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William Langewiesche's well researched 2019 article in The Atlantic [1] presented a compelling set of facts and inferences for understanding what happened with

William Langewiesche's well researched 2019 article in The Atlantic [1] presented a compelling set of facts and inferences for understanding what happened with MH370. He says evidence from the pilot's flight simulator reveals the obfuscating journey had been planned in advance. 53 year old Zaharie Ahmad Shah's life was unravelling. The reason we haven't heard the full story is that Malaysia's Air Force doesn't want their role in failing to manage the event to be scrutinised. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/07/mh370-malaysia-airlines/590653/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/07/mh370-m...

gustavo-fring 5y ago
Gives me some Breaking Bad vibes (the traffic controller) down to the discussion about accountability for why he was working.
Steko 5y ago
I didn't find it compelling at all. It mostly just makes a lot of assumptions and piles them all onto a suicide pilot theory that can be used to explain any action needed and has become unfalsifiable without recovering the wreckage. Here's a counterpoint: https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-atlantics-william-langewiesche-dusts-off-discredited-conspiracy-theory-to-accuse-mh370-pilot-of-hijacking https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-atlantics-william-langewie...
- argonaut 5y ago
  The counterpoint spends most of its words (rightfully) dismissing analysis of the pilot's psychology but does not persuasively address the flight simulator evidence. The arguments against that evidence mostly amount to how it is not conclusively incriminating. But this is not a court of law - we are not putting him on trial.
  - hugh-avherald 5y ago
    As someone who's used flight simulator games, I have definitely left the computer while cruising, forgotten about the flight, and come back to find myself in the middle of nowhere. Also the smoking gun simulator session was in a different aircraft to MH370 and with a significantly different initial route.
    - ddeck 5y ago
      >I have definitely left the computer while cruising, forgotten about the flight If the reporting is credible, that's not what was found: "the track wasn’t really a track — rather, it was a series of brief clips lasting no more than a few seconds each, indicating that Zaharie had programmed it in advance then skipped along it to various points without actually playing through the entire hours-long flight" [1] >Also the smoking gun simulator session was in a different aircraft to MH370 and with a significantly different initial route. It was effectively the same aircraft (777-200LR vs 777-200ER). From the ATSB report: "It comprised four complete and two partial data captures of various aircraft and simulator parameters at discrete points during the simulation. The aircraft simulated was a 777-200LR The initial data point shows the simulated aircraft at Kuala Lumpur International airport. No useful location data was available from the second data point. The next two data points show that the aircraft had flown north up the Straits of Malacca. By the fourth data point the simulated aircraft had reached 40,000ft, was in a 20° left bank, 4° nose down, and had a southwest heading of 255°. Data points five and six were in the far reaches of the Indian Ocean, 820nm southwest of Australia's, Cape Leeuwin, with the simulated aircraft having exhausted its fuel. Data point five has the simulated 777 at 37,651ft, at an 11° right bank, and almost due south heading of 178°. The sixth, and final, data point was incomplete. "It was 2.5nm from the previous data point and the aircraft right bank had reduced to 3°.The aircraft was pitched nose down 5° and was on a heading of 193°. At this time there was also a user input of an altitude of 4,000ft," says the ATSB." [2] Also from the ATSB report: [3] "Six weeks before the accident flight the PIC had used his simulator to fly a route, initially similar to part of the route flown by MH370 up the Strait of Malacca, with a left-hand turn and track into the southern Indian Ocean." "There were enough similarities to the flightpath of MH370 for the ATSB to carefully consider the possible implications for the underwater search area. These considerations included the impact on the search area if the aircraft had been either glided after fuel exhaustion or ditched under power prior to fuel exhaustion with active control of the aircraft from the cockpit." [1] https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/call-of-the-void-seven-years-on-what-do-we-know-about-the-disappearance-of-malaysia-airlines-77fa5244bf99 https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/call-of-the-void-seven-y... [2] https://www.flightglobal.com/atsb-details-mh370-captains-simulation-of-indian-ocean-route/125588.article https://www.flightglobal.com/atsb-details-mh370-captains-sim... [3] https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/5773565/operational-search-for-mh370_final_3oct2017.pdf https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/5773565/operational-search-for...
  - Steko 5y ago
    "In fact, the FBI said it found nothing incriminating in the computer simulations, and certainly nothing that came close to the erratic course that the flight first followed." That seems pretty persuasive. The Atlantic article guesses that the simulation was meant "to leave a bread-crumb trail to say goodbye." which seems laughably weak.
    - fanzhang 5y ago
      'Nothing incriminating" doesn't mean it it should be fully discounted. The suicide theory is the strongest one in absence of a better explanation.
    - batushka3 5y ago
      The FBI didn't found anything incriminating, when tourists from Saudi Barbaria were learning just to point plane to desired destination, without any interest in landing or taking off.
- metacritic12 5y ago
  What alternative theory do you have that would pass the sniff test better? Given the facts, the suicide theory seems like the leading one by occam's razor.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- mannykannot 5y ago
  In that response, Irving is weak-manning Langewiesche's article, by attacking only the weakest, most speculative parts. As Argonaut says, it is mostly concerned with the point that Langewiesche is speculating about the captain's state of mind and motives. Irving makes no attempt to explain the inconvenient fact that someone activated the Inmarsat system and turned the airplane south an hour after it could have landed at Kota Bharu or Penang. In addition, Irving has no qualms over speculating when it seems to suit his purpose. He claims that the rational choice for someone wanting to disappear would be to head east, ignoring the fact that one has to go further in that direction to reach the open ocean while avoiding radar. Irving concludes by making an issue of the fact that the section of flap that washed up in Tanzania was not deployed at the time of impact, which is an utter non-sequitur. The thing is that once you have compelling technical evidence that the disappearance was not accidental, it is reasonable to speculate about motives, and the weakness of those speculations does not weaken the independent case that it was no accident.
DaiPlusPlus 5y ago
> Malaysia's Air Force doesn't want their role in failing to manage the event If I understand it correctly, they weren't operating their radar on a 24/7 basis - but don't want to admit that - which is crazy...
- Giorgi 5y ago
  Yeah that and huge amount of other mishandling details and chain of mismanagement after the incident.
RickJWagner 5y ago
I just don't understand why the pilot would have taken such elaborate measures to get to where they plane went. To hide the wreckage and cast doubt on the happenings? If that's the purpose, it seems to have been in vain. He could have simply nose-dived the plane to the water at any point. Why bother with all the evasiveness?
- professorsnep 5y ago
  From what I understand, the theory is that the route was specifically designed so that nobody would have known where it went. No evidence, no crime. By just nose-diving, it makes it easier to find that evidence (like the black boxes). At the time, not a lot of pilots knew about the feature of the satellite communication unit that would allow investigators to estimate a track over the southern Indian Ocean. Without that, nobody would have known where the plane went after it left military radar range.
  - jonny_eh 5y ago
    But why? To keep the life insurance?

gustavo-fring 5y ago

Gives me some Breaking Bad vibes (the traffic controller) down to the discussion about accountability for why he was working.

Steko 5y ago

I didn't find it compelling at all. It mostly just makes a lot of assumptions and piles them all onto a suicide pilot theory that can be used to explain any action needed and has become unfalsifiable without recovering the wreckage. Here's a counterpoint: https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-atlantics-william-langewiesche-dusts-off-discredited-conspiracy-theory-to-accuse-mh370-pilot-of-hijacking https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-atlantics-william-langewie...

argonaut 5y ago
The counterpoint spends most of its words (rightfully) dismissing analysis of the pilot's psychology but does not persuasively address the flight simulator evidence. The arguments against that evidence mostly amount to how it is not conclusively incriminating. But this is not a court of law - we are not putting him on trial.
- hugh-avherald 5y ago
  As someone who's used flight simulator games, I have definitely left the computer while cruising, forgotten about the flight, and come back to find myself in the middle of nowhere. Also the smoking gun simulator session was in a different aircraft to MH370 and with a significantly different initial route.
  - ddeck 5y ago
    >I have definitely left the computer while cruising, forgotten about the flight If the reporting is credible, that's not what was found: "the track wasn’t really a track — rather, it was a series of brief clips lasting no more than a few seconds each, indicating that Zaharie had programmed it in advance then skipped along it to various points without actually playing through the entire hours-long flight" [1] >Also the smoking gun simulator session was in a different aircraft to MH370 and with a significantly different initial route. It was effectively the same aircraft (777-200LR vs 777-200ER). From the ATSB report: "It comprised four complete and two partial data captures of various aircraft and simulator parameters at discrete points during the simulation. The aircraft simulated was a 777-200LR The initial data point shows the simulated aircraft at Kuala Lumpur International airport. No useful location data was available from the second data point. The next two data points show that the aircraft had flown north up the Straits of Malacca. By the fourth data point the simulated aircraft had reached 40,000ft, was in a 20° left bank, 4° nose down, and had a southwest heading of 255°. Data points five and six were in the far reaches of the Indian Ocean, 820nm southwest of Australia's, Cape Leeuwin, with the simulated aircraft having exhausted its fuel. Data point five has the simulated 777 at 37,651ft, at an 11° right bank, and almost due south heading of 178°. The sixth, and final, data point was incomplete. "It was 2.5nm from the previous data point and the aircraft right bank had reduced to 3°.The aircraft was pitched nose down 5° and was on a heading of 193°. At this time there was also a user input of an altitude of 4,000ft," says the ATSB." [2] Also from the ATSB report: [3] "Six weeks before the accident flight the PIC had used his simulator to fly a route, initially similar to part of the route flown by MH370 up the Strait of Malacca, with a left-hand turn and track into the southern Indian Ocean." "There were enough similarities to the flightpath of MH370 for the ATSB to carefully consider the possible implications for the underwater search area. These considerations included the impact on the search area if the aircraft had been either glided after fuel exhaustion or ditched under power prior to fuel exhaustion with active control of the aircraft from the cockpit." [1] https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/call-of-the-void-seven-years-on-what-do-we-know-about-the-disappearance-of-malaysia-airlines-77fa5244bf99 https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/call-of-the-void-seven-y... [2] https://www.flightglobal.com/atsb-details-mh370-captains-simulation-of-indian-ocean-route/125588.article https://www.flightglobal.com/atsb-details-mh370-captains-sim... [3] https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/5773565/operational-search-for-mh370_final_3oct2017.pdf https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/5773565/operational-search-for...
- Steko 5y ago
  "In fact, the FBI said it found nothing incriminating in the computer simulations, and certainly nothing that came close to the erratic course that the flight first followed." That seems pretty persuasive. The Atlantic article guesses that the simulation was meant "to leave a bread-crumb trail to say goodbye." which seems laughably weak.
  - fanzhang 5y ago
    'Nothing incriminating" doesn't mean it it should be fully discounted. The suicide theory is the strongest one in absence of a better explanation.
  - batushka3 5y ago
    The FBI didn't found anything incriminating, when tourists from Saudi Barbaria were learning just to point plane to desired destination, without any interest in landing or taking off.
metacritic12 5y ago
What alternative theory do you have that would pass the sniff test better? Given the facts, the suicide theory seems like the leading one by occam's razor.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
mannykannot 5y ago
In that response, Irving is weak-manning Langewiesche's article, by attacking only the weakest, most speculative parts. As Argonaut says, it is mostly concerned with the point that Langewiesche is speculating about the captain's state of mind and motives. Irving makes no attempt to explain the inconvenient fact that someone activated the Inmarsat system and turned the airplane south an hour after it could have landed at Kota Bharu or Penang. In addition, Irving has no qualms over speculating when it seems to suit his purpose. He claims that the rational choice for someone wanting to disappear would be to head east, ignoring the fact that one has to go further in that direction to reach the open ocean while avoiding radar. Irving concludes by making an issue of the fact that the section of flap that washed up in Tanzania was not deployed at the time of impact, which is an utter non-sequitur. The thing is that once you have compelling technical evidence that the disappearance was not accidental, it is reasonable to speculate about motives, and the weakness of those speculations does not weaken the independent case that it was no accident.

DaiPlusPlus 5y ago

> Malaysia's Air Force doesn't want their role in failing to manage the event If I understand it correctly, they weren't operating their radar on a 24/7 basis - but don't want to admit that - which is crazy...

Giorgi 5y ago
Yeah that and huge amount of other mishandling details and chain of mismanagement after the incident.

RickJWagner 5y ago

I just don't understand why the pilot would have taken such elaborate measures to get to where they plane went. To hide the wreckage and cast doubt on the happenings? If that's the purpose, it seems to have been in vain. He could have simply nose-dived the plane to the water at any point. Why bother with all the evasiveness?

professorsnep 5y ago
From what I understand, the theory is that the route was specifically designed so that nobody would have known where it went. No evidence, no crime. By just nose-diving, it makes it easier to find that evidence (like the black boxes). At the time, not a lot of pilots knew about the feature of the satellite communication unit that would allow investigators to estimate a track over the southern Indian Ocean. Without that, nobody would have known where the plane went after it left military radar range.
- jonny_eh 5y ago
  But why? To keep the life insurance?