Hey, everyone. Welcome to another Mystery Monday. This week’s story is no doubt, one of the strangest disappearances in modern history.
It’s not hard to imagine a small plane like the one Amelia Earhart flew disappearing in 1937. Radio communications weren’t as sophisticated, and we didn’t have the benefit of satellite communication. But how does a huge commercial jetliner disappear without a trace in the twenty-first century?
Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 (MH 370) departed Kuala Lumpur International Airport in route to Beijing International on March 8, 2014. Thirty-eight minutes into the flight, the crew of the Boeing 777-200 last communicated with air traffic control when the plane was over the South China Sea.
A Boeing 777-200, the same type of aircraft as MH370. (Creative Commons)
Minutes later, ATC radar screens lost sight of the plane, but military radar tracked it for another hour as it deviated west from its planned flight path. It crossed the Malay Peninsula and Andaman Sea and left radar range 200 nautical miles northwest of Penang Island in northwestern Malaysia. The plane, 227 passengers, and twelve crew members have never been seen again.
A search for the missing aircraft initially focused on the South China and Andaman seas. However, an analysis of the aircraft’s automated communications with an Inmarsat satellite identified a possible crash site somewhere in the southern Indian Ocean.
After a three-year search across 46,000 square miles of ocean failed to locate the plane, the agency heading the operation suspended the search in January 2017. A second search by a private contractor began in January 2018 but ended without success six months later.
Twenty pieces of debris believed to be from MH370 was recovered from beaches in the western Indian Ocean by October 2017. Eighteen were “identified as being very likely or almost certain to originate from MH370.”
The first item of debris to be positively identified as originating from Flight 370 was the starboard flaperon which was discovered on July 2015 on a beach in Saint-André, on Réunion Island in the western Indian Ocean. France’s civil aviation accident investigation agency examined the item. On September 3 of that year, French officials announced the serial numbers found on internal components of the flaperon linked it “with certainty” to Flight 370.
After the discovery, French police conducted a search of the waters around Réunion for additional debris and found a damaged suitcase that might be linked to Flight 370. Other debris, including parts of a stabilizer and a Rolls Royce engine have been discovered in various locations.
No one is certain as to the reasons for the flight’s deviation from its intended path. Some speculate passenger or crew involvement, but there has been no definitive proof.
All we know for sure is somewhere is the remains of a jumbo jet, its passengers and crew.
23 Responses
I remember when that happened and thinking how could we lose a big plane with all our technology. Sad all the lives lost but I still wonder why.
It still amazes me how we lost it and why we can’t find it. I’m sure ocean currents play a big role in where it met its final resting place. But to simply vanish? Unbelievable in this day and age.
🙂
SHAME ABOUT THOMAS COOK JOAN, GREAT POST, CHINA
Thanks, China.
Reblogged this on LIVING THE DREAM.
Thanks for sharing, China.
I still find this very confusing. With everything at our disposal, things like this just shouldn’t happen… Everyone talks about the plane, as if that’s all that went missing, but what about all those people?
Exactly. If the plane went down (and I believe it did). All the passengers and crews went with it. What baffles me is how, with all our technology, that we can’t find it.
Not exactly a small plane either!
For real!
I believe it did crash but where and why will likely remain mysterys. I wonder if this is one of the inspirations for the TV show Manifest? Sad story, but great story fodder. Thanks for sharing, Joan 🙂
I believe it’s somewhere in the Indian Ocean. Seems strange that we haven’t been able to find it. Like many mysteries, there are all sorts of conspiracy theories floating around.
I remember seeing this on TV for quite some time. Amazing with all the technology we have that we can’t find that plane. Perhaps we aren’t meant too.
It’s puzzling why we can’t find it. You could have a point. Maybe we aren’t meant to.
I remember the disappearance of this plane, Joan. I followed it for ages as I really wanted to understand what had happened to it. A fascinating post.
I still wonder. And after more than five years has passed, I’m not sure we’ll ever know.
That is some mystery, Joan. It makes great fodder for a story! Thanks for sharing and here’s to a great week ahead!
Yes, it does, Jan. The old saying truth is stranger than fiction is true.
People don’t realize how vast the planet is, and the oceans pose an even bigger problem. We lose small craft in the American West. The sea is overwhelmingly huge. So big that there likely wasn’t even a ship to see it go down.
Good point, Craig. And the earth is 2/3rds water. I imagine ocean currents could also factor in.
A mystery clouded in the loss of so much. Not only the plane, crew, and passengers, but questions over technology which obviously didn’t work to lead us to find this lost plane and those people. I can’t believe it’s been five years, but we followed for so long and maybe that’s why it stands in our recent memory. Great post, Joan!
Thanks, Sherrey. This one does rank as one of the strangest disappearances in modern history.