Except that the plane has (apparently) been found off the West coast of Australia, which surely rules out all but a terrorist plot to down the plane where it would be fairly hard to find.

Unless they tried to turn it round to get to an airport to land but were overcome by smoke/lack of oxygen and the plane just flew until it ran out of fuel? Experts have confirmed this as a likely theory this morning.

Why would a terrorist ditch a seemingly non-descript set of passengers and plane into the sea miles from anywhere without transmitting any kind of message? It's not really terrorism.

Why on earth does any reporter not already based there need to be in KL?

Possibly a bit early to say that. They have found a 'fairly non-specific' object of 24m in length that is partially under the water.

Could be anything

Kay Burley's sense of self-importance?

Possibly. Although to be fair, credit should go to the Smokey person, as it was he/her who brought such an excellent word to our attention.

Maybe he drinks in there?

My immediate thought was the club in Alan Partridge, but that's Cloisters, not Cahoots

Given that there's hardly been any shortage of theories previously, how come no theory has been advanced as to how this plane could have ended up crashing in the far southern Indian ocean?

The reports of possible wreckage floating seem to have been taken seriously enough to divert very expensive search assets, which would presumably tie in with the seeming fact that the location of this debris broadly ties in with a point on the curved satellite track; but why would the plane do a U-turn, and then fly perfectly normally for several hours on a route aimed at Antarctica, until it ran out of fuel?

If something happened on board to cause changes in direction, OK I can understand that as a lielihood, but then either the persons flying the plane sat in the cockpit for several hours en route to an Antarctica which they could never reach anyway, (and there is literally no other destination that way) or else set the autopilot to head for the pole. It couldn't have happened accidentally.

I'm no expert, but that Greek jet a few years back flew on until it ran out of fuel, so perhaps this one turned to try and locate somewhere to land but then events took over and prevented any further changes to flight path and it just continued on until the fuel ran out. The debris doesn't seem too far from the suggested areas it could have reached.

If you want outlandish theories though, just have a butchers at today's tabloids.

...or possibly something happened similar to the plane crash that killed Payne Stewart but on a bigger scale ?

[urlhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1999_South_Dakota_Learjet_crash[/url

What if it was god that killed him for his dress-sense?

Then that would be understandable, a tad harsh, but understandable if The God were having a bad day, woke up with one of those headaches over the left eye that won't be shifted, poured sour milk on his cornflakes and didn't notice until he'd taken a mouthfull, run out of orange juice, stubbed his toe on the table leg - that sort of bad start to the day, you could understand The God glancing out of The Heavenly Window and shouting "Who the fook is that joker getting on that private plane, I'm having him today..."

I knew you'd get it.


Poulter will be wary of air travel if my theory proves correct.

But that cannot be true in this case, simply because the plane was within easy reach of numerous airstrips where it could have landed, but (if it was on autopilot) it was set to fly south towards Antarctica, where there simply was no conceivable target airport. The plane could have been aimed in pretty much any other point of the compass and been able to find airports, but not that direction. That's my point, that even if hypoxia disabled all the crew, before it did so then there is no reason for them to set a course for the pole, of all places.

If it was turned and put on autopilot then without a doubt the autopilo0t would be set tot he course of the target airport. Anyway if it was an emergency I cannot imagine any pilot going to autopilot, it would be manually flown to the nearest landing, ASAP.

And if it was not on autopilot then somebody was flying it for 7 or 8 hours in that direction.

Autopilots can't land the plane safely, can they? No good sending it to an airport, which is usually within about 10 miles of a major city, if that plane is going to be making a crash landing.

If the pilots are going to be dead in a very short time, and therefore everyone on the plane is likely to die too (or be dead already), the main thing to do is point the plane where it's not going to take anyone else out. Antarctica is pretty much that place.

We suddenly have a plethora of Sin Bin expert aviators.

Madcap theory I heard in work today. The plane was laden with Ukranian bullion and the Americans have flown it to Diego Garcia.

I have theory on this and it sounds mad.

It crashed in the vast ocean and is very hard to find

Well I have a very good theory but I'm keeping my cards close to my chest until Sky News ring me to appear on all of their news bulletins for the next four or five weeks, but here is a sneak preview for you all...

The plane was hijacked by penguins.



It explains it all, penguins from Kuala Lumpur zoo disguised as nuns boarded the plane then shortly after takeoff bribed the cabin crew with chocolate biscuit bars to let them into the cockpit, a common enough practice on Malaysia flights apparently, once in their they threw off their cunning disguises and threatened the pilots with the aid of their sharp beaks, huddling around in a circle like they do on those David Attenborough documentaries they trapped the pilots into a huddle while their expert penguin pilot (who trained at a private company in Arizona) turned off the tracking devices and headed for home, Antarctica.

You heard it here first, now keep a lid on it while I negotiate a fee with The Discovery Channel, this covers so many of their documentary bases that I should get at least two lots of fees.

At least I've watched "Air Crash Investigation"

There couldn't be a penguin pilot because everyone knows that penguins can't 'fly'.
However, they don't need to fly to be experts on everything aeronautical since they can read, otherwise why do we print Penguin books?
I agree the penguin theory is a breakthrough and the Malaysian authorities should be alerted ASAP.

Yes, modern jets can land themselves, (and in sever weather eg very bad visibility, frequently do) as long as the airport has the relevant ILS systems. (Many landings at foggy airports, like Leeds Bradford, often don't take place and the plane is instead diverted not because it couldn't land (it easily could) but because to be allowed to do so, you need 2 qualified ILS pilots on board and most typical flights don't have.

In the case of a dire emergency I suggest a pilot would choose to disobey this rule rather than set course for death in the Antarctic.



It could never reach Antarctica, though. And if the plane could fly for seven hours then it could definitely land. And if you have time to set up such a bizarre scenario then you'd certainly have time to tell ATC what you are planning and why.

Excuse me, I believe you have accidentally stumbled into the wrong forum. You are looking for a forum where expert aviators discuss arcane, technical and obscure matters concerning their art. This isn't one.

Isn't it always the cap fits merchants that respond first.
lol
Good thread this one.