This is about as much as I can summarise 440 pages while retaining the main points (Satire warning!)
- Plane disappeared after 40 min, xpdr and other ways to track the plane broke but we know it ended up somewhere in the Indian Ocean
- We took a map, threw a dart at it and started searching. No plane.
- Once we started searching, we could have found the plane at any time.
- Hey we can check the ACARS, now we can fly the PMDG 777 in FSX to determine where it went down I mean do complex simulations
- I donât think you should be using that flaperon to build your castle, it looks like bits of MH370. Hey it is, we now know since it ended up here it must have drifted on sea currents therefore we can pinpoint it to 25000 square kilometres!
- Thanks to Air France for doing an impromptu game of hide and seek with an A330-200, weâre confident we can find other planes that go missing in the middle of Nowhere, Nowhere.
- Thereâs 661 possible bits of wreckage on the seafloor, but we checked the 82 most plane looking ones and found 4 ships masquerading as submarines but no 777-200ER.
- Weâre confident that the plane isnât in the places weâve already searched.
- Oh sh*t we canât find the 777.
- Release a report anyways, telling people that itâs to document our progress (sounds like me when I never do homework and the teacher asks âwhats your progressâ)
In fact itâs exactly the sameâŚ
âHave you done your homework?â
âI have spent much time absorbed in analysis.â
âI have also enlisted the help of those wiser than me.â
âNot only that, Iâve run through a couple of methods and Iâm certain that itâs wrong.â
âSo have you done your homework?â
âNo.â
(I do apologise if any of the above offended anyone, I do know that many man-hours and money was spent to try and locate the plane and I appreciate those putting time and effort in to try and locate the jet.)
Alright now thatâs done, lets get on to the actual details.
MH370, a Boeing 777-2H6ER registered 9M-MRO and powered by 2x Rolls-Royce RB211 Trent 892B-17s disappeared during a flight from KL to Beijing, with 12 crew and 227 passengers on board.
After a request from the Malaysian Government, Australia joined in the search. The Peopleâs Republic of China also joined in. Since it was a Malaysian aircraft, they are in charge of the general direction of the investigation. However, Australia later took charge of this.
A Quality Assurance Manager was appointed to ensure that all search data was sifted through and that they did not miss anything.
As far as money goes,
Malaysia--------- A$115m (58% of total)
Australia--------- A$63m (32% of total)
PRC-------------- A$20m (10% of total)
Total-------------- A$198m
Key Recorded Events of the Flight:
All times are in UTC.
MH370 departed KLIA at 1642.
Pilot In Charge reported that they were at FL350 at 1701
First ACARS report was received at 1707.
Last radio transmission was at 1719.
Aircraft passed over waypoint IGARI at 1720, which it cancelled itâs SID and headed directly to after takeoff.
The last recorded secondary surveillence rader position was at 1721.
At 1752, the FOs mobile phone was detected by the Penang communications tower.
It was last recorded on primary surveillance radar at 1822.
From 1739, Malaysian and Vietnamese controllers attempted to contact the flight with no success. A formal distress phase was triggered at 2232.
Two calls were attempted from ground to air to try and contact the aircraft, at 1839 and 2313 respectively.
The last recorded handshake between the aircraft and the ground station was at 0019, after which the aircraft did not respond to a further handshake at 0115. It is assumed that the unscheduled log-on request at 0019 was the aircraft switching to the APU after having exhausted its fuel. Shortly after, the aircraft impacted the ocean.
Search for the Aircraft
The first SAR area covered 573000km^2, east of the Malay Peninsula from 8 to 15 March 2014. Another area searched was west of Malaysia, covering 4560000km^2. These areas were searched based on radar data of a plane flying up the Strait of Malacca, which was thought to be MH370. New information discovered caused the search to be halted on the 15th of March 2014 on both the east and west of Malaysia.
After SATCOM data was analysed, the search moved to a southern corridor 1630000km^2 long. This area was searched from the 18th to 23rd of March 2014.
All the way from then until the 29th of April 2014, search operations were conducted, with patterns being refined as new information was gained.
Possible pings from the Underwater Locator Beacon was detected 4 times but nothing was found after that.
Debris Found
On the 29th of July 2015, the right flaperon from MH370 washed up on a beach at La Reunion in the western Indian Ocean.
Other debris such as the engine cowling section (with part of the RR logo), the right wing flap track fairing with the MH stencil, the right horizontal stabilizer panel section, an internal cabin bulkhead panel section and part of the right outboard flap were also found.
(see the posted pic in the original post for more)
Safety Analysis
The initial surface search for the plane has been the largest in aviation history. It is unacceptable that in this day and age, where a large commercial aircraft such as a 777 to be lost and three years later, for the families of those on board to still not know what became of them.
In comparison, other planes lost in the sea have been found within 27 days (in the case of EgyptAir 804) and 5 days (Asiana Cargo 991, AirAsia X 8501). MH370 is the only aircraft occurrence since December 2009 to remain missing.
In the wake of this crash, the ICAO has introduced measures such as recorder-mounted Underwater Locator Beacons to have a battery life of 90 days and to have provisions for automatic deployable flight recorders that have integrated ELTs instead of ULBs. They have also mandated that new aircraft types must be able to detect unsafe conditions and trigger near-continuous data as well as for all aircraft operators to track the postion of their aircraft every 15 minutes in normal flight.
Inmarsat announced that all planes on its Classic Aero system (such as MH370) would have their positions reported for free every 15 minutes, and 2 minutes for their newer Swift Broadband service.
Malaysian Airlines planned to implement satellite based ADS-B tracking once the Aireon satellite constellation is operational in 2018.
ATSB Safety Recommendations
- ICAO encourages or mandates the publication of relevant information about SAR operations for future research.
- ICAO investigation bodies should publish SAR information for future research.
- If aircraft position is lost, relevant mechanisms should be in place for a rapid detection and appropriate response.
- Aircraft operators, manufacturers and equipment manufacturers investigate ways to provide high-rate or automatic global position tracking in existing and future aircraft fleets.
I think thatâs all :)
