Malaysia Airlines Loses Contact With 777 en Route to Beijing

[James Bond]

Unofficlal reports are 9M-MRO delivered in 2002.

It is and it's the same aircraft involved in this

http://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=147571

[B757300]

News conference coming up in about 15 minutes according to Fox and CNN.

[James Bond]

Unconfirmed reports that it landed safely in Nanming, China

I find this hard to believe but I sure hope I'm wrong.

edit: Probably nonsense. China says it never showed up in their airspace.

[James Bond]

flightradar24 has it over the ocean, while flightaware does not.

Why the difference?

[James Bond]

Notice anything unusual here?

[B757300]

"Bowing"

That's what you get with Piers Morgan. There is a reason CNN is getting rid of him.

That said, China has said that it has not landed in their country.

[B757300]

The media really makes a head hurt.

I'm no expert on aviation, but I often know more than the so called "experts" they dig up.

[Darren Howie]

Having flown over the Gulf if Thailand many times no doubt it will turn up soon.
The Gulf is full of thousands and i mean thousands of fishing boats.
Enough that you coukd almost mistake the water for a star filled sky.
The weather in my experience is generally fairly benign this time of year with the monsoon in the Southern hemisphere.
Ho Chi Monh uses datalink for primary comms so getting out a distress message would not be as easy as via Vhfut a call should of if possible been put out on vhf anyway.
Sounds sudden..guess we will find out at some point soon but i doubt it will be long just due to the incredible number of shipping traffic.

[B757300]

According to the BBC, the aircraft lost contact with Ho Chi Minh City Air Traffic Control at 01:20am local time.

[AVION1]

I wonder if they are equipped with a cospas/sarsat ELT?

[James Bond]

Flight & cabin crew for MH370

[Gabriel]

The flight was piloted by Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah, a Malaysian aged 53. He has a total flying hours of 18,365hours. He joined Malaysia Airlines in 1981. First officer, Fariq Ab.Hamid, a Malaysian, is aged 27. He has a total flying hours of 2,763 hours. He joined Malaysia Airlines in 2007.

http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/my/e...dark-site.html

[James Bond]

Reports that a signal has been detected 120 miles southwest of Ca Mau province. This from a Chinese news agency.

Not sure how reliable this is.

[B757300]

Reports that a signal has been detected 120 miles southwest of Ca Mau province. This from a Chinese news agency.

Not sure how reliable this is.

Denied, according to Reuters.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/...0M505Z20140308

[AVION1]

Citizens of Ukraine aboard.

Those aboard included 153 Chinese citizens, including one infant, 38 Malaysian citizens, 12 Indonesian citizens, seven Australian citizens, four American citizens, including one infant, two citizens each from New Zealand, Canada and Ukraine and one each from Russia, Italy, Taiwan, the Netherlands and Austria.

[James Bond]

Vietnamese Navy Admiral Ngo Van Phat, Commander of the Region 5 on Vietnamese News service Tuoi Tre:

Our radar recorded that the plane crashed into the sea at a location 153 miles South of Phu Quoc

https://twitter.com/YahooSG/status/442161848331153409

[Gabriel]

According to The Aviation Herald's radar data the aircraft was last regularly seen at 17:22Z (01:22L) about half way between Kuala Lumpur and Ho Chi Minh City (Vietnam) at FL350 over the Gulf of Thailand about 260nm northnortheast of Kuala Lumpur and 160nm northeast of Kota Bharu 40 minutes into the flight, followed by anomalies in the radar data of the aircraft over the next minute (the anomalies may be related to the aircraft but could also be caused by the aircraft leaving the range of the receiver).

Aviation sources in China report that radar data suggest a steep and sudden descent of the aircraft, during which the track of the aircraft changed from 024 degrees to 333 degrees. The aircraft was estimated to contact Ho Chi Minh Control Center (Vietnam) at 01:20L, but contact was never established.

http://www.avherald.com/h?article=4710c69b&opt=0

[TAP-A343]

Tuoi Tre, a leading daily in Vietnam, reports that the Vietnamese Navy has confirmed the plane crashed into the ocean. According to Navy Admiral Ngo Van Phat, Commander of the Region 5, military radar recorded that the plane crashed into the sea at a location 153 miles South of Phu Quoc island.

When contacted, Malaysia Airlines declined to confirm or deny the reports, saying that the Malaysian authorities are working together with the Vietnamese government on the matter.

Meanwhile, Al Jazeera reports that China has dispatched two maritime rescue ships to help locate the missing plane.

http://my.news.yahoo.com/mas-aircraf...023820132.html

[James Bond]

So it's definitely Vietnamese waters?

[AVION1]

Bad news. ELT signal activated.
UPDATE [11:32am]: VN Express, Vietnam's largest news site, reports that Vietnam Emergency Rescue Center just announced it has found signal of the missing plane at 9.50am 120 miles South West of Ca Mau cape, the Southern-most point of Vietnam.

The signal is believed to be the ELT (Emergency Locator Transmitter) , which can be activated manually by the flight crew or automatically upon impact.