GOODFELLOW REBUTTAL...Interesting analysis of my analysis.
New information surfaced today of several people in the Maldives seeing a large white airliner with three red stripes flying overhead at 6:15am the following morning. This coincides nicely with the 2000 nautical mile distance from the original turn made 5 hours before approx. 400 knots/hr. The Maldives lie on an extended line from the initial heading the plane took.
The writer says MH370 made several course changes at various waypoints. This is based on Malaysian radar data which may well have been tracking the other aircraft which is mentioned in the piggy back scenario while MH370 continued on in a southwesterly direction.
This morning I posted a new piece that calls for Rolls Royce to come clean with its data. I think they have the keys to the puzzle so to speak. After all it took two days for the information to filter out they had been collecting the databursts for a further six hours. (this was after I penned my original piece). The key to whether this was a "ghost plane" for 6 hours or a hijack is in their data. Again simple. If the data shows the engine parameters did not change - constant rpm - and normal cruise settings throughout the six hours then the aircraft for all intents and purposes was a ghost flight with no human input. If on the other hand as this writer asserts the plane maneuvered and changed direction and particularly if we were led to believe it performed a the piggy back operation to avoid radar as it moved up the Bay of Bengal there would be many power setting changes in the data. Rolls Royce needs to clarify this asap.
I would dearly love to be proved wrong and for this aircraft to have been hijacked and landed somewhere and the passengers although being held were at least alive. However, I cannot come to that conclusion on my interpretation of the scant facts. I still believe the craft flew on until fuel exhaustion somewhere west of the Maldives. The sighting, if correct, in the Maldives ties together the timeline and heading. The 777 when trimmed is a very stable plane and theoretically could just fly on if a heading was entered.
The New York Times has written that the initial turn south west was initiated by an entry into the Flight Management System and the plane was not manually turned. I don't know how they can determine this but I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. I too have GPS in my car and in two keystrokes I can hit go home and the route is plotted. Guess what? All the airports in the region of operations of this aircraft are already loaded in the FMS. All the pilot had to do was enter the identifier for Langwaki and they craft turned and headed for the initial approach waypoint. He may well have had time to do this before events overwhelmed him. In any event the plane took up a heading for Langwaki which appears incontrovertible at this point.. Many people wrote me about airports on the north coast of Malaysia. KBR in particular but this is a 6,000 foot strip with an approach over land and hills. Few pilots would opt to try and stuff an obviously damaged craft of this type at this point into a 6,000 strip at night. I still believe the turn was to initiate an approach to Langwaki where he had a long clear obstruction free approach over water. His craft was likely above max landing weight and he knew it. He couldn't dump fuel if he had fire. The best scenario is a very long runway.
Unfortunately I still think they were overcome by events.
I am an optimist and I believe we are going to have a resolution within the next couple of days because at least now I feel they are searching in the right place....namely at the place I said in the first post on an extension of the heading they had set up for Langwaki. I said it would be either at a point where the plane crashed becausefire destroyed the flight surfaces OR at the end of fuel exhaustion. We now know it motored on six hours. We now know there was a sighting in the Maldives. I hope and pray they find it west of the Maldives very soon.
Today I received calls from all major networks CNN FOX ABC NBC MSNBC AL JAZ CBS. I declined all interviews. I am not interested in 15 minutes of media fame or more speculation. I am interested in seeing this aircraft found and now feel they are looking in the right place. If found west/southwest of the Maldives I shall travel to New York for a press conference at my own expense and the media can have a go at me at that time. Until then all I'm interested in is the fate of 239 souls and the families concerned and with the enormous interest in this story it seems the whole world is too.
Thank you for your interest and time in this story.