passed to the concerned departments and the military were able to track the flight 370, which was then not on its scheduled path.
The flight deviated westwards and crossed Malay Peninsula and reached Andaman sea and it disappeared from military radar, 200 N.M of the island of Penang (Northern Malaysia). There were many theories and stories regarding the disappearance of flight 370 & the mystery behind it. There's evidence that the flight transponder was turned off manually to avoid locating its flight path. This was found by the British owned satellite called Inmarsat.
According to the data from satellite, Flight 370 , after turning her transponder off, had flown for almost 08 hours uninterrupted deviating from her original flight path. Inmarsat, made a series of successful transmission to flight 370, which is known as "handshakes". The flight computer responded to six of these handshakes and instigated the seventh, which was caused by the rebooting of the flight system. Investigators believe this was caused due to the low fuel. Then the flight didn't respond to the eighth one which was sent an hour later.
At this point , the investigators believe that the flight may have crashed. The location where the fuel supposedly ran out is termed as seventh arc. This is where the search team had their primary focus. The current official theory, adopted by both the Malaysian government and the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, is that the pilot was unconscious at the seventh handshake, thus the plane dived sharply to land in a location near the seventh arc.
Investigation :
Soon after the mysterious disappearance of flight 370, government activated Investigation Team for the search and rescue . Many nations around the world, extended their help for the search of flight 370. Various radars were checked, satellites and data were checked and search party used Air, Sea and Underwater search technologies for better results. Different Navies, its air division , around the world gathered for the search of missing flight 370, and numerous sightings of possible debris were made. After detailed studies, many of them were rejected and later many debris of the missing flight 370 were founded on shores of France, Madagascar, Mozambique, South Africa and Mauritius. Various studies indicated the rapid descent of aircraft when it touched the water.
Priority Zone were created by various studies of satellite data and assumptions.
( Like the possible area where the flight ran out of fuel, etc with the help of data). Underwater searches were initiated and ships with equipments installed to detect underwater locater beacons were deployed in the area. The locators were used to detect signals which were sent from Black Box. During the initial days, some ships found strange, but weak signals from sea bed, which were likely to be from the black box of flight 370, which after some hours vanished. Experts says, the battery may be exhausted and underwater search robots were deployed for the thorough scanning of seabed. But couldn't find any suspicious objects or signals.
Many satellite images were observed and could find many "debris" floating over the water near to the "crash site". Several satellite images shown large pieces floating. But none were confirmed to be the debris of missing flight 370. After careful examination the sweep area, which initially a small area, expanded to a vast area upto 200,000 sq. km and the search operation had then became an international operation led by many countries around the globe. The surface search around southern Asia and Indian Ocean lasted 52 days. In these days, 29 aircrafts and 14 ships from various countries searched the above said area.
On July 29,2015, first confirmed debris were found on shores of French island called Reunion. The part was later confirmed that its a flaperon and it belongs to the missing flight 370. The following day , some Chinese water bottles, damaged suitcases etc were found. Nearby areas were notified for the search of debris. The collected pieces were sent to Toulouse, France where they were examined thoroughly. On 23 March, 2016, a piece of Rolls-Royce Engine cowling was discovered on a beach in South Africa.
After long searches and analyzing various data, and in help with various nations around the globe, the investigators finally had declared all the passengers and crew onboard flight370 are presumed to have lost their lives. This is one of the deadliest incidents in aviation history and the search and rescue operations is the most expensive operation done. Although the flight is presumed to have lost , it is still unclear about the real reasons behind this accident.
Mysterious acts :
¶ Instead of following the pre planned flight path, why the aircraft deviated?
¶ Why the transponder was switched off?
¶ What exactly happened in cockpit?
¶ Who was at controls when the flight made its mysterious turning.?
¶ Investigators , upon examining the debris (wing) concluded that the aircraft never made a controlled landing towards sea. Data proved it made a rapid descent. What exactly happened to cockpit crew?
¶ No distress signals were sent out by the crew or the system, and no incidents or malfunction were reported by the crew to ground before or after takeoff.
¶ Why did the captain, on his personal simulator, tried the unusual practice (almost same routing) of deviation ?
Answers yet to be found...
ACARS : Aircraft Communication Addressing and Reporting System
SDU : Satellite Data Unit
IAD : International Air Distress frequency
Images: various online sites and medias
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