Oh BARNACLES! The Search for MH370

[smstachwick]

The nine-year-old investigation into the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, which claimed the lives of all 239 passengers and crew onboard, got a recent boost with the help of geoscientists studying the isotopic composition of the oxygen in barnacle shells attached to a flaperon recovered from the aircraft, which drifted for months through the Indian Ocean.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidb...resting-place-of-malaysia-airlines-mh370/amp/
It is hoped that the data could be applied to the largest, oldest barnacles on the debris, the ones that may have attached themselves very soon after the crash, and allow the water temperature close to the time and location of the crash to be calculated.

Since water temperature tracks strongly with latitude in this part of the world, a successful application of the study may produce a smaller probable area to conduct a more focused search in the coming years.

There’s a lot of “hope” and “maybe” in there, but for the families in desperate need of answers for those more generally invested in aviation safety and security, that’s about the best they’ve been getting since the jet vanished in 2014.

Fingers crossed.

 

[K'Tesh]

 

[smstachwick]

I’ve seen this one, actually.

I remember watching it while I had a huge task list I was not accomplishing and deciding that if I’m watching a video about Darwin’s hatred of barnacles instead, I’m officially procrastinating.

 

[K'Tesh]

I remember watching it while I had a huge task list I was not accomplishing and deciding that if I’m watching a video about Darwin’s hatred of barnacles instead, I’m officially procrastinating.

For me, that was yesterday...

 

[smstachwick]

There’s also been some work done in weak signal propagation that may also suggest a search area

https://www.thedailybeast.com/mh370-report-suggests-new-location-where-missing-plane-could-be-found

 

[smstachwick]

Actually this WSPR stuff is far more tantalizing. Godfrey and company just published an extensive report with an estimated flight path that, if correct, gives more credence to the speculation that the flight was hijacked by the Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah and flown under his control to the end of the flight.

The link to the full 232-page report is here:

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/nfyr...2023.pdf?rlkey=hqpi76o194vel6k4gk86x04wg&dl=0

There are several spots where it looks like the aircraft turned around and a few where it zig-zagged, almost as if he was checking to see if somebody was following him, or like he was trying to confuse searchers further with an erratic path.

Godfrey believes that a search of the immediate area could take only a few weeks and the jet could be found by the end of this year if the investigative authorities act quickly.

 

[bjphoenix]

There are several spots where it looks like the aircraft turned around and a few where it zig-zagged

I remember the 747 that crashed in Japan after the tail was compromised by explosive decompression and they couldn't steer the craft. I wonder if such a thing could have happened.

 

[smstachwick]

I remember the 747 that crashed in Japan after the tail was compromised by explosive decompression and they couldn't steer the craft. I wonder if such a thing could have happened.

Japan Air Lines Flight 123. That was before my time but I am familiar with it.

They are looking into cabin pressurization and hypoxia as to why the passengers and remainder of the crew didn’t attempt to make phone calls or anything like that, especially as some of them would have been business passengers who would recognize if they were heading away from coastal lights and out over the open ocean.

Apparently one working theory is that Ahmad locked the other pilot out of the flight deck when he got an opportunity (as would happen in the case of the Germanwings Flight 9525 murder-suicide crash the following year) and switched off the cabin pressurization system. His own oxygen would have lasted for a very long time but the passenger system would have worked for only about 20 minutes.

I don’t know enough about the workings of a 777 to know whether or not oxygen masks would have deployed at that point. Clearly there are bits that are still missing as to what was actually happening on the flight deck and in the cabin.

Sadly we will likely never know in a lot of detail since the cockpit voice recorder only has enough capacity for two hours. Regulators looked to improve this to 25 hours (the same as the flight data recorder) in the immediate aftermath of the disaster and ran into resistance from the pilots’ unions. Apparently they were concerned about the possibility of disciplinary action against crews for actions that are not part of an accident sequence or relevant to improving air safety.

Clearly something must be done to balance this valid concern with the need for better investigative tools.

 

[Marc_G]

Are any authorities still willing to spend resources searching based on these various theories and data reviews, or is it just "treasure hunter/adventurer" types left?

 

[smstachwick]

Are any authorities still willing to spend resources searching based on these various theories and data reviews, or is it just "treasure hunter/adventurer" types left?

Back in March the Malaysian government committed to further search if new credible evidence were put forth. They’re likely consulting with other experts and reviewing some of this work now.

I believe Ocean Infinity was looking to get a new search underway as long ago as last year, probably when Godfrey’s report was being reviewed.

We may see additional companies, including small startups, getting involved, but I don’t see them having a great chance at finding it. 1000 miles is a long way from land and 4000 meters is very deep.

 

[Marc_G]

More on studying biota associated with MH370 debris, to give insights into crash location:

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/mh370-search-debris-barnacles.html

 

[Peartree]

More on studying biota associated with MH370 debris, to give insights into crash location:

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/mh370-search-debris-barnacles.html

I read that this morning. Thing is, much of their results l, by their own admission, don't make any sense when applied to any of the assumed initial conditions. Making sense of this new data will likely require a complete rethink on how and where (and possibly even when) the plane went down.

 

[Marc_G]

We can find a five foot lander on the moon but not a huge plane underwater.

 

[Peartree]

We can find a five foot lander on the moon but not a huge plane underwater.

It helps when you know exactly where to look.

 

[SolarYellow]

We can find a five foot lander on the moon but not a huge plane underwater.

We actually know a heck of a lot more about outer space than we do about what's in and under the oceans. It's a lot easier to look when there isn't thousands of feet of salt water covering it.

 

[OverTheTop]

Yep. Space is only about -14.7psi compared to the surface.

Oceans add 14.7psi for each 30' you go down. That really adds up.

 

[bjphoenix]

Here's more on the theory of pilot suicide:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle...S&cvid=2826ea4748a44c1d90029846d5380e7c&ei=83

 

[smstachwick]

Here's more on the theory of pilot suicide:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle...S&cvid=2826ea4748a44c1d90029846d5380e7c&ei=83

This has seemed the most likely explanation to me basically since it was first pitched. I hadn’t considered the possibility that he might have been looking at submerged terrain features too.

 

[bjphoenix]

This has seemed the most likely explanation to me basically since it was first pitched. I hadn’t considered the possibility that he might have been looking at submerged terrain features too.

I was wondering why it would matter. Is he trying to protect his reputation? Any remaining family?

 

[smstachwick]

I was wondering why it would matter. Is he trying to protect his reputation? Any remaining family?

Possible. I’m also wondering if the whole thing, both the crash and the clear efforts to obscure its site, amount to some kind of middle finger to the world.

Simon Hardy believes that there was some kind of sick pleasure in planning and performing a task that required such meticulous planning to work.

 

[teepot]

I saw an article a week or so ago. One of the researchers believes they have been looking in the wrong place.

 

[Donnager]

I saw an article a week or so ago. One of the researchers believes they have been looking in the wrong place.

Maybe they only have one side of the headpiece.