Malaysia Airlines 'loses contact with plane'

**Monseratto** · March 12th, 2014 01:22 PM

Is Malaysia mishandling the search? Vietnam thinks so...

Vietnam suspends air search for missing Malaysian jet
Agence France-Presse
10:47 am | Wednesday, March 12th, 2014

PHU QUOC—Vietnam said Wednesday it had suspended its air search for missing flight MH370 as it waited for Malaysia to clarify the potential new direction of the multi-national hunt.

“We’ve decided to temporarily suspend some search and rescue activities, pending information from Malaysia,” deputy minister of transport Pham Quy Tieu said, adding a sea search was still ongoing, but on a smaller scale.

Read more: Vietnam suspends air search for missing Malaysian jet | Inquirer News
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**Monseratto** · March 12th, 2014 01:31 PM

Malaysia is handling MH370 incompetently
by David Learmount on 11 March, 2014

It’s bad enough for a widebody jet to go missing with 239 people on board, but then for the responsible country’s government and aviation agencies to handle the associated information with total incompetence is unforgivable. China, which may have lost more of its nationals on board than any other single country, certainly thinks so.

This Boeing 777, if the uncoordinated information released by Malaysia is to be believed – and maybe it isn’t – was last seen offshore from Malaysia within primary and secondary radar range. Air traffic control uses secondary radar, which interrogates transponders on board aircraft and gets an identified signal in response. If the signal disappears it could either be because the aircraft itself has had an accident, or because the crew has turned the transponder off.

The terrorists that hijacked the four American airliners on 9/11 (2001) turned off their transponders once they had taken charge of the aircraft, so they were lost to ATC, but the military could still see them on primary radar, and at that time there was no provision for direct communication between the military and the civil ATC to establish what was going on.

There is now.

The Malaysian military has primary radar to provide surveillance of surface and airborne activity off its coasts and borders. It clearly knew more about what happened to MH370 than any other Malaysian agency, but the authorities do not seem to have tapped into this expertise, and the military may have been slow to volunteer it.

There are so many information sources that do not appear to have been used effectively in this case. As a result the families of the missing passengers and crew are being kept in the dark, and the search areas now extended to both sides of the peninsula have become so wide that it is clear that tracking information on the aircraft has not been used effectively.

Nothing has been said about the 777′s ACARS system (airborne communications addressing and reporting system), a datalink that provides technical information about the health of aircraft systems to Malaysian Airlines’ base. In the 2009 Air France 447 loss case, just before the fatal sequence of events an ACARS transmission told AF’s base that an airspeed sensor disagreement had caused the autopilot to trip out. That information was made public.

If MH370 was lost to civil radar screens because the transponder had been switched off, it raises questions as to why that would be so. If the military, who are now quoted as reporting that the aircraft turned off its northerly track and headed west, descended and flew across the peninsula, saw that happen, why has the information taken so long to be released?

There has been no report about attempts to pick up signals from the aircraft’s emergency locator transmitter, although the increasingly international fleet of search vessels are clearly doing their best. If MH370 has come down in the Gulf of Thailand, South China Sea or the Malacca Straits, the water there is shallow – less than 200m compared with the 4,500m depth of the South Atlantic where AF447 was lost.

There is an all-pervasive sense of a chaotic lack of coordination between the Malaysian agencies which has hindered the establishment of an effective search strategy.

Meanwhile the failure to provide timely information when simple facts have been established shows a total lack of consideration for the families of those who are missing.

- See more at: Malaysia is handling MH370 incompetently - Learmount

**Retz** · March 12th, 2014 01:37 PM

Mystery Malaysia flight may have lost signal, gone hundreds of miles off course

Mystery Malaysia flight may have been hundreds of miles off course - CNN.com

**chua_riwap** · March 12th, 2014 03:11 PM

one of the missing pilots was trained at PAL aviation school in the early 80's.

Posted via Tsikot Mobile App

**awing** · March 12th, 2014 04:36 PM

Tulong tayo sa paghahanap

----> Tomnod

**enterbay** · March 12th, 2014 05:20 PM

4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42

**Retz** · March 12th, 2014 05:36 PM

Malaysian MH370 co-pilot entertained teenagers in cabin on earlier flight

Photos emerge of Fariq Abdul Hamid and colleague with two South Africans on flight in 2011 from Phuket to Kuala Lumpur
Kate Hodal in Songkhla, Thailand
Tuesday 11 March 2014 18.29 GMT

Photographs of the co-pilot of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 have emerged showing him entertaining teenage tourists in an aircraft cockpit during a previous flight.

The images came to light on the day Malaysian officials said they were investigating potential "psychological problems" of the crew or passengers for possible reasons as to why the aircraft could have gone missing.

The first officer, Fariq Abdul Hamid, 27, invited two South African teenagers in to the flight cabin for the entirety of a flight in 2011 from Phuket to Kuala Lumpur. He and his colleague entertained the two girls, smoked cigarettes and posed for photographs with them.

more.....
Malaysian MH370 co-pilot entertained teenagers in cabin on earlier flight | World news | theguardian.com

Malaysian MH370 co-pilot entertained teenagers in cabin on earlier flight | World news | theguardian.com

**Monseratto** · March 12th, 2014 08:25 PM

Stranger and stranger...

A well-known Malaysian malay bomoh (shaman), Ibrahim Mat Zin (centre) holds two coconuts as him and his assistants offer to help locate the missing Malaysia Airlines flight 370

Chinese ridicule Malaysia’s recruitment of ‘witch doctor’ to track missing plane
PUBLISHED : Wednesday, 12 March, 2014, 5:01pm
UPDATED : Wednesday, 12 March, 2014, 7:05pm

Chinese netizens have mocked news that the Malaysian government has invited a witch doctor to help hunt for the missing state carrier's plane amid increasing criticism of the search and rescue operation.

Malaysian media reported that Ibrahim Mat Zin, a famous “bomoh” [shaman] also known as the Raja Bomoh Sedunia Nujum VIP, performed a prayer at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on Monday to help locate the missing MH370, allegedly at the invitation of one of the country’s top leaders.

“I think the plane is still in the air or has crashed into the sea,” he was quoted by Free Malaysia Today as saying.

Cynical Weibo users in China ridiculed the conclusion. “Wow, that is exactly what I think too,” many wrote.

Many expressed astonishment that spiritual methods were being considered in the hunt for the plane, as the operation entered its fifth day.

Jamil Khir Baharom, a minister in the Malaysian Prime Minister’s Department, had earlier said the government welcomed any help in tracing missing flight MH370, including that from bomohs, as long as their methods did not contravene the practices of Islam, Free Malaysia Today reported.

Muslims make up more than half of Malaysia’s population of 22.7 million people. Malaysian Muslims respect spiritual power and bomohs are well respected among believers.

I think the plane is still in the air or has crashed into the sea IBRAHIM MAT ZIN
The Raja Bomoh, who has 50 years of experience, rose to fame after offering his services in searching for victims in several major cases, including the Highland Tower tragedy, Kuala Dipang flood and the Mona Fendy murder, according to Free Malaysia Today.

“We use a fish trap hook and a bamboo binocular to search and ask for the victims to be found as soon as possible,” he said. He added that he would go back to the airport to perform another prayer in two days.

It is not unusual in parts of Malaysia for believers and politicians to turn to shamans. More than 200 people in the country were defrauded of a total of more than 23.4 million yuan (HK$30 million) in 2012 in cases involving shamans.

“All Malaysia has been doing is deny whatever Vietnam found in the past four days and get witch doctors,” said one popular comment on Weibo. “Couldn’t it be a little more reliable?”

**falken** · March 12th, 2014 08:38 PM

^"I think the plane is still in the air or has crashed into the sea."
Quack.

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**macsd** · March 12th, 2014 09:07 PM

Originally Posted by Monseratto

Stranger and stranger...

A well-known Malaysian malay bomoh (shaman), Ibrahim Mat Zin (centre) holds two coconuts as him and his assistants offer to help locate the missing Malaysia Airlines flight 370

Yung isang coconut meron transponder yung isa naman gps.