The Malaysia Airline Flight 370 has now reached epic conspiracy theory status.  Authorities are searching an area the size of the United States.  Some theories have this plane flown to a secret airstrip where terrorists can use it as some super weapon.  I even heard one report that Israel was practicing air defense against such an attack, just in case.  I obviously have no more information than anyone else, but this did remind me of a couple of personal experiences.

As a combat crew member I was on several aircraft that experienced fires and on two planes that suffered an explosive decompression.  Because of those experiences, some of the things described in the media were consistent with my personal experience.

The only thing we know for sure is that some electrical components, such as a transponder, started to fail prior to the last word from the pilot.  If there was an electrical fire, it is possible that some of these failures happened without the pilots being aware that it was happening.  By the time they did know there was a fire, they may have lost all ability to communicate with anyone.

If there was a fire, the pilot would almost certain program the flight computer to take the plane to the nearest emergency airfield.  There was a report on the news today that the new route took the airplane directly over a 13,000 ft. runway that would definitely serve as an appropriate alternate.   So, the turn of the plane would be entirely consistent with the pilot reversing course and seeking an emergency landing field.

If there was a fire and the location cannot be reached by fire extinguishers a pilot might very well decide to take the airplane to maximum altitude to try and starve the fire of oxygen.  There are reports that this aircraft climbed to 45,000 ft., above the service ceiling of the airplane.  That maneuver would make sense if the pilot was trying to put out a fire.  I have been on a plane when this exact maneuver was used by the pilot to put out an electrical fire.

If at the time the aircraft reached 45,000 ft. there was a failure in the pressurization system the pilot would put the plane into a steep dive to try and get back to a survivable altitude. Keep in mind that 45,000 ft.  Is above the service limit for this aircraft.   There is one report that the plane descended from 45,000 ft. to 5,000 ft. in about a minute.  I have been on aircraft that did exactly that as the result of an explosive decompression.  We were flying at 40,000 ft. in a combat zone when our plane suffered an explosive decompression.  Since this was a military aircraft we were all wearing helmets with oxygen masks attached and we were trained at pressure breathing.  That meant that the pilot had a little more time to get the plane down to a safe altitude than a civilian aircraft.  Even so, we went in a steep dive, in both cases, because the pilot wanted to get us down to a safe altitude.  If there was a decompression at 45,000 ft. it would make sense for the pilot to want to get down to a lower altitude as soon as possible.  A plane in a controlled dive can go a lot faster than a falling object.

Apparently then the plane leveled off at 23,000 ft. and flew on.  If that route had been pre-programmed into the computer this also makes sense.  That reminded me of the Paine Stewart plane.  That crew suffered a decompression and the pilot and crew all died.  But the plane flew on for hours eventually crashing after it ran out of fuel.

I hesitated to mention my theory, in view of all the expert opinions, until I read the following article in wired.com:

http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/03/mh370-electrical-fire/

It turns out that I was not the only one who thought about this.  Obviously, Chris Goodfellow has done a lot more research and is a lot more qualified than me.  I don’t know if he is right or not.  But I do know that all of the conspiracy theories require a ton of incredible coordination and miraculous piloting skills. Sometimes, what is obviously true is obviously true.

TDM