Yours truly on Real Clear Science

It's still amazing that such a large plane disappeared.  I suppose it was only a matter of time until conditions nefarious or otherwise were just right for this sort of a disappearance.  Anyway, interesting take on the incident.  I agree some type of fire must have disabled electrical systems enough to lose contact and obviously lose the plane as well.  As far as not finding any debris I think that may be because the plane made a controlled descent and "landing" somewhere in the ocean so if/when we find the plane we will find all of it.  Maybe...

The controlled decent idea is possible, depending on the sequence of events when the engines failed. The B777 has a very effective yaw damper, so much so that engine failures are non events. It's my guess that the airplane hit and sunk quickly, in whole or in parts.

It will be found, it's just a question of when.

Since you guys know what happened why don't you clue the world in on where the plane is too?

Lots of accident investigations are concluded with a probable cause and no recovered airplane. In this case, because no passenger or Crew member has so far come back as suspicious, the sudden loss of communication and a turn toward two suitable airports coupled with a decent, we have some idea of what "may" have happened. That pattern of actions has happened before, dozens of times and in every case it was an electro-mechanical event that triggered the crews reaction.

I was clear in my article that we will not know for sure what happened until the airframe is located, other parts of the investigation can clue us in on what might have occurred.

But to answer your question, so far the data points all show it's on the bottom of the Indian Ocean.

No offense OP but anything and everything is pure speculation. Any of us could just reach up and grab a reason the plane disappeared at this point and no one could really say it didn't happen. I've read and heard everything short of alien abduction and I'm sure somewhere, someone has claimed that has a possibility too.

Understood and none taken, we have had hundreds of aircraft crashes and incidents through the years. Obviously  a pattern has emerged that leads guys like me who have been involved in investigations and debriefs to compare them to prior events.

In this case, without a clear indication of nefarious intent on the part of the crew and passengers that has yet been exposed (and trust me, this investigation has been full of leaks) that leads me to just a couple of possible conclusions based on past experiences and the most likely flight path. That is why I wrote the article, where in it I stated we will not come up with a probable cause until the airframe is located and recovered.

They all do have a clue, in the ocean.  More like finding a hair in a haystack than a needle.  


I thought this was going to be about radar cross section.

I too was expecting something about the radar cross section of an airliner and an analysis of how far offshore it could be seen.  Then the elevation resolution of the atc radar would determine the altitude accuracy.  Then what about the radar bending over the horizon....  

But alas, it was a spam for an unsubstantiated theory posted on a website called "real clear science".  The irony was not lost on me.