MH370 Hilang: Kita Masih Di Dalam Kegelapan?

Why are we still in the dark about Malaysia Airlines disappearance?

By Harriet Alexander
1:48PM GMT 09 Mar 2014

Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 disappeared in the early hours of Saturday, yet it was a modern aircraft, from a reputable airline, flying in good weather. What could have gone wrong?

Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah is described by friends as an 'aviation tech geek' who loved his job

The disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 has left agonised relatives waiting for over 48 hours without answers – and the rest of the world has been asking how the plane could have dropped off the radar, seemingly without trace.

It was flying in clear weather. The Boeing 777-200 plane was only 11 years old, and considered one of the safest in the skies. It was also at "cruise" level, having already completed the statistically-higher-risk take off.

Furthermore, the pilot, 53-year-old Zaharie Ahmad Shah, was highly experienced and described by friends as an "aviation tech geek" who loved his job so much he even spent his days off tinkering with a flight simulator he had set up at home.

"He was an aviation tech geek. You could ask him anything and he would help you. That is the kind of guy he is," said a Malaysia Airlines co-pilot who had flown with Capt Zaharie in the past.

"We used to tease him. We would ask him, why are you bringing your work home," said another pilot who knew Capt Zaharie for 20 years. "He knew everything about the Boeing 777. Something significant would have had to happen for Zaharie and the plane to go missing. It would have to be total electrical failure."

Other questions have been raised as to why there has been no wreckage seen yet; why there was no distress call; and about the four stolen passports used to board the flights

An oil slick spotted off the coast of Vietnam while searching for the missing plane (EPA)

"At this early stage, we're focusing on the facts that we don't know," said Todd Curtis, a former safety engineer with Boeing who worked on its 777 jumbo jets and is now director of the Airsafe.com Foundation.

The significance of the four faked passports – one from Italy, one from Austria, and two believed to be Chinese – is not yet known.

The Home Office says that 298,055 British passports were reported lost or stolen in the year 2011/12 – the most recent data available.

"The issue of the passports is not at all conclusive," said David Learmount, operations and safety editor for Flight International. "Thousands of faked passports are in circulation – usually to get into another country, or hide yourself. Bringing down jet planes is not normally a reason for this."

And he added that the immediate lack of information in the aftermath of the disappearance was not unusual.

"All we can say for certain is that this is not unheard of," he told The Telegraph. "We just have to accept that, for the moment, we do not know what has happened."

He explained that there were a series of similarities in the circumstances of the Air France flight, which crashed into the Atlantic in June 2009 as a result of pilot error.

Both the Air France and the Malaysia Airlines flight disappeared off the radar in the early hours of the morning – a time when all humans are least able to react to challenging situations. Both accidents happened in the cruise section of the flight. Both airlines are highly regarded, and flying modern, well-maintained planes.

And both sets of pilots failed to send distress calls.

"With the Air France case, their plane sent signals to Paris – so they already knew that some of the flight instruments were not working," he said. "Malaysia Airlines might have similar information but not be releasing it.

"It's also worth remembering that it took two days for any Air France wreckage to be found – and two years for the full operation to be completed."