Missing flights and the Asian Bermuda Triangle - Conspiracy Theory

By: L. Maksoud

Flight 370, or, MH370 was a scheduled flight operated by Malaysia Airlines which disappeared on the 8th of March 2014. It mysteriously vanished while traveling from Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia to Beijing. The final communication from the aircraft to one of the control towers was thirty-eight minutes after take-off while the plane was over the South China Sea. The plane was lost from radar screens merely moments after, only to be spotted by military trackers an hour later, moving towards the opposite direction from its original course. The monitor also showed that the plane was flying at an impossible 58,000ft, when a Boeing, a plane of that nature, can only reach 44,000ft. There were over two-hundred people on board, and there has been no sign of them since then.

The disappearance of flight 370 led to one of the largest search missions ever, backed up by Australian, American, Malaysian and Chinese investigators for a period of 4 years. But until this day, no clues about what happened to this ghost plane have risen. But the following are the conspiracy theories about what could have happened to it.

The least crazy, by default, of these conspiracy theories, is one that outlines that the plane was shot down, most likely by Russians, as the only aircraft which could reach the absurd 58,000ft would be a Russian jet plane, the Sukhoi SU 30, which may have been the one seen on the monitor. This conspiracy is also backed up by physical evidence, as a few weeks after the disappearance, an Australian man made a claim that the plane had been shot down with proof from Google Maps. The man, Peter McMahon, a mechanical engineer, spent years combining images he had collected from the website in search for the aircraft, managing to find the wreckage in an area that the Americans refused to search, confirming that the plane indeed was covered with bullet holes. The images were taken to the Civil Aviation Authority in Malaysia, analyzed, but found to be “baseless”.  

Another theory, my favorite for this issue, is one that contemplates whether there was a mysterious extra passenger onboard who hijacked the flight and propelled it towards the sea. The idea first emerged on the day a lawsuit was filed by the USA on behalf of all the families which lost loved ones to the “accident”. The plane’s official manifest stated that 239 people went missing, however, an investigator stated that there were only 238 people on the flight. “So now, we have an ‘extra’ person on board MH370”, the investigator told a newspaper.  

Of course, no conspiracy regarding a disappearance would be the same without some paranormal implications from the public. One of the most popular theories of the Malaysian flight is that the plane disappeared in the “Pacific Bermuda Triangle” also known as Devil’s sea. Since 1989, over 700 people have reportedly “disappeared” in the area, which expands all the way from the Japanese coast to the rest of Southeast Asia. In fact, while investigating the activity of an undersea volcano, a Japanese research vessel carrying 31 people was destroyed in that particular area, exemplifying the uncanny theory. Another piece of evidence was even pointed out by a Malaysian minister, who stated that the so-called Devil’s sea is located exactly on the opposite side of the globe to the Bermuda Triangle (or at least, eerily close), another mysterious disappearance spot.
   
Several conspiracy theories resonate on whether the most incognito nation on Earth, North Korea, should be dragged into this search or not. The claim originated from South Korea, as three days before the disappearance, a Chinese Southern Airlines plane crossed through a North Korean missile trajectory and was nearly taken down. Some believe that Pyongyang, North Korea’s capital city, shot the plane down,with the specific reasons unknown. But kidnapping scandals are not new to the nation. Back in the 80’s, South Korean film director Shin-Sang Ok was taken along with his wife and actress Choi Eun Hee by the riders of leader-in-waiting Kim Jong Il. Why? Because Kim wanted them to make a movie for them. Maybe the current North Korean leader believed that the 238… or 239 people in flight MH370 could potentially star in his new movie. We can never know what a nation which believes that they have the cure for cancer and AIDS in a single pill is thinking about.

Some say the plane is on the moon, some say that it was captured by aliens, some by North Koreans. James Cameron stated that “We know more about the surface of Mars… than we do of our deepest oceans.” and that it is “No surprise” that the plane hasn’t been uncovered yet. Even years after the occurrence, people are still searching, finding new evidence by the second (in fact, just two days ago a man found through satellite images what he believes to be the engine and cockpit of the missing plane, deep in a Cambodian jungle). I personally don’t think that the plane crashed into the sea, as the passenger's phones rang for four days after the disappearance.  

It is said that the last words heard from the plane’s speakers were “Goodnight Malaysian flight three seven zero.”