Mystery Of The Plane

THE LONGEST HUNT EVER and the biggest loss of our nation of the Malaysian Airlines(MAS)’s Boeing 777-200 ER airliner, MH370, started from the 8^th of March 2014. As everyone has already learnt about it from the daily news, I won’t want to blab about this for long. Let’s refer to our texts below for the rearranged and simplified details of the grievous incident and our leaders’ acts in seeking the plane.

  According to the reports given off by the news reporters, the flight left KLIA at 12.41am and straight headed to its originally scheduled destination, Beijing. Flying the plane was Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah and his assistant pilot, Fariq Abdul Hamid, who both held the heavy burden of the other 237 souls onboard. Subang Air Traffic reportedly lost contact with the plane as it mysteriously disappeared all of sudden from the radar screen. Our country along side with our ‘neighbours’ including China, Vietnam and Singapore launched an immediate rescue operation with numerous aircrafts and ships holding various functions to a part of the South China Sea, where it was around 120 nautical miles east to Kota Bahru.

  Several unexpected obstacles took places during the investigation. As you had heard, two male passengers were found to have boarded the flight with stolen passports, which raised the possibility of an unwanted terrorist attack. The two men were later identified as Iranians, and were believed to be illegal immigrants. Meanwhile, the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) reported to the media that they had found a pretty vast oil slick about 100 nautical miles off Tok Bali, Kelantan. The samples collected were then tested and fortunately it was only bunker oil from a ship. A long list of technical experts from Boeing volunteered into investigation team while more countries offered us their full support.

  Bukit Aman made the moves to investigate the possibility of hijacking or sabotage, and not forgotten any psychological problem among the passengers and crew that might cause any influence to the case. The search was expanded to the Straits of Malacca and the Andaman Sea because the RMAF radar was reported to have tracked an unidentified aircraft flying across the Peninsular from the last known position of MH370 about 45 minutes after the airliner vanished from the civilian radar. Another news report claimed that the Boeing 777 aircraft could have blown up in mid-air due to unexpected engine problems that happened suddenly, but USA rejected it for its satellites did not detach any explosion in the air.

  The Pentagon indicated that MH370 had crashed into the Indian Ocean. A military officer surfaced the theory that the plane was deliberately turned towards the Indian Ocean by someone with up-to-date flying knowledge and radar positions. That left the police no choice but to investigate Captain Zaharie’s background and the investigations proved that the pilot himself and his co-pilot do not have any flying experience in the search corridors. The Captain was also reportedly a PKR fanatic and the authorities believed that the missing aircraft might be an act of political protest. Other than that, the government had received background-check results on the passengers from all relevant countries, stating there were no suspicions.

 

  The number of countries involved in the search climbs up to 25, including France, Laos and South Korea. Australia suggested a highly-possible breakthrough as its satellite show two objects in the sea that were suspected to be related to the missing  airplane. Several aircrafts and ships were sent to the site but the debris had not been located, suspected they might have sunk and looking for it would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. Another threat to the rescue team was Cyclone Gillian, which made the patch of ocean where the search was taking place one of the harshest points on Earth. The Prime Minister then announced that the flight path of MH370 ended somewhere over the Indian Ocean, with all passengers onboard presumed dead.

  The Malaysian authorities promised that the search would continue and search efforts will now solely focus on the southern area of the ocean, hoping that the black box will be found as soon as possible before the battery is used up. Meanwhile, angry relatives of China passengers aboard MH370 protested outside the Embassy of Malaysia in Beijing. Well, we believe that all we can do is to wait patiently for the results our government can give. Keep your fingers crossed, miracles do happen.

By,

Euan Thum, 17/5/14.