Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 Update: New Evidence Found Points to Hijacking, Was Crew Involved?
The airliner flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing may have been hijacked, according to officials. The Boeing 777 carrying 239 passengers and crew, the majority of whom are Chinese, lost communications two hours into its flight. New developments may bring the fate of the missing plane to light.
Days following the plane's disappearance, reports poured in with different information. It has now been concluded, according to CBS, that the plane could have possibly been hijacked. Malaysian officials say the investigation has now switched to focus on the crew. They are looking for potential reason or evidence that one or multiple crewmembers may have wanted to take over the plane, says CBS.
Following the plane's disappearance, which has been now deemed as deliberate, it flew erratically towards the Indian Ocean. Data sent from the plane's Rolls Royce engines showed that the plane changed altitudes quickly, according to the New York Times. The plane first ascended to 45,000 feet after it changed direction and turned off its transponder. Malaysian military radar tracked the aircraft and also recorded its descent to 23,000 feet while heading northwest towards the Indian Ocean. The plane's last reported altitude was 29,500 feet.
This latest information dismisses the possibility of an accident and crashing into the South China Sea. US officials stated Friday that they are investigating the possibility of "human intervention," according to CBS. They added that it might have been an act of piracy. The malfunction of both the transponder and the messaging system within 12 minutes of each other seems far too unlikely, according to officials.
Nothing can be certain since the plane's communication systems were turned off, but that action points towards a hijacking of the plane. Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Razak has said that shutting off the communication devices and the erratic flight path are "movements ... consistent with deliberate action of someone on the plane." Though he did not explicitly say the pane was hijacked, he emphasized that all possibilities are being investigated.
Yet, according to CBS, an official who wanted to remain anonymous said that the investigation has now switched to focus on the possibility of a hijacking and that the plane may have landed somewhere. Prime Minister Razak stated that the plane could have followed two paths: one through Indonesia and into the Indian Ocean or through Northern Thailand towards Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. According to the BBC, investigators will try to obtain radar information from all the countries the plane may have flown over, which include Thailand, Myanmar, Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India and Pakistan.