On March 8th, 2014 the scheduled flight departing from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing never arrived. Officials know the plane made a left turn after their last contact with the aircraft, but what happened after remains unknown. Somehow, a 209-foot plane holding 239 people vanished. Help came from all over the world to scour the ocean for any signs of what could have happened. Four years later, the families hoping for answers have none.
It was recently made public that the Malaysian government released a final safety report for the missing flight MH370. Having always been perplexed by this disappearance and not satisfied with the information found from news outlets, I decided to read through the report myself to try and get a better understanding. The nearly 500-page report was easily accessed on the Malaysian Ministry of Transport website.
Noted at the beginning of the report are the limitations faced by the significant lack of evidence. That sentence alone had me raising my brow. As I read on, there were several blank sections like Fire, Survivability, Other Damages, and many more simply stated "Not applicable" or "No information". For being a government official document regarding missing persons, this report was very discouraging. Even with all the research and simulations conducted, the question remains unanswered. What happened to MH370?
The initial search for the aircraft lasted for 1,046 days until the suspended in agreement of China, Malaysia, and Australian governments. In January of 2018, the American company Ocean Infinity came into a 90-day agreement with Malaysian officials to do an underwater search in the area most likely to have the wreckage. That search came to an end in May. There are 27 items found that have been linked to the missing aircraft. Of those 27, only three are official, confirmed wreckage from MH370. Two of the items were found in the Southern Indian Ocean, and the third was found near Tanzania. These findings are a small glimmer of hope, in this unsettling mystery. As broken down through the report, here is a summary of events leading up to the disappearance.
At 4:40 p.m. the flight was cleared for takeoff
At 4:43 p.m. the flight made communication to confirm ETA to the first waypoint for 5:22 p.m.
At 5:19:26 p.m. MH370 is instructed to radio into the waypoint
At 5:19:30 p.m. MH370 radios back "Goodnight Malaysian three seven zero."
At 5:20:31 p.m. MH370 passes through the waypoint
At 5:21:13 p.m. The radar loses position on MH370
At 5:39 p.m. The whereabouts of MH370 come into question
6:01 p.m. Before losing signal of the aircraft completely, they detected the aircraft at 4,800 ft
6:03 p.m. The Aircraft disappears from the radar
6:15 Signal of aircraft reappears going faster and at 29,500 ft
6:22 The signal disappears, for good.
The military data shows significant changes in the speed and altitude of the plane after the chilling last message. This information only raises more questions in my mind. The possibilities of what happened to this flight are endless. What bothers me is that each and every person on that flight is still missing. No clothing, no shoes, no signs of life have ever been discovered from the flight.
If it crashed into the ocean, how is this possible? If it's not possible, then where did the plane go? Was it aliens? Did the entire plane get kidnapped? Was it swallowed up into a hole in the sky? Did it sink to the deepest depths of the ocean? For the sake of the families who lost someone, I hope we can one day have an answer.
