Talk:Malaysia Airlines Flight 370/Archive 11

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Two timelines

I think having two timelines is redundant in this case due to article's size. To save the room for future developments and per WP:ANOTHER it could be better to leave just the timeline of disappearance, putting a wikilink for Timeline of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 there. The events of general timeline are already in the text anyway and the listy format eats more space than plain prose. Brandmeister^talk 09:01, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

The content of Timeline of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 was split from the "Timeline of events" section of this article. According to Wikipedia:Splitting#Procedure: "In general, if the split is due to size, then a summary section is required." When using Summary style, "The original article should contain a section with a summary of the subtopic's article as well as a link to it." The timeline section has 15 significant events relevant to Flight 370, while Timeline of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has 63 events on 51 days (and is incomplete). So I think the timeline section is appropriate use of summary style.

Regarding article length, I think that the length of the article is actually a good reason to have this section. The events are already in the text, but are buried in lots of prose. "Readability is a key criterion" (see: Wikipedia:Article size#Readability issues) when considering the size of the article. The timeline makes it easier for people skimming through the article. Furthermore, the article is currently at 56 kB (8898 words) "readable prose size" (using this tool). According to Wikipedia:Article size#Size guideline: articles over 50 kB readable prose size "May need to be divided (likelihood goes up with size)" and articles over 60 kB readable prose size "Probably should be divided (although the scope of a topic can sometimes justify the added reading material)". This article is not too long, it is comprehensive. There are no more sections which are long enough to be split (and noteworthy enough to be a separate article). The length of the article is acceptable. It is comprehensive and all it needs is one small section to be expanded ("Blackboxes") and a copyedit before it's ready for a Good article nomination. Some further cleanup and a little expansion and hopefully it can become a Featured article. AHeneen (talk) 11:23, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Notes for the Good Article review

To the reviewer:

One thing that a review may think is a problem is stability, but I'll explain why that's not a problem. Regarding stability, there are actually two different issues: the stability of the article over time (frequent edits) and, since the subject hasn't been found, what happens if the aircraft is found.

The article attracts edits whenever something about Flight 370 is in the news, such as happened around the end of December (starting 28 December) and early January after Indonesia AirAsia Flight 8501 crashed and Flight 370 was brought up in the media. This takes the form of vandalism (reverted); good-faith edits that are incorrect, speculation, or don't come from reliable sources (these are mostly reverted, otherwise they're fixed); and a lot of copyedits. Please bear in mind that this is a high-traffic article, receiving 754,000 views in the 90 days before the GAN (24 Oct-21 Jan). Between 28-31 December, this page received nearly 224,000 views and given the bizarre/mysterious circumstances of its disappearance, it naturally attracts edits that introduce speculation and information from unreliable sources. Editing of the article has quieted down, but this will certainly occur around the one-year anniversary of Flight 370's disappearance in March (hopefully the GAN can be completed by then). Vandalism and copyedits don't count against stability, according to the Good article criteria, and I don't think the good-faith edits adding speculation or unreliable information should be counted against the article's stability.

The only significant changes to the article's content recently was the removal of two large sections ([1]) to Search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, just a few hours after the user suggested the move on the talk page (and no one replied before it was moved; note that this was a few hours after ). The first of those sections, "Analysis of satellite communications", I had planned to split and was working on a draft of Analysis of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 satellite communications at the time, so didn't bother raising an issue about moving that section. I finished the draft and re-inserted that section as a summary-style overview. The other section that was moved was "Analysis of hydroacoustic data" (now here); since that section clearly dealt with the search, the move was appropriate, although consensus should have been reached first. The SATCOM section, however, not only relates to the location of the aircraft (scope of the search article), but also possible in-flight events and the flight path and therefore needs to be mentioned in this article. There was also a brief dispute over the inclusion of the timeline section, see the above discussion "Two timelines". There are no ongoing edit wars, outstanding disputes about content, or significant changes to the article's content.

The last couple of months, you will see a lot of edits by me, which have added missing content and cleaned-up the article in preparation for the GAN, so that too shouldn't count against the article's stability. I'll continue making improvements to the article as I come across news or old information that I missed and feel should be added .

Now on to the other stability issue. The plane hasn't been found and there's still a search going on for it, so major changes will be made to this article, right? Not exactly. First of all, there is a separate article for the search and only a summary style-section is in this article. As the search progresses, most information will be added to the search article, not here. As far as finding the aircraft and this article needing to be expanded with information about the causes of the accident, you have to consider the time-frame and how much content needs to be added at what point. If pieces of the aircraft are found tomorrow, it will take weeks to map the debris field, after which officials will determine which pieces are a priority to raise and analyze. At that point, there really would not be much to add to this article beyond adding the coordinates and changing some sentences to reflect that the aircraft did crash and that the location is known. That alone will take a few months. Some details may emerge as the wreckage is explored and raised, for example only one body may be in the cockpit, suggesting a hijacking, or the air bags may have been deployed, supporting the hypoxia scenario. Most likely, however, there will only be a few details, disclosed/learned over an extended period of time, that would require just a little addition of content to this article. The article will need to be expanded with a modest amount of content when the final report (or any significant preliminary report) is released and it will take a year or, likely, a few years for the investigation to be conducted once the aircraft is found. Of course, this all depends on the aircraft being found. Therefore, if promoted to a GA, the GA status would not be threatened by the aircraft being found, so long as editors add new information (info about the search goes in the search article). The article may fall below GA status if it is not updated quickly after the final report is issued, but that may not occur for several years. AHeneen (talk) 22:55, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

Recent Changes

Originally posted to the talk apge of @Spongebob1944:, copying here for a more in depth discussion.

Hi, I'm going to remind you that Wikipedia works a lot on consensus building and discussions among the community. It might be your belief that passengers on MH370 are dead, it might be my belief that they are being held hostage, it might be someone else's belief that they have been abducted by aliens. Please DO NOT make such drastic edits without discussing it on the talk page of the article, in this case Talk:MH370. --Rsrikanth05 (talk) 06:28, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

Contrary to what you believe, I do not think that I made a drastic edit. To say that anyone on that aircraft is absurd. Sonar radar has showed that it is on the bottom of the Indian Ocean. For anyone to say that anyone survived is outrages. Whatever your personal belief on this is, I cannot and will not change my edits based on one person. If you really wanted to confirm that everyone for sure is dead that could take months, years, or even decades. The wreckage may quite possibly never be found. It is still my belief that the fatalities and survivors section can be filled, but I will not edit the Flight 370 page again, because you will be mad. Don't take anything I said offensive, I'm just stating my personal beliefs. I wish you well, and together we can share our love for being Wikipedia editors. Thank you very much.- Spongebob1944

This is precisely it is a 'drastic edit'. Because you believe that anyone who survived is absurd in the absence of any source stating the reality [which nobody knows]. --Rsrikanth05 (talk) 07:38, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

We dont actually known what happened to the passengers and the article should reflect that which is why both fatalities and survivors bit of the infobox are both blank. MilborneOne (talk) 16:16, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

I just think we should cut the excess information and make another page about the search, since it's the main thing in the article and it's overflowing. The Very Random Guy (talk) 06:26, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

A bit like the existing Search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370? MilborneOne (talk) 11:08, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

What "excess information" & how is it overflowing? The article is currently at 50 kB (8074 words) "readable prose size" (using this tool), which is exactly the length threshold at which an article "May need to be divided (likelihood goes up with size)" (emphasis added). This article is comprehensive, not too long. AHeneen (talk) 00:43, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

citation from Spongebob1944: "..Sonar radar has showed that it is on the bottom of the Indian Ocean." At least this is wrong. So you should reopen the discussion and reinsert modified text blocks as long as your arguments aren't worth the ASCII weight of it.--Cosy-ch (talk) 15:33, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

Malaysia declares flight disappearance an accident

As per this BBC article: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-31039460 It says to not edit this page without discussion, and I am not experienced with citations, so I am reluctant to add, but wanted to note here. --rachel (talk) 19:51, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Apologies, I just added it. I don't see why it should be contentious. It's just a fact. But any update of the cause in the info box probably needs discussion. Martinevans123 (talk) 19:52, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

@Martinevans123:, yes, it probably does. Now would seem to be a good time to initiate that discussion (below). 19:57, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Infobox summary

With the official declaration that the disappearance is an accident, maybe it is now time to examine the wording of the infobox summary. I suggest that it be changed from "missing" to "missing, presumed crashed". No attempt should be made at adding a cause yet, as we cannot know for certain what the cause was. Mjroots (talk) 19:57, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Agree. Martinevans123 (talk) 20:17, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Dont have a problem with the change but just note that the declaration was made so the families can make insurance claims, the Malaysians dont actually now any more about the Flight or what happened. MilborneOne (talk) 20:24, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Yes, the source says: "He [BBC's transport correspondent Richard Westcott] says it is a legal move designed to help families claim compensation." Martinevans123 (talk) 21:44, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

"Missing, presumed crashed" is ok. Missing should still link to List of aerial disappearances, though, because that's the best description of this incident. I reverted a change to Hull loss (which was piped as "Lost"), which describes just about every aviation incident that is notable enough to have a Wikipedia article. Is there an appropriate link for "presumed crashed"? AHeneen (talk) 23:53, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

You're wrong: the assurance company was begining to pay out victims from 18th of march 2014 on!! that was just 10 days from the take-off and dismiss !!! Source is the top serious german 'Handelsblatt', as well as the (german) company itself: Allianz GmbH.--Cosy-ch (talk) 15:44, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, who's wrong? Was it AHeneen? Was it me? Was it the BBC? My edit says nothing about insurance claims and the source says nothing about any claims being the first. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:04, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

I think the comment was to MilborneOne. Some ex gratia payments have been made, but the insurance companies have not been paying victims yet. The insurer Allianz paid Malaysia Airlines an initial payment of US$110 million in March 2014. However, the payment to the airline is based on the wording of the insurance policy, while the payments to passenger families is based the wording of laws. It's also relevant to insurance policies that aren't related to the accident. For example, if a passenger has a life insurance policy, that policy will not be paid until the passenger is legally declared dead. The article already states: "On 12 June, Malaysia's deputy Foreign Minister Hamzah Zainuddin said that families of seven passengers received $50,000 advance compensation from Malaysia Airlines, but that full payout would come after the aircraft is found or officially declared lost." AHeneen (talk) 08:04, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

Are you sure that this article is stable enough for a GAN? I was thinking about reviewing this sometime soon, but it looks like the news on this is still rather unpredictable. --Biblioworm 19:35, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

Refer to the preceding section "Notes for the Good Article review". Without repeating all that is in that section, there is no edit warring or content disputes. There really isn't much unpredictable news. On 29 January, Malaysia announced that they were changing the status of Flight 370 from missing to an accident with no survivors. This move concerned the legal status of the flight in accordance with international protocol on accident/incident reporting; officials had stated the same in March 2014, but legally they continued to classify the plane as missing. As you see above, this caused some discussion about how to update the infobox, but was quickly resolved. I managed to fully update the article by 31 January. Again, refer to the above section for comments about the stability of the article. AHeneen (talk) 23:06, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

New York magazine article

• Wise, Jeff. "How crazy am I to think I actually know where that Malaysia Airlines plane is?" (Archive). New York. February 23, 2015.

What in this article may be incorporated? WhisperToMe (talk) 08:52, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Wise's wife is wise. 82.16.87.209 (talk) 17:06, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

I don't think there's really anything that belongs in this article. The theory can be included in Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 unofficial disappearance theories. AHeneen (talk) 20:20, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Sounds good :) WhisperToMe (talk) 22:27, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

New and useful reliable source for insertion

This is a piece from the Associated Press about the discoveries made during the search for this flight. Perhaps an editor more familiar with this article would be better placed than me to insert it. starship.paint ~ ¡Olé! 13:01, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out! That is an interesting article, although some of the things learned are very generic. I don't think there's anything from it to add to this article (plane tracking is already mentioned). We have the article Search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 and the lessons could be added to that article. Improved satellite data could be added to Analysis of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 satellite communications. AHeneen (talk) 14:57, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

Interesting page view statistics

As the first anniversary approaches in less than a week, I think it's interesting how few pageviews there are for the subpages. For the 90-day period 2 December to 1 March (90 days is the most that can be viewed from the page view tool):

• Main (this) article: 753,206 (including about 220,000 in the four days after Indonesia AirAsia Flight 8501 disappeared)
• Unofficial disappearance theories: 121,667 (including about 35,000 in the four days after Indonesia AirAsia Flight 8501 disappeared)
• Search: 15,264
• Timeline: 7,875 (created 14 December)
• Satellite communications: 2,857 (created 6 January)
• JACC: 1,369

While this article should be expected to receive substantially more views than the other pages, I nonetheless find the huge discrepancy between this page (nearly 50x) and the search page very odd. Just though this was worth pointing out on the talk page here...not saying there's anything that needs to be done. AHeneen (talk) 15:27, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

Peer review suggestions

1. Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (numbers), there should be a non-breaking space -   between a number and the unit of measurement. For example, instead of 200kg, use 200 kg, which when you are editing the page, should look like: 200 kg.[?]
2. Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (numbers), please spell out source units of measurements in text; for example, the Moon is 380,000 kilometres (240,000 mi) from Earth.[?] Specifically, an example is 10 km.
3. As per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates), dates shouldn't use th; for example, instead of (if such appeared in the article) using January 30th was a great day, use January 30 was a great day.[?]
4. Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (headings), avoid using special characters (ex: &+{}[]) in headings.
5. Per WP:WIAFA, this article's table of contents (ToC) may be too long – consider shrinking it down by merging short sections or using a proper system of daughter pages as per Wikipedia:Summary style.[?]
6. There are a few occurrences of weasel words in this article- please observe WP:AWT. Certain phrases should specify exactly who supports, considers, believes, etc., such a view. it has been might be weasel words, and should be provided with proper citations (if they already do, or are not weasel terms, please strike this comment).[?]
7. Please make the spelling of English words consistent with either American or British spelling, depending upon the subject of the article. Examples include: behaviour (B) (American: behavior), harbour (B) (American: harbor), meter (A) (British: metre), metre (B) (American: meter), defense (A) (British: defence), defence (B) (American: defense), organize (A) (British: organise), organise (B) (American: organize), recognise (B) (American: recognize), criticise (B) (American: criticize), ization (A) (British: isation), isation (B) (American: ization), analyse (B) (American: analyze), travelled (B) (American: traveled), ageing (B) (American: aging), grey (B) (American: gray), programme (B) (American: program ), sceptic (B) (American: skeptic).
8. The script has spotted the following contractions: isn't, don't, don't, didn't, Don't, can't, don't, HASN'T, doesn't, if these are outside of quotations, they should be expanded.
9. Please provide citations for all of the s.[?]

Copied from peer review bot....--MONGO 21:31, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

I've changed the bullets to numbers to make it much easier to reply (I hope you don't mind). I think 1, 2, 3, 4, and 7 are just general review points given by the tool for all articles. The MOS allows units to be abbreviated if they appear many times; the first instance of "kilometre" is spelled in both lead (which I just changed) & in "Search" section, but this is a well-known abbreviation & the example of 10 km appears further down in the article (it is also used in the convert template). There have been several users using automated scripts go through the article and clean up wrong spellings, non-breaking spaces, and dates. I don't think there are any currently in the article.

The ToC is long (#5), but this is a long article; it already has 3 daughter articles and two related articles (unofficial disappearance theories & JACC). It would be great if #6 gave specific examples (I know this is copied from the review tool); the only places were I think any phrases that could be considered "Weasel words" are used is in the "Aftermath" section, where there are plenty of references. Contractions only appear in a quote and in titles of references (#8). There are no "citation needed" templates in the article (#9). The article has recently been cleaned up as it was recently promoted to good article status. AHeneen (talk) 20:18, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Additional images of exterior of aircraft

A couple users have recently added images of the exterior of the aircraft to the article. Adding any to the "Aircraft" section is problematic because there are images, a Commons template, and table in adjacent sections such that an additional image in this section would look too crowded. I also removed an image of a similar plane from the "Information sharing" section, mainly because there are plenty of images of the actual aircraft that disappeared (9M-MRO). There is already an image of the plane in the infobox. I don't really think more are needed, but if others would like to add any, please discuss the issue here. I think the "Malaysia Airlines" section is the best for another image of the aircraft. AHeneen (talk) 20:26, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

IMO no article of this type needs multiple photos of the same aircraft (let alone a "simmilar" aircraft), crowded or not. This user has tried the same thing in Indonesia AirAsia Flight 8501, never discussing or even writing an edit summary, and I have reverted them there. ―Mandruss ☎ 11:23, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

Agree with Mandruss not needed. MilborneOne (talk) 11:25, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

Dead battery

The report says the ULB battery was dead a year before the flight took place? [2] Martinevans123 (talk) 19:53, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

Expired (past its expiry date), not dead. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:06, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

Ah yes. So no one knows if it was dead or not. But in theory it could have been? Isn't this fact slightly notable? Martinevans123 (talk) 21:19, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

Sure it could have been, but there's no way to know. The content has already been added, here, but it needs some rephrasing and preferably a better source. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:27, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

I'm on the verge of agreeing with you. And the second source just doesn't work. Ideally I think a source should explain what "expired" means in terms of serviceability or likelihood of being functional. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:37, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

I found a New York Times source, which will be an improvement, although it's somewhat fuzzy on the question. I'll work on it. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:43, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

ABC News says this:

"The report also found the battery powering the underwater locator beacon on the plane's flight data recorder was due to expire in December 2012, and there was no evidence to suggest it had been replaced.

However, the battery on the plane's cockpit voice recorder had been replaced and was due to expire in June last year.

It noted that while batteries could still operate past their official expiry they could lose effectiveness, calling it an "oversight"."

[3]. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:52, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

See my edit; moved the information to Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_370#Flight_recorders. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:02, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

@Martinevans123: The passage with your changes bolded: The March 2015 investigative report revealed that the battery for the ULB in MH370's aircraft's flight data recorder had passed its expiry date in December 2012, so that the ULB may not have been functional at the time of the accident.

• "MH370's aircraft's" does not make sense.
• "had" is ok but really a waste of a word.
• My "that ULB" referred to the FDR's ULB as opposed to the CVR's ULB. "So that" is not good grammar. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:38, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

I guess you left, so I copyedited it. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:54, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

There was a bit of an edit conflict there. I don't believe "had" is a "waste of a word", I think it's correct grammar. Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:56, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

Towelette discovered

According to the Australian press, a Malaysian Airlines towelette was found washed up on a beach in western Australia. There is speculation this may be from MH370. Should a mention of this be made in the article? Regards, Illegitimate Barrister 04:10, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

I think we should wait until there is some sort of official remark after testing. It seems very strange that such an object was found in July, but is only now in the news. They say it was handed over to police, but not when (in July? just recently?). I'm inclined to think this is a hoax (it was found in July, but only came to light at the one-year anniversary??). Furthermore, if it entered the water where investigators believe it did, then the currents drift west...not towards Western Australia. If a mention is made it is more appropriate in the Search for Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 article. AHeneen (talk) 04:40, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

Alternate is not a synonym of alternative

The word "alternate" means "every other", whereas "an alternative" is an option or a choice. Use of "alternate" is therefore incorrect in this context. For guidance, see Wikipedia:Guidance_on_applying_the_Manual_of_Style#Choice_of_words. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 19:57, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

You didn't say what context you're talking about, but I have brilliantly deduced that you're referring to the use of "alternate airport" (since that's the only use of "alternate" in the article). You're correct from a purely language standpoint. However, the article reflects the standard terminology in the aviation community. See this Google search, which shows that terminology used by authoritative sources including FAA and AOPA. ―Mandruss ☎ 23:22, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

"Alternate [aerodrome]" is also the term used in Annex 6 to the Chicago Convention - hence its prevalence? Alakzi (talk) 23:32, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for internationalizing the concept, and I apologize for my US-centrism! ―Mandruss ☎ 23:37, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

I was referring to this edit. If the term "alternate airports" is being used to mean something other than "every other airport" (the only internationally accepted meaning - with the claimed exception of the Chicago convention), then that meaning could do with an explanation. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 07:25, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

(Replacing an earlier comment,) I'll grant that only the American English dictionary supports interchanging the two words. Unless you can produce an official use of "alternative airport" outside of US aviation, I don't think your argument warrants article space to clarify the term. How about a short footnote following the first use? I would be happy to do that. ―Mandruss ☎ 07:35, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

With any luck, this will be acceptable to all (how often am I that lucky?). Even if it stands for now, I expect it to eventually get removed with the reasoning that many other Wikipedia articles do the same without an explanation. You're welcome to watch this article forever and protect the footnote, referring to the archived copy of this discussion in your revert edit summaries. ―Mandruss ☎ 08:31, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

Good edit. I agree it would be inappropriate to clutter this article with further explanation of the meaning beyond what Mandruss has already done, but surely this must affect multiple articles? I just wonder whether Alternate airport might be worth an article in its own right - or as a section under Chicago Convention? Dondervogel 2 (talk) 09:01, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

See my addition to my previous comment, which I added just before you posted yours. I could see an addition to this Wiktionary entry, where some terms are without separate entries. You have my blessing. ―Mandruss ☎ 09:13, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

I don't think the footnote is necessary. Caveat: yes, I speak AmEng, and this is the first time I learned alternate cannot mean alternative outside AmEng. That being said, Dondervogel 2, not knowing the two words can be synonyms in AmEng, still understood what was meant. The body even mentions the word divert. Therefore, a footnote effectively saying "alternate airport" means exactly what you probably deduced even if you don't speak AmEng is pointless. If further clarification is needed, it is better provided (subtly) in the text. Perhaps by something like the following:

The extra fuel was enough to divert to the first two alternate airports, Jinan Yaoqiang International Airport and Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport, in case landing in Beijing was not possible. The aircraft would have required 4,800 kg (10,600 lb) or 10,700 kg (23,600 lb), respectively, to reach Jinan or Hangzhou from Beijing.

It provides clarification for those not familiar with the term and with poor deduction skills, while also being naturally informative for everyone else. After all, even if you know alternate = alternative in AmEng, you may not understand the purpose of an alternate airport. And there is also an excessive number of notes in this article. -- tariqabjotu 09:50, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

I think the footnote is an acceptable compromise, the word compromise being virtually unknown on this site, but I'll leave the fight to you and others. ―Mandruss ☎ 10:06, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

A bit late to this conversation, but it's worth pointing out that the source (a report issued by Malaysia, using Commonwealth English) uses the term alternate:

ATC flight plan forecast recorded remaining fuel of 11,900 kg at landing, including 7,700 kg of diversion fuel. The first alternate airport, Jinan Yaoqiang International Airport (China), was estimated to be 46 minutes from the diversion point with 4,800 kg fuel required and the second alternate airport, Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport (China) was estimated to be 1 hour 45 minutes with 10,700 kg fuel required.

I think the term "alternate airport" should be used because that is the common term in aviation. Although I think the meaning should be easy to deduce (I too was unaware of the difference between English variations, according to the Oxford dictionary [Eng UK] "chiefly North American another term for alternative."), the footnote is acceptable. AHeneen (talk) 18:16, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

I've wikilinked "alternate airport" to Flight plan#Alternate airports and adjusted the sentence wording to avoid having adjacent wikilinks. I think this is a much better solution than the footnote. I would like to get this article to A-class or FA class in the coming months and I think that a footnote here is odd and that most people reading the footnote would find it odd to define an "alternate airport", so I think wikilinking is the best solution. I've removed the footnote, but it can be re-inserted if others feel it's appropriate. AHeneen (talk) 19:05, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

How to provide a source to something which was not reported in the media? If I want to pinpoint the media didn't report it!

I want to stress that no media whatsoever reported about MH370 were spotted or tracked by Jindalee Operational Radar Network. If it fall down somewhere west of Perth then it SHOULD have been spotted and tracked before crush by Jindalee Operational Radar Network Radar2 (range around 3000 km) covering up most of the search areas in Souther Indian Ocean there underwater searches went for several months. I cannot find any mention in the Internet that search and resque groups used ANY information from [Jindalee Operational Radar Network]] which is strange. I mentioned it today:

No information from Jindalee Operational Radar Network (Australian Air Defence over-the-horizon radar (OTHR) network) were reported to be used in the search or even analysed. This is quite strange as all the search zones shown on the map are well within the range of Radar2 (at Laverton, Western Australia) of Jindalee Operational Radar Network and as big airliner as the Boeing 777-200ER should have been spotted and tracked. No information from airport radars on the Christmas Island and/or Cocos_(Keeling)_Islands (which flight MH370 should certanly fly-by heading from North to these search zones in South Indian Ocean close to Perth) were reported to be used in the search either.

But my edit was undid by user Rsrikanth05 which wrote: "Please provide a spurce" I agree that the source or some explanation is needed but how I suppose to provide it if I want to stress that there are no information whatsoever in the media about the use of radar data from Jindalee Operational Radar Network??? KOT-TOK (talk) 20:36, 7 April 2015 (UTC)

If it is has not been reported in the media it is clearly not notable enough for inclusion. MilborneOne (talk) 20:43, 7 April 2015 (UTC)

Please read: Wikipedia:Verifiability. Information about the radars that tracked or did not track Flight 370 is in the "Radar" section. That is where such information belongs. The section already includes: "No radar contact was detected by Australia, including the JORN over-the-horizon radar system, which was believed to be looking north to detect illegal migrants and not west over the Indian Ocean where Flight 370 is presumed to have flown based on satellite communications." From the Australian:

Australia’s hopes of helping to solve the mystery have been dashed because the nation’s most powerful radar was not looking west towards the Indian Ocean at the time when the missing plane may have passed by Australia. The Australian understands that a preliminary investigation of all Australian intelligence, including military and civil radars, shows no record of the plane passing off Western Australia as Malaysian authorities have speculated. This does not mean the plane did not pass through the area, just that it was not detected. Instead of looking west, the nation’s $1.8 billion Over the Horizon radar system was believed to be looking north to help detect asylum-seekers as part of Operation Sovereign Borders...Defence declined to comment yesterday but sources say the system was not tasked to look westward towards the Indian Ocean on the morning of the MH370 flight because there was no reason to do so. Even if the radar system was tasked to cover that area, it is unclear whether the lost plane would have travelled close enough to the Australian coast to be in range. Civil air traffic controllers in Perth, the Kimberley and Darwin, whose radars can reach 250 nautical miles offshore, also recorded no sign of an unidentified aircraft on March 8.

The source ([4]) requires a subscription, but you can avoid that by doing a web search for the title: "Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 ‘flew low to evade radars’". The interim report released by Malaysia in March 2015 has lots of details about which radars tracked Flight 370. I don't have time to look them up, but you can view that report here. AHeneen (talk) 22:37, 7 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks a lot for the text you have found! It's really a thing I have searched for! Official statement about Australian AAD and air-control radar data. But it looks very disappointing to anybody who understands something about the way how military AAD works...

The part: "This does not mean the plane did not pass through the area, just that it was not detected." sounds as dump as it could only be! They built a really advanced and expensive radar system which should detect small jet fighters, privat Cessna and even Stealth airplanes, but it could not detect huge jet airliner... Nice defence investment! And next one: "Instead of looking west," ... "radar system was BELIEVED to be looking north to help detect asylum-seekers as part of Operation Sovereign Borders" - this is the most funny section: they "believed" - (like people belive in church?) - sounds like they are not sure, so they cannot see the radar records? or check radar duty journals or just ask AAD officers about Radar2 direction during 8th of March? How it comes? No idea: they just "believed" instead...

Asylum-seekers travels not on the airplanes but on boats, i.e. on the sea level. That means that the radar system is able to detect even small boats with asylum-seekers on the sea surface which is a way more difficult than detecting huge metal airliner some 300-600 meters above sea surface!!! I should stress that there are nothing about air- or sea-control radars on the Christmas Island and Cocos (Keeling) Islands which are the primary target for asylum-seekers heading to Australia and which are quite close to the proposed MH370 trajectory. If you check all maps charted with a help so called sattelite signals from MH370 engines, you will see that MH370 should approach Australia from North or North-West, not West.

Reading this official bullshit I once more wonder: why they bother to write and publish it? If they would keep silent it would be much more decent and they would not made so many stupid logical misstakes in so short message. KOT-TOK (talk) 22:12, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Note that the quote is just part of a newspaper article and is not from officials: "The Australian understands that a preliminary investigation of all Australian intelligence, including military and civil radars, shows no record of the plane passing off Western Australia as Malaysian authorities have speculated...Defence declined to comment yesterday but sources say the system was not tasked to look westward towards the Indian Ocean on the morning of the MH370 flight because there was no reason to do so." It's important to understand that technology has limitations. Just because the radar can see up to 3000 km doesn't mean that it can do so in every direction and at all times. Atmospheric conditions (eg. weather and solar weather) is probably the most important factor that affects how well the radar 'sees' and there are also other factors that probably limit the capabilities of the system...for example, it may have been undergoing maintenance or the entire system may be cost prohibitive to operate at its maximum performance. An easily understandable comparison is that 4G LTE mobile phone networks can support up to 299.6 Mbit/s download speeds and up to 75.4 Mbit/s upload speeds; however, most users will obtain much lower speeds. AHeneen (talk) 20:12, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

So, where is any official answer about MH370 detected or not detected by any of Australian radar systems? If the media cannot get ANY answer from officials (in democratic state with freedom of information and etc) then they wrote their own vague ideas about why the MH370 was not spotted? Cool but useless. Or they really found these shy sources deep in Australian ADD? I guess the so-called sources used by journalists if they cannot really find an official person with guts to say openly one of 3-4 possible stright answers: "was detected" or "was not detected" or "radars were off because of ..." or "our radars are so bad, we see nothing, do not believe official data about them, we are unprotected from air and sea..." Or these sourcesused by goverment if it decided to feel the information vacuum somehow (with the help of media) but without taking official responsibility for the answer.

I refuse to believe that I am the only one so strange and peculiar person (mainly because my AAD education) which spot the simple fact that Radar2 from Jindalee Operational Radar Network and air-control radars from Christmas Island and Cocos (Keeling) Islands actually MUST detect MH370 if it flew as it shown on the official maps (here: http://www.jacc.gov.au/media/maps/index.aspx http://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/2472/computer-model-yields-two-possible-flight-paths-of-mh370-in-south-indian-ocean https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_370#/media/File:MH370_SIO_search.png , and this one is just amazing: http://www.airtrafficmanagement.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/MH370-Satellite-Tracks-20140501.jpg ). Can you, please, find out if any journalist, expert, politician in Australia or abroad officially or openly asked Australian goverment of Air Forces (AAD), other authorities about radar detection of MH370 ? How could nobody asked about that if it so obvious??? How could the officials avoid to answer this question?

And now about your unsupported statements: 1. "Just because the radar can see up to 3000 km doesn't mean that it can do so in every direction and at all times." - Not in every direction but in the directions it was design to see - they are shown on the map ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jindalee_Operational_Radar_Network#/media/File:JORS.svg ) it can do it and should do it. About all time please read official statement here: http://www.dsto.defence.gov.au/innovation/jindalee-operational-radar-network

"The JORN network is Australia’s first comprehensive land and air early warning system. It not only provides a 24-hour military surveillance of the northern and western approaches to Australia, but also serves a civilian purpose in assisting in detecting illegal entry, smuggling and unlicensed fishing. The system also assists in weather forecasting ..." Clear enough?

2. "Atmospheric conditions (eg. weather and solar weather) is probably the most important factor that affects how well the radar 'sees'" - Yes, of course. Rought weather doesn't mean radar is shut down (read about 24-hour and weather maps above). And it's easy to check: weather archives do exists. About solar weather I can recommend you this source: http://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en/archive/2014/03/08/xray - Sun particles flux (no big flares during 8th of March) and http://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en/archive/2014/03/08/kp - Geomagnetic Kp index (Kp=1 during whole day). It means very quite solar weather condition from the HF radiowaves point of view (theory is here: http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/~pharden/hobby/FDIM81.pdf ) - By the way it's not like 4G, it's another technology, much older Over-the-horizon radar.

3. "or the entire system may be cost prohibitive to operate at its maximum performance." - Sorry, the entire system WAS designed to operated at it's normal perfomance of 3000 km range. The maximum perfomance is mentioned here: http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htecm/articles/20041031.aspx "It has an official range of 3,000 kilometres (1,900 mi), but in 1997 the prototype was able to detect missile launches by China[11] over 5,500 kilometres (3,400 mi) away. " It's the reason why the state (taxpayers actually!) payed huge 1 800 000 000 dollars for JORN! It's operation costs (power consumption, spare parts, staff) are much lower than the investment itself and only power consumption can rise with range. KOT-TOK (talk) 21:15, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

This is not a forum. Unless and until such matters are specifically discussed in relation to flight 370 by published reliable sources, they are of no relevance to article content. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:26, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

As AndyTheGrump said, this talk page is not a forum. As far as the information in this article, it must be verifiable and not original research. AHeneen (talk) 19:06, 15 April 2015 (UTC)

That issue was already considered by several sources. The Australian says, in particular: "Defence declined to comment yesterday but sources say the system was not tasked to look westward towards the Indian Ocean on the morning of the MH370 flight because there was no reason to do so. Even if the radar system was tasked to cover that area, it is unclear whether the lost plane would have travelled close enough to the Australian coast to be in range. Civil air traffic controllers in Perth, the Kimberley and Darwin, whose radars can reach 250 nautical miles offshore, also recorded no sign of an unidentified aircraft on March 8". And here's JORN range map. Brandmeister^talk 17:45, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks a lot for a last link [5] Well, it's nice to read that I am not alone and were others asking the same stupid and simple question: Why JORN couldn't detect flying MH370 if on all Australian resque operation maps all possible MH370 approach trajectories and crush sites are within JORN Radar2 range ??? Just overlap the maps! Two question arise soon afterwards: Why there is no clear loud official answer to this question from ANY authority? Why didn't any newspaper, magazine, TV-show or other media source report/discussed JORN's unability to detect MH370 and the suspicious silence (absence of any answer about JORN) from authorities? KOT-TOK (talk) 01:24, 29 April 2015 (UTC)

This is still not a forum. If you want to discuss things the media didn't do, find somewhere else to do it. AndyTheGrump (talk) 01:27, 29 April 2015 (UTC)

The above comment is correct. It was a bit terse because you were previously advised about WP:NOTFORUM, twice, and you either failed to read that, failed to understand it, or chose to ignore it. If you look at the top of this page, you will see two sentences that are boldfaced because they are important: "This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject." ―Mandruss ☎ 02:40, 29 April 2015 (UTC)

Bayesian search method

Why no mention of Bayesian search theory? 71.139.161.62 (talk) 05:40, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

That perhaps should go to Search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 per WP:SIZESPLIT. Brandmeister^talk 16:04, 14 July 2015 (UTC)

Flaperon on Réunion

The Daily Telegraph reports that a flaperon has been washed up on Réunion. It has "incredible similarity" to the type of aircraft involved in MH370. Mjroots (talk) 21:54, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Probably very significant. "... there was much discussion over a code part of the wreckage: BB670.... But if the flaperon does indeed belong to MH370, it's clear that the reference will be swiftly identified. In a few days we will have a definitive answer." Martinevans123 (talk) 22:04, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Would fit with the reports from the Malidives where locals were adamant they saw a 777 flying low over their islands the morning that MH370 disappeared. The Maldives are almost directly enroute between where MH370 disappeared in the Andaman and Reunion in the Seychelles. - Duncan Kinnear — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.56.51.248 (talk) 23:03, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Current speed direction nd duration since crash more than sufficient to bring it there from the main search area off of Australia, in fact it is very likely path and distance

Also it is almost certainly a 777 starboard flaperon.

Here is a port one in for repair. Scale is hard to tell but it seems is identical in all geometry except it is inverted meaning a starboard side one:

http://cdn-www.airliners.net/uf/188037/middle/1438202174BsQkrq.jpg

Boeing parts makers do indeed use a two letter three digit serial of this part, and it is reported their is a plate with two letter three-digit serial on the recovered part.

here is is shop sample (thise pids are not mine hence the links) http://cdn-www.airliners.net/uf/188037/middle/1438202158gs8cUN.jpg IanFinn1982 (talk) 00:22, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Can this article be semi-protected to avoid speculation and inappropriate additions? AHeneen (talk) 01:33, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't want to come across as owning this article, but having worked this article to GA (plus the timeline is currently an FL candidate, while the JACC, & satcom analysis articles are GA nominees...review anyone? [cough, cough]) I would just like to say a few things about the article and recent discovery, since this just had to happen the evening before a big day for me (so I won't have much time to follow new reports & the status of this article).

1. There's not a lot of content that this discovery will affect. The only thing that really changes with this finding, if confirmed that it is from MH370, is the status can be changed from disappeared to crashed. However, since there are still a lot of details left unsolved and the "disappearance" is what this flight is known for, I think the lead sentence should be kept with the term "disappeared" and followed by a sentence: "On 29 July 2015, a [name of piece] from the aircraft washed ashore on Réunion."
2. In the second paragraph of the lead, the following sentence needs to be changed, but retain the fact that this was the largest & most expensive search in aviation history and keep a reference to the unofficial theories article: "Despite being the largest and most expensive search in aviation history, there has been no confirmation of any flight debris, resulting in speculations about its disappearance."
3. I think the "presumed loss" section is important relevant to the article subject. Despite the finding, the absence of any debris from the aircraft for so long is an important part of MH370's notability (and not subject to recentism). I think the "presumed loss" section should be kept as-is, minus the last paragraph about the "If the official assumption is confirmed...". Remarks from officials confirming MH370 crashed can be added to a new section after "presumed loss" and include the paragraph about notability.
4. In the search section, remove "but has failed to locate any physical debris from the aircraft." Since this piece of debris was not found as part of the search, I do not think it should be mentioned in the search section. If it is added, a single sentence should be added after the sentence "Since 30 March 2014, the search has been coordinated by...governments." This is important! The search section is a summary-style overview of the search. The finding is not part of the search.
5. I think a subsection called "Debris" should be added to the "Investigation" section. This section is intended to cover the investigation of this piece of the aircraft.
6. Elsewhere in the article nothing should be changed, although there may be a couple places where the reference to "disappeared" could be changed to "crashed". However, not all mentions of "disappeared" should be changed...look at the context.
7. Very important: Finding debris in Reunion does NOT mean that the aircraft crashed in the western Indian Ocean, nor does it give any more credence to theories that the plane flew towards the Maldives. The drift models have indicated that if the plane crashed where investigators believe it did (current search area), that debris would drift west. This debris finding absolutely does not mean the JACC is searching in the wrong area.
8. The above comments also apply to the search article.

Again, I hope I don't come across as someone trying to own the article, but it is comprehensive and would not have needed much work to turn into a featured article. On current events, there's always a lot of minor edits (most of which are well-intended) that mess up the flow of the prose. This is the most comprehensive source of information about MH370 on the web (especially when considered with the related articles) and to the large number of readers who will come to it for information, I think this article shows off the best of what Wikipedia has to offer...a comprehensive article with reliable information on a topic for which there's no comprehensive source of information on the internet! Please help me keep it tidy (remove unreferenced/speculative material, inaccurate statements, & keep the prose tight). AHeneen (talk) 02:30, 30 July 2015 (UTC):

Talking about ownership, you removed my tweak to a short par put in the lead by someone else. All it said was "On July 29, 2015, debris from an aircraft wing was found on the shores of Réunion Island. Authorities were investigating whether it was from a Boeing 777-200ER, and whether markings on it could be traced to the MH370 aircraft. If so, this will be the first time any part of the missing aircraft has been located.". Accurate. Concise. Referenced. Yet you zapped it with the astonising POV edit summary saying "remove a mini-paragraph that is too detailed for lead". Who says? If you don't believe new content entered by bona fide editors should be in the article then you should take it to talk. You even asked whether "Can this article be semi-protected to avoid speculation and inappropriate additions?" Good heavens. Moriori (talk) 03:02, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

We have many RSs reporting this now. For the moment, let's leave it out of the lede, but the discovery should be included in the body of the article. If it is definitely confirmed to be from MH370, then it should go into the lede. Mjroots (talk) 05:55, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I did NOT remove that statement! What I removed was: ""We are eliminating areas where it [MH370] is not. They're searching an area which is about 1800 kilometres southwest of Perth, and the area they're searching is about 120,000 square kilometres. They've roughly done half of it," said aviation expert Geoffrey Thomas. Thomas says it is likely the search will last into early 2016." I moved the statement about the tail to the end of the paragraph about the search...and mentioned that in the edit summary, which you only quoted the first half. The full edit summary was "remove a mini-paragraph that is too detailed for lead; move comment about tail to search section". I made a mistake by saying search section, when I meant to say search paragraph (of the lead), but that doesn't mean that you couldn't look at the edit and see that the sentence about the tail was still in the lead! The lead should not have single sentences as a paragraph, what I did was format the lead per MOS:LEAD. AHeneen (talk) 15:33, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I think it should be called a flaperon - this is what the ABC News source calls it. Also there is currently more detail in the lede than anywhere else. I'm not sure that's appropriate. Martinevans123 (talk) 15:46, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I have added a subsection called "Possible debris" to the "Disappearance" section. This section is the place for most details about the finding. It could be changed to a section (as opposed to a sub-section of "Disappearance"). AHeneen (talk) 20:49, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I predict this section will probably become detached and eventually get washed up, as a separate article, somewhere off the coast of Africa. Martinevans123 (talk) 20:56, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I'm waiting to be entertained by a new round of unofficial disappearance theories. AHeneen (talk) 23:28, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Boeing 777 wing flaperon

Centpacrr (talk) 17:13, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Debris location relative to the known flight path (red), calculated flight path (yellow), and underwater search area since October 2014 (dark blue; 46% searched as of 29 July 2015).

I have created a map with the position of Réunion relative to the known flight path, calculated flight path, and current underwater search area. It should not be added to the article until there is official confirmation that the debris is from MH370 (which seems increasingly likely). The thumb at left has an appropriate caption. The final statement is based on simple math. The figures in the JACC updates have been in increments of 1000. The total area of the underwater search area is 120,000 km². The latest update says that over 55,000 square kilometres have been searched. 55000/120000=45.83%. 56000/120000=46.666%. The 29 July search update can be added as a reference in the caption, just add: <ref name="29 July search update"/>AHeneen (talk) 23:28, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Not good. --Itu (talk) 11:21, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Infobox caption

An IP has changed the caption several times and been reverted. Fair warning is given that a block for edit warring will ensue should the caption be changed without consensus. Mjroots (talk) 18:49, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Mjroots is simply avoiding the inevitable as "crash debris" from the aircraft can have no other logical conclusion but the aircraft being involved in a "crash". It's no longer simply a "missing" aircraft. I'm certain my constructive edit will eventually be restored by an editor who's either not in denial or possesses an ounce of reasoning, or both. If a "fair warning" has been given, then the editor who baselessly reverted me twice without offering an acceptable reason should have been warned on their talkpage for edit warring, yet Mjroots decides to intervene by instead harassing the IP user with a frivolous talkpage "warning" which was justifiably removed. Absurdity aside, I look forward to seeing the caption undoubtedly being corrected sooner or later by an uninvolved editor despite Mjroots ill-informed protest. 173.35.54.125 (talk) 19:10, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

@173.35.54.125: I was not the only one reverting your edits. A fact that you are well aware of. You are entitled to blank you talk page, but by so doing it is taken that any warnings removed have been read and understood. Said warnings are still active and valid. Mjroots (talk) 19:27, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

@Mjroots: I already mentioned above that you intervened once the editor in question baselessly reverted me twice, so if you read carefully, you'll realize that I clearly acknowledged the involvement of more than one editor. Your warning is frivolous & baseless for the reasons I accurately described above, especially since you have a conflict of interest by admittedly supporting the erroneous point of view of the opposing editor over mine, and this is further supported by the fact that you blatantly avoided giving a talkpage warning when you knew full-well they were guilty of edit-warring, not me. I could post warnings all day on users talkpages, including yours, that doesn't make them active/valid in the slightest. Nice try though, I bet you assumed I was some ignorant IP who you could get away with by intimidating to futilely impose/support your point of view. Next time, try to be a little more impartial when you decide to intervene and post warnings you hope to carry any merit. 173.35.54.125 (talk) 20:01, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Note that it didn't take very long for the caption to be changed [6] by another editor who correctly removed the word "missing" which is what you illogically protested, and I expect the correction to be completed with word "crash" replacing "incident" very shortly. 173.35.54.125 (talk) 20:24, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

@173.35.54.125: - looks like I've got to spell it out for you.

At 18:26, you edited the caption. This is fine as the edit was made in good faith and in the spirit of being bold.

At 18:27, MilborneOne reverted you with the summary of "it was ok before". Again, this is fine as it come under the "R" part of WP:BRD. At this point the "D" part of WP:BRD should have come into play.

At 18:29, you reverted MilborneOne. This is edit warring.

At 18:31, MilborneOne reverted you again. Something he was entitled to do. He said in the edit summary "take it to talk or provide a ref for the crash site" - which you failed to do.

At 18:38, you reverted MilborneOne without discussing the issue. This is edit warring.

Also at 18:38, I reverted your edit warring. Something that any editor is entitled to do in that situation. I issued you with a warning not to edit war.

At 18:39, you continued to edit war.

Do you disagree with the above sequence of events? The evidence speaks for itself. There is no consensus to change the long-standing caption at this point in time. Mjroots (talk) 20:25, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

@Mjroots: - I guess I have to spell it out too.

At 18:27, you conveniently mentioned MilborneOne's edit summary when he first reverted me without a valid reason (entitled or otherwise), yet...

at 18:29, you failed to mention my subsequent edit summary when I restored my constructive edit (something I am entitled to do).

At 18:31, MilbornOne reverted me a second time without offering a valid reason, something he is not entitled to do, and this is the point where he became guilty of edit-warring.

At 18:38, you conveniently failed to mention my edit summary again (which was:Maybe you haven't noticed, but the entire article is being re-edited to reflect crash debris being found with a "current event" tag even added.) while mentioning all of MilbornOne's edit summaries, and I'm not surprised at all since your bias has been well documented and your conflict of interest thoroughly exposed as pointed out above.

Clearly I disagree with your biased sequence of events and as you correctly stated, the evidence does indeed speak for itself. While you sit in denial and continue to claim "no consensus" on caption change, I've already provided a diff above where another editor has already changed and corrected the caption and I expect more editors to become involved and support the change and correction which I had initiated. 173.35.54.125 (talk) 20:46, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Use of word missing

Comment was originally placed in the section "Peer review suggestions". Moving this to a new section.

Why are people still listing this as "missing"? Airplanes don't go missing. They either land at their destination, their alternate/diversion airport, or they crash. There's really no middle ground. It's not like it had enough fuel to keep flying for over one year. I suggest this be changed from "missing" to "crashed." What justification do you use to NOT do so? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.53.184.67 (talk) 16:35, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

That is the consensus of at least three discussions about this subject. "Missing" is the best simple summary that can be provided. AHeneen (talk) 18:22, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

What discussion was this? Who decides this? The most accurate description would be aircraft crashed - location yet unknown. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.53.184.67 (talk) 19:43, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Do you have source confirming that the aircraft crashed? No wreckage or debris have been located yet. 71.12.206.168 (talk) 20:03, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Neither the aircraft nor any verifiable pieces of it have been located. Therefore, the plane is, by definition, missing. IrishCowboy (talk) 12:37, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

Once an airplane takes off it either lands or crashes somewhere. Just because we haven't discovered the wreckage doesn't mean it's "missing." The official text should be 'Crashed - location unkown' — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.53.184.67 (talk) 03:30, 26 April 2015 (UTC)

Or it could have landed somewhere. Again, the best term to describe the flight at this time is missing. This issue has been discussed many times (see the discussions linked in the "The consensus for the infobox..." box at the top of this talk page). AHeneen (talk) 19:39, 26 April 2015 (UTC)

Landed somewhere? Are you serious? How do you land a plane the size of a 777 somewhere, with 200+ people onboard, and then cover it all up so no one knows where the 777 landed and is stored, and silence and hide 200+ people? You've seen far too many movies, or maybe you just love the TV-series 'Lost.' This aircraft ran out of fuel and crashed. That was the official word of the Malaysian authorities when they said based on Inmarsat's data, they conclude that the aircraft's flight path ended over the South Indian Ocean. Source: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-26716572 No offense, but only an idiot like yourself would believe it has landed somewhere. Get real. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.53.184.67 (talk) 08:04, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

only an idiot like yourself - I suggest that you read WP:NPA and be very careful. Preceding a personal attack with "No offense, but" does not make it any less a personal attack. ―Mandruss ☎ 19:57, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

Once again, the best term is "missing". I believe the official conclusion that the flight ended in the southern Indian Ocean, but there are many people who doubt it because of the lack of debris. Until any verifiable debris from the plane is found, the best term is "missing". You also need to understand that the infobox summary does not use the term "crashed", but lists the cause of the crash. Repeated personal attacks can result in a block. AHeneen (talk) 23:10, 12 May 2015 (UTC)

Wing flaperon has now been confirmed as being from MH370 from authorities. It is now a partial wreckage discovery, and by definition, the airplane is not missing if they have discovered a portion of the plane and CONFIRMED that the part is from the plane. Stop the 'Missing' tagline. It is now conclusive that the aircraft's flight ended in the Indian Ocena, and the wreckage piece discovered has been proven to be from MH370. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.79.44.102 (talk) 18:12, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Partial debris has been found and positively identified as MH370! Why are you people still changing my post to "missing"??? It is not missing if a part has been found and identified positively. And to the person who keeps changing the article, how about you write here on the talk page first? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.79.44.102 (talk) 20:03, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

There are already CERTIFIED, GENUINE reports that Malaysian officials have confirmed the debris IS from the flight. No longer is the need to put terms like "missing" or "disappeared" as the words that you think are preventing mislead are actually causing more misleading. Aa03 (talk) 06:36, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Mauritius ON TOPIC PLEASE

Debris search in the Mauritius and Seycelles needs to be added to "Debris" section. http://english.cntv.cn/2015/08/04/VIDE1438654451835423.shtml--68.231.26.111 (talk) 22:42, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Oppose. Not significant unless/until debris is found there. Geogene (talk) 20:40, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Mauritius

Debris search in the Mauritius and Seycelles needs to be added to "Debris" section. http://english.cntv.cn/2015/08/04/VIDE1438654451835423.shtml

--68.231.26.111 (talk) 22:42, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Debris washed up on Reunion Island. MH370 has been found. I saw it on CH7 Australia yesterday --EurovisionNim (talk to me)(see my edits) 08:02, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Nah, MH370 has not been found. The debris has washed up a year and a half after the accident on a faraway island. This was floating debris that rode the currents that entire time, meaning thousands of miles. We don't know where MH370 is, or where it went down, but now we have confirmation that it crashed or ditched at sea. That's a lot more than we had 10 days ago. Dcs002 (talk) 11:22, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

The main plane section hasn't been found yet (only parts of the plane has been found). Let's wait until there are bodies recovered. 97.85.113.113 (talk) 19:27, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Then I think we might be waiting quite a long time. I suspect that "recovering bodies" from MH370 is about as likely as finding it parked on the moon. It took two years of searching to find the black boxes from AF447 and we knew more or less the flight path for that aircraft. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:10, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Infobox summary

@Ahecht: changed my incident summary to the inferior, and outdated, previous version [7]. The reason given was "changed without consensus". Comments? Geogene (talk) 19:06, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

I think the fact that it is a change to the infobox and not the article has something to do with it. Generally infoboxes are kept to a much higher standard than the article - instead of reporting the most recent information it should be a summary of all known information. Any other thoughts from others? Garchy (talk) 19:11, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Yes, it should be a summary of all known information. That's my point. I don't understand why a demonstrably useful edit was reverted for procedural reasons--it's missing the point. Is there something wrong with it? Geogene (talk) 19:17, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

The summary has been the subject of mini-edit-wars before, so, yeah, changing it is "touchy", and is best handled via talk. That's what we're doing here, so all is good.

Usually, the summary is a single word or phrase. Yes, that's hard to do here. But I'd bet that things will get more officially "resolved" fairly soon now that debris has been found. I wouldn't rush to make changes that will be obsolete soon. --A D Monroe III (talk) 19:43, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

@Geogene:Well I'm just speculating, I didn't revert any of your edits, but my guess it that to keep the article consistent with other aviation disaster articles users generally want a certain criteria to be met before a categorization is changed in the infobox. I have actually read the 4 different debates on consensus listed above (not sure if you've looked yet), and it goes into a lot of the reasons why they want to wait (and having the debris confirmed today doesn't detract from a lot of their points). I would imagine even with a piece of wing being confirmed the plane is still "missing", as no bodies or other debris has been found yet. I found this especially helpful in understanding this (in addition to reading the archived discussions on the "missing" entry in the infobox, please check it out). --> Wikipedia:WikiProject Aviation/Style guide. Garchy (talk) 19:47, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

As far as I know, no credible sources disagree that it crashed in the Indian Ocean, so I see no problem saying it crashed there (somewhere) even though it is (I agree) "missing" until the crash site is found. In this case I don't think "missing" and "crashed" are mutually exclusive. I'll read the aviation style guide, thanks. Unfortunately some IPs are working on that summary now and what they're producing may be worse than what was there before, somebody might want to have a look at that. Geogene (talk) 19:54, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Yes, things are getting crazy! I've requested temporary page protection, so we'll see if that helps. Garchy (talk) 19:59, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

I agree, so I've semi-protected the article for 72 hours. Mjroots (talk) 20:49, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

As noted, the summary has been the subject of several discussions and small edit wars. Although one piece has now been found, the bulk of the aircraft is missing. The summary is meant to be a short overview of the incident. A consensus should be reached on the talk page before adjusting it. AHeneen (talk) 21:18, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

I agree it's supposed to be a short synopsis of the incident, which is what I was trying to do here: [8]. Geogene (talk) 21:28, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

This is just one piece of the aircraft and has floated far from where the fuselage is located. "Missing" is still the best summary of the incident. AHeneen (talk) 21:33, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

"Missing" isn't a summary of the event. Geogene (talk) 21:43, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

What about "Missing, but we've found a flaperon"? Martinevans123 (talk) 21:47, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Better, but what seems to have happened is that the aircraft, for no known reason, turned south, went back over the ocean, and flew for hours until it crashed. To my mind, summarizing that as "missing, pieces found" doesn't do it justice. I know that's in the article, but an infobox summary would spare readers from a wall of text. And, using links to two other articles about MH370 for readers to find that information also seems to defeat the point of having a convenient summary there. Geogene (talk) 22:00, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Sorry for not using the <sarcasm> tags. I don't see that "Debris from the aircraft has washed ashore on Reunion Island" is, or ever will, be an essential feature in a summary of this loss. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:05, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

I don't mind if that were left out. Geogene (talk) 22:07, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

More specifically, I don't mind if Reunion were left out, although it's significant that wreckage was found in the Indian Ocean. Geogene (talk) 19:29, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Not sure we can yet call it "wreckage". And not sure how "significant" the location is - the Indian Ocean is quite big. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:45, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Technically, we don't know if the loss of the flaperon is the result of a crash; it may have been from some earlier event before the final total loss of the aircraft, with it limping along without it for hundreds or thousands of miles. Yes, that's unlikely, but we must avoid WP:SYNTH. Why not let the respected sources make the logical conclusion, as they soon will in due course, so we can cite it as is proper? 99% of the aircraft is still missing, so that's the best summary at the moment. WP:NOTNEWS. --A D Monroe III (talk) 17:33, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Flaperon

Since the Malaysians and French are giving conflicting info on whether the flaperon definitely belongs to MH370, the infobox should say "one flaperon suspected to be from SMH 370 found" and the article shouldn't treat it as confirmed info until the French confirm it's from MH370. Blaylockjam10 (talk) 11:26, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Meanwile.... back on the front page: "Debris found washed ashore on Réunion is confirmed to be from Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, which went missing in March 2014 (aircraft pictured)"? Martinevans123 (talk) 12:19, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Why should Malaysia's "confirmation" be treated as less reliable than France's non-"confirmation"? Ghmyrtle (talk) 12:39, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

I'm really not sure. Especially as BEA is very much the "senior party" in the investigation. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:43, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

• The part number stenciled inside the component "657 BB" comports with that for a portion (leading edge panel) of a Boeing 777 right wing flaperon as found in the table on page 221 of Boeing's "777 Aircraft Maintenance Manual" dated May 3, 2008 (D633W101-RBA) in Chapter 6 (DIMENSIONS AND AREAS), Section 06-44-00 (WINGS Major zones 500 and 600). As Boeing 777-2H6ER (Registration 9M-MRO, C/N 28420, MSN 404) is both the known accident aircraft and is the only unaccounted for written off hull in the 777 world fleet, the found component is identical in size, shape and construction to a 777 right wing flaperon, and Boeing has confirmed that's what the item is, by process of elimination that confirms that this piece of debris could have only come from the MH370 accident aircraft and therefore should be described as such. Centpacrr (talk) 17:29, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Why no statement from BEA? Still testing the barnacles? Martinevans123 (talk) 17:49, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

@Ghmyrtle: B/c although it's likely to be from MH370, it's not a unanimous agreement by the parties testing the flaperon and b/c the Malaysians have a pattern of premature and/or wrong announcements (see the latest announcement about new debris being found). Blaylockjam10 (talk) 21:02, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

777 right wing flaperons don't usually go missing from aircraft without anyone noticing. Of course, some very devious Boeing employee just might have sneaked one out (down their trousers) and dropped it in the Indian Ocean, just as a practical joke. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:13, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

We an report from sources, but we can't speculate. It's a B777 flaperon, and only one aircraft is missing. But to link the two is WP:SYNTHESIS. Not that I credit any alternate explanation, but there it is. --Pete (talk) 21:44, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

On Wikipedia, we rely on what reliable sources say. The BEA and other French authorities are not disagreeing that the flaperon is from Flight 370, they are simply using an abundance of caution and saying that it is likely from Flight 370 and needs more testing. However, under international aviation law, Malaysia is responsible for the investigation and they are saying that the piece is from Flight 370. Since it is not just Malaysia, but also many aviation experts (cited by the media) who are saying the debris comes from Flight 370, that should be considered enough reliable sources to say that the flaperon is from Flight 370. Of course, the statements from French officials can be noted in the debris section, but continuing to say that it may come from Flight 370 gives undue weight to the BEA's statements.

CNN: Less than an hour after the Prime Minister's statement, Paris Deputy Prosecutor Serge Mackowiak used slightly less definitive language. He said that there were "very strong presumptions" that the debris from Reunion is from MH370, but that absolute certainty was not yet possible...Najib, the Malaysian Prime Minister, didn't go into any detail in his statement early Thursday on what Malaysian officials believe provides the conclusive link between the flaperon found on Reunion and MH370. But Malaysia's Transport Ministry provided more information later in the day, saying that a serial number on the wing part matches Malaysia Airlines' technical records. The ministry said it found matches for a maintenance seal and paintwork on the flaperon.

France24: French prosecutors involved in determining if the wing part was from MH370 used more cautious language than Najib, saying only there was a "very high probability" it came from the plane.

BBC: French officials...have also said there was only a strong possibility that the flaperon had come from MH370 - avoiding the firm link made by the Malaysians.

So the statements by French and Malaysian officials don't conflicting/contradictory of each other, it's just that the French are being a little more cautious to make a definitive link between the flaperon and Flight 370. (Note: I'll add a mention of the search around Reunion to the search section within the next hour or so). AHeneen (talk) 00:32, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

• The French statement came from a Paris prosecutor who only became "involved" in this because there were four French nationals on the flight. The prosecutor's office has no technical expertise, line authority, or direct access to evidence in, any official flight safety investigation of this accident and its views should therefore really be disregarded altogether as irrelevant in this matter. Again, please see here, here, and here. Centpacrr (talk) 03:38, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

Lawyers are notoriously unreliable sources in the investigative process. They are interested parties due to the adversarial nature of court proceedings.

Also, the BEA is indeed the lead investigating agency for the parts found on Reunion Island, which, until proven otherwise, is the scene of the accident under their investigation, whatever plane it was. Malaysia is the lead authority for the loss of MH370, so questions concerning the flapperon should be addressed with the BEA as the lead agency, and questions concerning MH370 itself should be considered with Malaysia as the lead authority. Note the potential conflict of interest for France: As long as they do not confirm absolutely that the flapperon and other debris came from MH370, they have a reason to keep the parts and other debris for their own purposes, including potential prosecution. Dcs002 (talk) 01:19, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

Hypoxia speculation in lead should be cut

Just the hypoxia speculation. The speculation should be in the body, but not in the lead because it gives undue weight to a potentially irrelevant fact. Autopilot with no pilot input, fine, but right now there is really nothing saying the hypoxia hypothesis is superior to other explanations, particularly human action. The flight path shows that there was definitely human input and control until radar contact was lost, and that flight path deviated completely and somewhat erratically from the flight's planned course. I am not trying to persuade anyone that a hijacking downed the plane, only that there are other valid hypotheses of equal merit to the hypoxia hypothesis. (It also begs the question of what might have caused the loss of pressure while both engines were running during controlled flight.) A hypothesis without evidence is speculation. The evidence for hypoxia is equal to the evidence that the crew had been murdered or incapacitated violently. There is obviously a lot of attention on this article right now. Let's be careful. Dcs002 (talk) 11:19, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Support Oppose removal from lead, per explanation below. Geogene (talk) 19:26, 6 August 2015 (UTC) Geogene (talk) 20:04, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

The mention of hypoxia in the lead is about the flight path south into the southern Indian Ocean, not the initial deviation. AHeneen (talk) 22:42, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

That isn't relevant to the main points that were raised above, that it's speculative and that it's undue weight. The lead is massive, there's a lot of irrelevant information there. Geogene (talk) 00:00, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

The lead provides an overview of the article's content, in line with WP:LEAD. The article itself is long and the lead provides an overview of all the significant topics. It is structured by paragraph as: 1)overview of disappearance, 2)search, 3)investigation & possible causes, & 4)aftermath/notability. Each of these paragraphs provides a concise overview of each topic. The last five hours of the flight were most likely on autopilot until the flight ended after flameout. This is an important aspect to determining the flight path over the last few hours of the flight and, thus, the final location of Flight 370 (which is where the underwater search is ongoing). AHeneen (talk) 18:04, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Support removing this from the lead. Blaylockjam10 (talk) 11:31, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Support removing it and any similar speculation from the lead and article, we have a separate article for speculation and guesses. MilborneOne (talk) 20:11, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

I don't think the leading speculations need to be removed from the article (investigation & possible causes), but the hypoxia hypothesis is only one of several ways in which the crew might have become incapacitated, if indeed that is what happened. That is why I think it is undue weight to that one hypothesis, and I would prefer to remove it from the lead instead of adding more to give more proportionate weight. There are numerous high-quality RS proposing other (IMO more likely) scenarios for crew incapacitation, or other hypotheses why the plane was left on autopilot to the point of fuel starvation. The evidence is equal for all (the flight path without apparent crew input), but I think human action is the most common one among experts. My example that included the initial deviation is cited by some as their primary reason for the human intervention hypothesis, and of course, human intervention might have led to a hypoxic condition, but it could (according to many experts, not my own speculation) also have resulted in violent crew incapacitation. Hypoxia is one speculation among many, and it should not be given undue weight in the lead or in the article. Dcs002 (talk) 00:56, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

Oops... I wrote this comment today without looking at the article first, so really it's moot. Dcs002 (talk) 02:13, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

MH370 documents to archive

Here are some documents which I will archive (using Webcitation). That way, if Wikipedians ever need to refer to them, they can access them even if the originals are taken down:

• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/PDF/MH370/Announcement_of_MH370_by_DOA_english.pdf - http://www.webcitation.org/6agqd7czk
• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/PDF/MH370/doa_announcement_mandarin.pdf - http://www.webcitation.org/6agqfW4km
• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/PDF/MH370/MH370%20-%20Actions%20taken%20between%200138%20and%200614.pdf - http://www.webcitation.org/6agqjSR5O
• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/PDF/MH370/MH370%20-%20Preliminary%20Report.pdf - http://www.webcitation.org/6agqmjV6t
• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/PDF/MH370/MH370%20-%20Cargo%20Manifest%20and%20Airway%20Bill.pdf - http://www.webcitation.org/6agqqurqc
• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/PDF/MH370/MH370%20-%20Seating%20plan.pdf - http://www.webcitation.org/6agqunz6G
• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/Audio/1atcdelivery.wav - http://www.webcitation.org/6agqzle7t
• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/Audio/2lumpurground.mp3 - http://www.webcitation.org/6agr2hCSN
• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/Audio/3lumpurtower.mp3 - http://www.webcitation.org/6agr6UYKZ
• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/Audio/4lumpurapproach.mp3 - http://www.webcitation.org/6agr8ptlf
• http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/Audio/5lumpurradar.wav - http://www.webcitation.org/6agrDKQpw

WhisperToMe (talk) 14:16, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

Thank you. AHeneen (talk) 17:27, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

For some reason webcitation seems to be down lately. The good news is that I got these files saved on the Internet Archive. Put the URL after http://web.archive.org/web/*/ and you will see the archived record. When Webcitation is back up I'll try to save the documents on there. WhisperToMe (talk) 12:01, 10 August 2015 (UTC)

Done! WhisperToMe (talk) 00:33, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

This page is frequently vandalised of

i suggest semi-protecting it — Preceding unsigned comment added by Admiral Alvin (talk • contribs) 09:04, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for page protection#Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 Request placed. KDS4444^Talk 12:56, 10 August 2015 (UTC)

Page now semi-protected for a period of one week... which I suspect will not be enough, so please speak up again if you notice vandalism happening after that and we can arrange for a more extended period of protection. Thanks for making the suggestion. KDS4444^Talk 06:17, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Just for the record

In the Popular Culture section, I put in a sentence backed by 2 citations (more are available), pointing out that Billy Graham's daughter had mentioned the sense of 'where have all the people gone?' caused by MH370's disappearance as a possible small scale foretaste of what it would feel like being left behind after the Rapture, and adding a source giving secular criticism of her view.

Earlier an Indian editor, Subbush, had posted an Indian view, backed by citation an Indian citation, which was also the only thing in the entire article that mentions conspiracy theories.

They both got deleted by MilborneOne (who, incidentally, is also an admin, and it's a bit scary risking disputes with admins) with the explanation "removed recent as they do not really add anything of note". I restored them both, explaining in the case of the Indian section 'restoring "spawned numerous conspiracy theories" - these are a large and notable part of MH370's effect on popular culture; many RS articles report on them)' - I would also have mentioned WP:BIAS if I were doing it again.

These then both got deleted again by Andrewgprout with the explanations "this is not the right article for this discussion" for the conspiracies and Indian perception, and "not really appropriate for this article" for the Rapture bit.

So apparently, despite WP:BIAS, a couple of Western editors have decided that it is not "of note" nor "the right article" to mention in the popular culture section that it spawned cosnpiracy theories and to give an Indian perspective on something that happened in the Indian Ocean. Apparently merely mentioning these constitutes a misplaced "discussion" (what "discussion"?).

Apparently it is also not "of note" nor "appropriate" to mention that it generated an (admittedly relatively minor) religious v secular spat, thereby seemingly playing its own small part in the Culture War that is one of the dominant factors in US and world culture at present.

So it would seem that the only appropriate thing to appear in a Popular Culture section is a long list of free advertisements for Western books and documentaries.

However, life is far too short to risk wasting it on potentially endless "angels dancing on pins" arguments about the precise applicability of inherently subjective notions like "of note" and "appropriate" (which is a large part of the reason why I'm now semi-retired from Wikipedia, and I suspect is at least part of the reason why many other ediotors leave), and indeed I've arguably already wasted far more time than it's worth by writing this. So having recorded my dissent here "for the record", I'm now giving up and taking the article off my watchlist in a possibly futile attempt to try to minimize the risk of getting sucked into wasting more time on the matter.

But if somebody else wishes to take up the fight on behalf of either or both these items (both of which improve the article, at least in my view), I wish them the best of luck. Tlhslobus (talk) 11:54, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

Nobody is stopping you having a discussion on the conspiracy and christian additions, conspiracy stuff is already in a daughter article so we dont need to include it here, I am still struggling to see what that has to do with it being added by an Indian editor or Indian view as India is not mentioned in the piece at all and the relevance of "western editors" whatever they are. Just to note that being an admin doesnt stop you being a editor with views and opinions, it also doesnt stop you being wrong and being challenged when editing, being an admin is not really relevant or important in these discussions. I fail to see the relevance of comments by a christian evangelist to the accident, wikipedia is not for collecting everybodies thought on the subject, it is not what an encyclopedia is for. If you think that the other mentions in popular cultural are not needed as they are advertising then that can be discussed, I for one dont think that tv documentaries unless they raise new points of relevance to the accident are that notable, Mayday for example has run out of notable accidents to televise so will make a program on any accident however trivia so the fact they create a program is not that important in the scheme of things. MilborneOne (talk) 12:16, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

I think Tlhslobus brings up an interesting point. Has popular culture been defined here in a meaningful way? I think a few of the points of discussion he brought up would colloquially be referred to in the US as culture, but not pop culture, which has more to do with mass media, arts, and entertainment, in my understanding of the term. Perhaps popular culture means something different in India than it does in the US? I think religions are a cultural matter, but in my usage, not popular culture. Do we have a clean definition of what popular culture actually means? It would help make things uniform and remove the subjectivity described by Tlhslobus. Subjective evaluation of notability seems to be our biggest hangup as WP editors, and maybe more guidance is needed for popular culture content in general. This article is obviously a behemoth, and less is probably best, but ubiquitous comments like "not really appropriate for this article" say nothing but one person's opinion. Reasons and precedents help, as do guidelines. I don't know specifically what happened in the case of Tlhslobus or the context of the quote I just cited, and I'm not trying to re-argue that case, but I think we have all seen our share of deleted content with empty, subjective comments like that.

Saying simply that an incident has spawned conspiracy theories, with no discussion, just a link, acknowledges their widespread existence and clearly sends people to the appropriate place for that discussion. That seems reasonable to me. Is the 9/11 Truther movement a part of popular culture? Ufology? Cryptozoology? IMO, those might be good comparisons for whether such a statement belongs in the pop culture section.Dcs002 (talk) 03:34, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

The section name "In popular culture" is common on Wikipedia, although I can understand the trouble with defining "popular culture." Although it is not a policy/guideline, see Wikipedia:"In popular culture" content. In this article, I think the issue is due weight. Plus, the article Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 unofficial disappearance theories‎ exists, which can contain similar content. AHeneen (talk) 20:30, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the link. Yes, a paragraph on conspiracy theories in Pop culture would, as you say, give undue weight, I totally agree. Certainly the conspiracy theories among relatives of survivors are an important part of the story, but that is well covered in the Aftermath section. Again, I'm not advocating for the inclusion of conspiracy theories here. I'm just looking for a definition of what is pop culture in WP. Maybe my search is misguided though, because undue weight and notability can already be used to cull such content when necessary, and maybe it's important in some cases to let ambiguity exist to account for cultural differences among Wikipedians, if that makes sense. I also hadn't noticed that Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 unofficial disappearance theories‎ is already linked twice in the article - in places that were too prominent for me to notice I guess. Dcs002 (talk) 10:25, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

Debris confirmed to be from MH370

On 5 August 2015, it has been confirmed that the missing parts indeed belonged to MH370. 17:59, 5 August 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.33.180.117 (talk)

Should we open the debate about "missing" versus a variant now that there is hard evidence the plane is indeed not missing? Garchy (talk) 18:01, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

The plane is missing, unless they've found the crash site. I mean, we've known all along that it crashed somewhere in the Indian Ocean. Just wait and see if sources stop using the term "missing". Geogene (talk) 18:07, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

The aircraft, minus a small part, is still missing. No need to change anything yet. Mjroots (talk) 18:08, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Let's wait until the main section of the plane and bodies are found then we can change the article. 97.85.113.113 (talk) 18:54, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

• Suggest summary infobox be changed to: "Unexplained disappearance and crash
  Plane debris found on Reunion Island, search for main wreckage ongoing". The media still refers to the flight as missing (which is true in the sense the main wreckage has not been located). Thoughts? - Mailer Diablo 18:57, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Keep it as missing till more sources are available. --Rsrikanth05 (talk) 19:01, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, a discrepancy is not agreement or confirmation. I'm pretty sure it will work out - but Malaysia is jumping the gun. We don't have to.--Varkman (talk) 10:15, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

It should remain as "missing" until the fuselage is found. AHeneen (talk) 00:10, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

The French have confirmed the flaperon is from MH370. By definition, confirming a part of the aircraft means it is not missing. It has partially been discovered, but this is now fact the aircraft does lie at the bottom of the Indian Ocean. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.79.44.102 (talk) 16:27, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

By all means show us the WP:RS source that says "the aircraft does lie at the bottom of the Indian Ocean". Martinevans123 (talk) 16:31, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

Because that's where the flaperon was found, based on water current drift models, the current search area is where the aircraft is. Or are you idiotically suggesting that only the flaperon fell off inflight and the aircraft continued to land somewhere? Please put the conspiracy theories to rest already. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.79.44.102 (talk) 17:41, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

@72.79.44.102 If there is still a "current search area" as you state above - then the plane is still missing.Andrewgprout (talk) 17:57, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

All my conspiracy theories have been locked away, thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:00, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

Missing? I'd say it's "partially found." It's time to drop this whole missing tag. A piece has been recovered and positively identified from the aircraft. Based on the water drift models for the Indian Ocean, the piece was exactly where it was supposed to be after 16 months. The plane isn't missing, it's crashed, and now there's one piece of concrete evidence. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.79.44.102 (talk) 18:34, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

One flapperon does not an aircraft make. But rather foolish to make a wing part out of concrete? Martinevans123 (talk) 18:40, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

Confirmation of MH370 parts found

I added to the page that the flaperon was confirmed to be the part being from MH370. This gives closure to many. I initially saw this info on the MH370 Search page and am surprised it is not here as well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_for_Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_370#Search_timeline — Preceding unsigned comment added by 31jetjet (talk • contribs) 21:51, 13 September 2015 (UTC)

GEOMAR calculation of wing flaperon origin

There is a new map of the GEOMAR calculation of the wing flaperon origin:

Feel free to use it. --MrAurum (talk) 16:22, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks a lot for the map! As anyone can see the map shows that MH370 strange officially proposed trajectory (leading to nowhere - why would pilot/terrorist fly from Indonesia past Australia to Antarctica if there was no fuel enough to reach it?) has nothing to do with wing flaperon origin. It's also interesting who and when will at the end officially confess that the strange officially proposed trajectory of MH370 is well within JORN and Christmas Island radar's range and these radars detected nothing (or detected something?) during 8th of March 2014? KOT-TOK (talk) 04:07, 10 September 2015 (UTC)

As of right now, the GEOMAR link is not working for me. However, assuming it represents good and valid calculations based on correct data, we cannot synthesize conclusions based on their data. The transponder was no longer detected after a certain point. That means that there is no reason that ATC radar anywhere else would detect them unless they had a reason to look for primary targets in a fairly specific location in their airspace. The search was focused to the north when MH370 might have passed through the airspace covered by JORN and Christmas Island. It would take many hours to reach JORN's coverage area, and I don't think the authorities thought MH370 was still flying at the time, and if it were, its last known course was headed away from Australia and JORN's coverage area (and Christmas Island) airspace. JORN also cannot detect objects flying in tangent to its coverage arc because of the way it uses doppler principles. MH370's proposed route was close to that tangent and near the limits of detection of the radar station itself. It was not inbound to Australia, and therefore not a perceived defense threat, thus no alarms.

You asked why a pilot/terrorist would want to fly past Australia to Antarctica without enough fuel to get there. If you aren't familiar, check out Ethiopian Airlines Flight 961. The hijackers demanded to fly directly to Australia (past many other safe alternates), though the plane had insufficient fuel, and they were told so again and again by the captain. They did not believe him, and the plane crashed due to fuel starvation. It's an unlikely scenario for MH370 IMO, but it has a precedent.

Finally, we still cannot conclude from the location of the flaperon alone that the plane crashed in the same location. (Moreover, I don't think any RS has yet, have they?) Loss of that flaperon should not in itself bring down a 777. I may be wrong, but I don't think I am. The accompanying debris increases the likelihood that the locations are the same though. Dcs002 (talk) 01:53, 18 September 2015 (UTC)

Large edit

Drcrazy102 made a large edit which needs to be checked. I wanted to fix the convert error (search for "convert:" to see it), but I don't like to fix a trivial issue without looking at recent changes because my minor edit might suggest I endorsed the earlier edit. In general, it is best to leave convert to work out what the output unit should be because that provides the greatest uniformity between articles. One of the issues about the edit is that it attempted to specify the output units for each convert. It did too many other things at the same time—an impressive piece of work, but the adjustments to html comments, and all the other changes, make checking difficult. Anyway, the regulars on this page might like to fix the convert problem which is a typo of "mni2" instead of "nmi2". Another reason I did not fix it is that I'm wondering whether it is useful to know the number of square nautical miles. Johnuniq (talk) 10:32, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

Ah, I knew there was a typo hiding in that edit somewhere! Sorry, had poor connection today or I would have triple checked. From memory, (it was a large edit) I only included the "nmi2" because it was referring to a water body surface area, but I do not feel strongly about keeping it. Remove it if it seems superfluous to the article.

I try to do my edits in large batches typically, followed by preview and then triple article check. My apologies for the difficulty with checking through the edit, and I hope that someone else pays as much or more attention to detail as you did Johnuniq. Cheers, Drcrazy102 (talk) 14:08, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

I don't have time to fix everything, but a couple notes:

• Adding MYT throughout the article is superfluous. It was previously used throughout the article, but was removed. Both the origin and destination of the flight and Western Australia were on the same time at the time of the disappearance. I don't have the time to remove this.
• I don't think it was necessary to specify the unit to convert to in most cases, but I also don't think it does any harm. However, there are a couple instances where displaying three units seems excessive. In the disappearance section, nautical miles are useful because nautical miles (for distances) and feet (for altitude) are the international standard units for these measurements. However, I don't think nmi (and especially nmi2) are needed elsewhere in the article.
• "peninsular Malaysia" means the part of Malaysia on the Malay Peninsula (about half the country is on the peninsula & about half on the island of Borneo); as far as I know, there is no "Malaysian Penisula" (this could be an erroneous name for the Malay Peninsula, which includes Singapore & part of Thailand), so I reverted that change
• I reinserted a hidden sentence which was a quote from the report and a very noteworthy event in the aircraft's disappearance. It was probably added for some reason, perhaps an edit conflict.
• I changed "Three days later, on 5 August 2015," back to "Three days later<!-- 5 August 2015 -->,". This was for better flow of the section. There is so much "on [date]" in the section, that this was a good place to simply note the date with the phrase "Three days later".
• Captain (civil aviation) is a redirect to Pilot in command, which is wikilinked a couple words earlier

I also made a few other minor adjustments. AHeneen (talk) 02:37, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

From my edit;

I was unsure about the addition of the timezone but will go through and remove the superfluous additions then (i.e. if it has already been used in the section/paragraph)

As a quick point of interest, the second measurement in the infobox for "File:MH370 ATC and air routes map.png" is wrong. 20 nmi is between 35 - 40 km, not 30 - 35,as shown here by Google's unit converter, hence use of convert template instead of manual measurement. Also, I will double check now and remove nmi2 and remove nmi from areas not discussing distances over water.

I'll admit that the Malaysian Peninsula was my mistake, I am still learning geography after many years. Sorry about the confusion.

No worries about the rest. Cheers, Drcrazy102 (talk) 05:56, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Distance in nanometers?

In the 'Debris discovered' section is the line:

"on Réunion, an island in the western Indian Ocean, about 4,000 km (4.0×10^15 nm; 2,500 mi) west of the underwater search area"

There is a conversion to nanometers in scientific notation. I won't change it in case it is normal to convert many thousands of km to nm. I thought it was funny. Maybe someone can let me know if it should remain? Thanks. Worker9 (talk) 22:33, 11 October 2015 (UTC)

Nautical miles --BurritoBazooka (talk) 22:42, 11 October 2015 (UTC)

 Fixed, looks like someone put "nm" instead of "nmi" for that template :) --BurritoBazooka (talk) 22:45, 11 October 2015 (UTC)

Debris confirmed

It's confirmed that the debris is indeed from MH370 Ayub407 (talk) 19:05, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Yes, we know. Geogene (talk) 19:06, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Speaking of debris, I think the Maldives debris examination is noteworthy because it is part of the search for the plane. I vote that it be mentioned regardless of the outcome, and I promise to keep the relevant section of the MN 370 page updated as news is released re: the Maldives phase.TH1980 (talk) 22:48, 10 August 2015 (UTC)

No, it's not notable, and some of the better sources that cover it say it's probably not related. Should be removed from article unless it gets confirmation. Geogene (talk) 23:11, 10 August 2015 (UTC)

Fair enough.TH1980 (talk) 23:37, 10 August 2015 (UTC)

Good call re: Maldives debris. It appears that these items are from a barge that sunk in February 2015, not MH 370: http://www.news.com.au/travel/travel-updates/mh370-debris-cant-be-on-reunion-island-and-the-maldives-at-the-same-time-says-expert/story-e6frfq80-1227477749825 TH1980 (talk) 17:08, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

If these items are indeed from the barge, isn't this worthy of mention as a false lead in the search?TH1980 (talk) 04:03, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Not really - not unless there was truly some real expectation that they were from the said aeroplane. Are you going to mention every piece of potential wreckage in the Indian Ocean, what makes this special and relevant?Andrewgprout (talk) 06:28, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

I take it that recording every false lead re: MH 370 debris would be cloying for this page? If so, I understand.TH1980 (talk) 18:10, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

I just updated the section about debris to mention the latest developments from Reunion. The French claim a large amount of debris has been found on the island itself, but not out at sea.TH1980 (talk) 20:39, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

Another report alleging debris from MH 370 has been found has come out, this time from the Philippines: http://www.themalaymailonline.com/malaysia/article/dca-to-look-into-report-of-mh370-wreckage-find-in-philippines-transport-min Since this could be in error or a hoax, will this warrant mention only if the debris is indeed from the plane?TH1980 (talk) 23:33, 11 October 2015 (UTC)

Claims of wreckage being found

The Metro are reporting that it has been claimed that an aircraft full of skeletons has been found on an island in the Philippines. No doubt other mainstream media will report this too. IMHO, we need to be very careful on this one until there is definite confirmation that is is MH370. Mjroots (talk) 13:46, 12 October 2015 (UTC)

But skeletons are proof! Jk, definitely need to be careful until there is official confirmation rather than news reports. Cheers, Drcrazy102 (talk) 02:41, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

One report is that a skeleton found strapped to a seat was found along with some other debris, nothing about a fuselage full of skeletons: http://www.themalaymailonline.com/malaysia/article/dca-to-look-into-report-of-mh370-wreckage-find-in-philippines-transport-min We do indeed need to wait for confirmation about this, though, since it could be a hoax, in my opinion.TH1980 (talk) 02:50, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

Correction: the article I posted the link to says about the same thing the other news reports do.TH1980 (talk) 03:39, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

This supposed "discovery" has been debunked by Filipino authorities: http://nypost.com/2015/10/13/philippine-officials-reject-claim-that-mh370-crashed-in-remote-jungle-island/ Case closed re: Tawi-Tawi?TH1980 (talk) 22:34, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

Note: China Daily article index

There is an index of MH370-related articles from the China Daily: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2014planemissing/ WhisperToMe (talk) 21:58, 28 October 2015 (UTC)

More wreckage

Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf is reporting that another piece of wreckage has washed up on a beach in Thailand. Hopefully an English language source will also report this. Mjroots (talk) 21:39, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Again a false alarm... It's a piece of a japanese rocket. Wykx 00:17, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

Phone calls from relatives

This could have been discussed before, but a quick search seemed to show that it wasn't already mentioned in the article before I added it. This says that phones still register as 'online' for a network for 1~4 hours after being turned off: https://www.metabunk.org/malaysia-airlines-flight-370-passengers-phones-still-ringing.t3259/

I think there were many reports about phones being called, and hearing ring tones, that were later than 4 hours after the last satellite ping. One story I read was a person in China showing local police that someone was still online, though this was QQ messenger rather than a phone call I think. If it's controversial, we can investigate it more. 2601:600:8500:5B1:DD92:E92D:ECC7:2769 (talk) 01:27, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

I have removed this, as it's not particularly controversial or relevant and the sourced used was Breitbart News Network which isnt' a very good source for this sort of thing. Basically no one with any understanding of mobile phone tech considers the phone call thing indicative of anything other than the complexities of how modern phone, particularly mobile phone, ringing is. Where the ringing is basically an artificial signal generate by some network somewhere to indicate something is happening. See for example [9] or Talk:Malaysia Airlines Flight 370/Archive 3#Mobile Phones. I

n fact, anyone who has used a phone enough will probably know that ringing is no indication that the phone itself will know it's been called. In other words, with enough experience but needing to be an expert you probably know it's entirely possible to call some, get a ringtone, but for the phone you called to never know it was called (e.g. in the form of missed call). Many networks may provide an alternative means (e.g. an SMS) of informing the callee they were called, but clearly anything coming seperately from the network is unrelated to whether the phone itself ever received info it was being called. As for the QQ thing, well again that will depend on what conditions QQ decides someone is online. If anyone really wanted to check this, they would ask Tencent when they last received an update from the person's account. Of course even if it was after the flight, the more likely explaination is this person accidentally stayed logged in on some other computer. (Presuming that Tencent keeps IP records and I'm guessing they do, it most likely wouldn't be that hard to work out where this was from, and I'm guessing it will turn out to be a friend or cyber cafe in KL and not Diego Garcia.)

The fact that some relatives where perhaps understandably clutching at straws just after the crashdoesn't mean we should include this info in the article. Nor does the fact some poorer media sources printed these claims without some basic level of checking. There are so many other random claims and we should only report those that are widespread and significant enough (even if debunked), and frankly this phone/QQ thing simply isn't that.

I think there are other areas where we should be cutting down on. E.g. the Chinese water bottle/Indonesian cleaning product line could probably be cut. Frankly I think that whole thing can be trimmed to finding the wing and how there was then a frenzy with every random piece of garbage on the island originating from the the world's garbage dump [10] became suspected as having originated from MH370 but nothing else was ever linked to the flight. (To be clear, I'm not saying there wasn't merit in paying more attention instead simply that it was a bit of an insane feeding frenzy at the time.)

Nil Einne (talk) 08:27, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

Lack of communication from passengers

I'm afraid that if I add this anywhere it will get reverted, as it could seem like "a random mystery but does not really belong in an encyclopedia article." There are a lot of people editing Wikipedia who don't feel that the purpose should include things like helping to find a missing plane and its passengers. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/28/flight-mh370-malaysia-missing-one-year-on-jon-ronson This says no messages, text or phone calls, were received from any passengers in the plane after they boarded, despite that some passengers were known to always do so after boarding. It also seems like the fact that passengers' phones could still be reached, but would ring several times before going to voice mail, has been removed from this Wikipedia article, probably for being 'irrelevant'. 2601:600:8500:5B1:E8B2:17B:726F:4962 (talk) 01:47, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 11 external links on Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add {{cbignore}} after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add {{nobots|deny=InternetArchiveBot}} to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/20150804213635/http://abcnews.go.com:80/International/wireStory/malaysia-seeks-expand-search-mh370-debris-32832669 to http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/malaysia-seeks-expand-search-mh370-debris-32832669
• Added archive https://web.archive.org/20150804213635/http://abcnews.go.com:80/International/wireStory/malaysia-seeks-expand-search-mh370-debris-32832669 to http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/malaysia-seeks-expand-search-mh370-debris-32832669
• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20140714174533/http://www2.nst.com.my/latest/font-color-red-mh370-tragedy-font-dca-has-authority-to-analyse-black-box-of-missing-plane-1.555040 to http://www2.nst.com.my/latest/font-color-red-mh370-tragedy-font-dca-has-authority-to-analyse-black-box-of-missing-plane-1.555040
• Added archive {newarchive} to http://mh370.dca.gov.my/information-provided-to-mh370-by-aaib/
• Added archive {newarchive} to http://mh370.dca.gov.my/mh370-press-briefing-by-hishammuddin-hussein-on-21st-march-2014/
• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20150316154050/http://www.nst.com.my/latest/font-color-red-missing-mh370-font-indonesia-helps-in-search-for-airliner-1.504168 to http://www2.nst.com.my/latest/font-color-red-missing-mh370-font-indonesia-helps-in-search-for-airliner-1.504168
• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20141026151630/http://www.nst.com.my/latest/font-color-red-mh370-lost-in-indian-ocean-font-credible-lead-moves-search-to-new-area-1.536483 to http://www2.nst.com.my/latest/font-color-red-mh370-lost-in-indian-ocean-font-credible-lead-moves-search-to-new-area-1.536483
• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20150910100540/http://www.nst.com.my/latest/font-color-red-missing-mh370-font-caregiver-sacrifices-time-for-family-of-passengers-1.521261 to http://www.nst.com.my/latest/font-color-red-missing-mh370-font-caregiver-sacrifices-time-for-family-of-passengers-1.521261
• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20140311071915/http://www.nst.com.my/latest/font-color-red-missing-mh370-font-families-cling-to-faint-hopes-psychologist-1.506061 to http://www.nst.com.my/latest/font-color-red-missing-mh370-font-families-cling-to-faint-hopes-psychologist-1.506061
• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20140314225646/http://bigstory.ap.org/article/china-appeals-malaysia-search-information to http://bigstory.ap.org/article/china-appeals-malaysia-search-information
• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20140725070118/http://www.imf.org/external/np/fin/rates/rms_five.cfm to http://www.imf.org/external/np/fin/rates/rms_five.cfm

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Article structure: Debris

After a quick investigation, I realised that debris from MH370 was mentioned in three places: twice in this article and once in the article about the search. I removed the second occurrence, however I think that this should also be removed from the other article as well. As I see it, the other article documents the search activities. The two items identified so far were not the result of these activities, so they should be recorded in this article. Any other opinions? Rentzepopoulos (talk) 14:29, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

I disagree that the content should have been removed. The subsections in the "disappearance" and "search" section serve different purposes. First, here is the text of the "marine debris" subsection of "Search" that you removed:

A week after the discovery of a flaperon from Flight 370 on a beach on Réunion, France announced plans for an aerial search for possible marine debris around the island. On 7 August 2015, France began searching an area 120 km (75 mi) by 40 km (25 mi) along the east coast of Réunion. Foot patrols for debris along beaches were also planned. Malaysia asked authorities in neighboring states to be on alert for marine debris which could be from an aircraft. On 14 August it was announced that no debris that could be related to Flight 370 had been found at sea off Réunion, but that some had been found on land. Air and sea searches for debris ended on 17 August. On 3 March 2016, a suspected piece of wreckage was found near Mozambique. US officials have yet to confirm the wreckage.

The first paragraph is directly related to the "search" for MH370. Obviously, the second paragraph had recently been added and does not fit with the flow of this subsection. Compare that to the text in the "Debris discoveries" subsection of "Disappearance":

On 29 July 2015, aircraft debris was found on a beach in Saint-André, on Réunion, an island in the western Indian Ocean, about 4,000 km (2,200 nmi; 2,500 mi) west of the underwater search area. The object had a stenciled internal marking "657 BB," consistent with the code for a portion of a right wing flaperon (a trailing edge control surface) from a Boeing 777. The following day, a damaged suitcase was found which may be associated with Flight 370. The location is consistent with models of debris dispersal 16 months after an origin in the current search area, off the west coast of Australia. On 31 July, a Chinese water bottle and an Indonesian cleaning product were found in the same area. There have been many claims that additional debris had been found on Réunion which may have come from Flight 370, but none appear to have come from an aircraft as of 5 August.

The first object to be found was transported from Réunion—an overseas department of France—to Toulouse, for examination by France's civil aviation accident investigation agency, the Bureau d'Enquêtes et d'Analyses pour la Sécurité de l'Aviation Civile (BEA), and a French defence ministry laboratory. Malaysia sent investigators to both Réunion and Toulouse. French police conducted a search of the waters around Réunion for additional debris.

On 2 August, Malaysian officials confirmed that the object was a flaperon from a Boeing 777 aircraft and that the verification was made with investigators from France, Malaysia, Boeing, and the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). Three days later, the Prime Minister of Malaysia announced that the discovered flaperon was confirmed to be from Flight 370; French officials only stated that there was a "very high probability" that the object was from Flight 370. On 3 September, French officials announced that serial numbers found on the flaperon link it "with certainty" to Flight 370. This serial number was retrieved via borescope.

On 2 March 2016, it was reported that an object had been found off the coast of Mozambique and early photographic analysis suggested it could have come from the aircraft's horizontal stabilizer. It was found on a sandbank in the Mozambique Channel, between Mozambique in eastern Africa and Madagascar; and in the same part of the southern Indian Ocean where the only confirmed piece of debris, a flaperon, had been found the previous July. The fragment is being sent to Australia where experts may examine whether it is a new piece in the puzzle of missing flight MH370.

This section has an entirely different focus and relates to the section that it is in. It's not impermissible to have the same general subject in different sections when, in this case, it is discussed in an aspect that is relevant to that section. Therefore, I am reinserting the content in the search section. The section in the search article could use some clean-up, but shouldn't be entirely removed. AHeneen (talk) 03:27, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

You are right -- I had misinterpreted the text as a simple repetition (partially as a result of the last insertion of information about the Mozambique finding). Rentzepopoulos (talk) 10:24, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

However

WP:EDITORIAL cautions us to be very careful about this word. I do not think it is needed here. Ask yourself, is the meaning of the passage less clear without it? --John (talk) 14:31, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

I have not been involved in the reverts; however (pun intended) I consider that the word must stay and this became more obvious after the restructuring of the first sentence. The meaning here is that initially the search was in a totally different area and subsequently, as a result of new information, the search shifted to the Indian Ocean. In my opinion, "however" is fully justified and it does not fall within the provisions of WP:EDITORIAL. Rentzepopoulos (talk) 14:46, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

Interesting. Where, in your opinion, is the contradiction between starting the search in one location and continuing it in another? --John (talk) 15:17, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

I think the keyword is "continuing". As far as I understand, searching did not continue to another location; searching near Indonesia was interrupted and a new search started in the Indian Ocean when new information showed that the aircraft continued flying after it was lost from radars. What do you think? Rentzepopoulos (talk) 15:36, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

I think this is a classic misuse of "however", which is why I removed it twice. It is akin to saying "Smith was born in Moscow, however he was brought up in Berlin." However does not mean and or then, and should only be used where "but" or "nevertheless" could substitute for it. --John (talk) 17:46, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

OK, I am convinced :) However, the example you gave implies "but" even more than the relevant text in the article: It is normal to expect that a person is brought up at or near the place they were born. Using "however" in your example stresses the fact that despite being born in Moscow, Smith was brought up in another country and so "however" is justified (if this was the intention of the author). This is how I read the relevant text in the article, as I noted above. Anyway, my intervention was meant as a third person's view on the subject -- I am not an English native speaker so no point in taking this further. Cheers! Rentzepopoulos (talk) 10:34, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

I am completely baffled that you claim this is a "classic misuse" of however. It is the most straightforward use of the word, I can imagine. A thing was happening. However, a change of circumstances occurred and the thing stopped". Your comparison does not make sense, and the paragraph is not clear without it. WP:edit says "Words such as but, however, and although may imply a relationship between two statements where none exists". However there is a relationship here between those two statements and "however" is needed to convey this. Mezigue (talk) 17:27, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

I am sorry to have baffled you. Ask yourself, is the meaning of the passage less clear without it? Where, in your opinion, is the contradiction between starting the search in one location and continuing it in another? --John (talk) 18:30, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

I already answered that: yes, the passage becomes confusing without it. Mezigue (talk) 20:13, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

I disagree that it is confusing. Where, in your opinion, is the contradiction between starting the search in one location and continuing it in another? --John (talk) 20:20, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

I wonder why you are obsessed with a contradiction. "However" can also introduce a contrast, a change etc... They searched in place A. However, evidence then suggested they should search in place B instead. Without the word, the logic of the paragraph disappears. Mezigue (talk) 23:41, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

It's certainly very poorly written at present. I will have a shot at a more general copy-edit that I hope will please you. "However" is generally useless padding (as in this case) and it introduces a false sense of contradiction (or contrast if you prefer); it is extremely common in cases like this for the search area to change. --John (talk) 01:00, 5 March 2016 (UTC)

• I've taken a hack at it. It still needs a lot of work. These articles suffer from bloat. Not every speculation and every tweet has to be included. I removed the two sections of timeline as I felt they duplicated material already in the article, and are of course in an article of their own. --John (talk) 23:25, 5 March 2016 (UTC)

Cargo

The cargo section of this article seems to contain duplicate as well as contradictory information, especially quoting 10,806 kg vs. 4,566 kg of Mangostenes. The German wikipedia and the Malaysian ICAO report seem to back the second figure. I am not up to making such changes but in an article rated as “good” such things should be ironed out. -- Aisano (talk) 09:03, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

@Aisano: It's not contradictory or duplicate:

• "Flight 370 was carrying 10,806 kg (23,823 lb) of cargo, of which four ULDs of mangosteens and 221 kg (487 lb) of lithium-ion batteries are of interest, according to Malaysian investigators."
• "There were 221 kg (487 lb) of lithium-ion batteries contained within a 2,453 kg (5,408 lb) consignment being transported between Motorola Solutions facilities in Bayan Lepas, Malaysia and Tianjin, China; the rest of the consignment consisted of walkie-talkie chargers and accessories."
• "A 4,566 kg (10,066 lb) consignment of mangosteens was aboard Flight 370, over half of which was harvested in Muar, Malaysia and the remainder from Sumatra, Indonesia."

There was 10,806kg total cargo aboard the aircraft. The 10,806kg includes the mangosteen consignment (4566kg), walkie-talkie consignment (2453kg, of which 221kg was lithium-ion batteries), plus all other cargo aboard the aircraft. AHeneen (talk) 15:32, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

@AHeneen: Thank you, my bad. -- Renardo la vulpo (talk) 18:30, 6 March 2016 (UTC) (ex Aisano)

Missing MH370 a question

Could MH370 have run out of liquid oxygen, hence if the pilots hadn't noticed would the pilots become confused. Maybe to a state of returning back to land. Maybe they were unable to turn the dial on the auto pilot all the way before they passed out. Perhaps they put the aircraft in a slow reduction in height so they would recover at a lower height. It could be a reason why no passenger's used their mobiles, as they had passed out for lack of oxygen. As the plane got nearer to the sea with the alarms going off would the autopilot keep the plane level, until it ran out of fuel then pancake into the sea. If so could the plane stay mainly intact, could be why the lack of floatage and other parts missing, mainly small parts broken off, as the hold holding suitcases etc being intact.Usually if a plane breaks up there is a lot of floatage from toys books and clothes, yet none in this case.

Paul Greenwood — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.109.245.48 (talk) 14:14, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

This area is for discussing proposed improvements to the article. What improvement are you proposing? --John (talk) 21:58, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

Southern route

I just added it in, but its reasoning is suspect: "The timing offset of the later pings also correlated more strongly with a southern route. It was possible to make this deduction with reasonable certainty because the aircraft's satellite terminal corrects for the aircraft's motion when choosing a communication frequency."

Looking at the interim reports, I did see that the correction is important. But the correction mentioned doesn't affect the burst timing offset, only the burst frequency offset. Was it that the frequency offset of the later pings supported the southern route? The last signal sent by the aircraft was not used for some analyses because it only provided a frequency offset, not a timing offset; was it just that it wasn't used for a final arc? 24.18.193.250 (talk) 15:28, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

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Debris

The Aviation Safety Network has a story that two items of debris are almost certainly from MH370. Original source is the ATSB. Mjroots (talk) 18:58, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

New ICAO provisions

The ICAO have updated Annex 6] of the Chicago Convention as a result of this accident. Mjroots (talk) 20:52, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

Yes. The changes are very significant:

1. The requirement for aircraft to carry autonomous distress tracking devices which can autonomously transmit location information at least once every minute in distress circumstances.
2. The requirement for aircraft to be equipped with a means to have flight recorder data recovered and made available in a timely manner.
3. Extending the duration of cockpit voice recordings to 25 hours so that they cover all phases of flight for all types of operations.

Should certainly be mentioned, in my view, although they will take effect only over the next five years. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:08, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

I agree. Thank you Mjroots for raising this here. --John (talk) 21:20, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the link. The new amendments to the Chicago Convention have been added to the article. AHeneen (talk) 02:35, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

Current state of lead section

The introduction is five paragraphs and kinda draggy. I was not well hooked by the introduction enough to read the whole article. Also, the disaster and disappearance happened two years ago. Why should introduction overcomplicate the topic than the topic already is? --George Ho (talk) 06:42, 7 June 2016 (UTC)

The length of the lead has been discussed a couple times before:

• Talk:Malaysia Airlines Flight 370/Archive 10#Lead
• Talk:Malaysia Airlines Flight 370/Archive 11#Hypoxia speculation in lead should be cut

The current lead provides an overview of the article's content, in line with WP:LEAD. There is not guideline for the size of the lead in terms of words (eg. "readable prose size"), only paragraphs. Per WP:LEAD: The lead should stand on its own as a concise overview of the article's topic. It should identify the topic, establish context, explain why the topic is notable, and summarize the most important points, including any prominent controversies. As a general rule of thumb, a lead section should contain no more than four well-composed paragraphs and be carefully sourced as appropriate.

The article itself is long (70 kB readable prose size) and the lead provides an overview/summary of all the significant topics. It is structured by paragraph as: 1) overview of disappearance, 2) search, 3) investigation & possible causes, & 4) aftermath/notability. Each of these paragraphs provides a concise overview of each subtopic. AHeneen (talk) 17:32, 7 June 2016 (UTC)

I beg your pardon, AHeneen, but the first discussion was discussing the 2014 revision (diff); the second, the 2015 revision (diff). Also, what about the audience of 100 years later? Must they read a draggy introduction about the disappearance and the late discovery of the flight, especially when the disappearance was two years ago? The guideline says, The lead is the first part of the article that most people will read. For many, it may be the only section that they read. Also, per WP:LEADLENGTH, The length of the lead should conform to readers' expectations of a short, but useful and complete, summary of the topic. Moreover, a lead that is too long is intimidating, difficult to read, and may cause the reader to lose interest halfway. To rephrase, most readers read just the introduction and then move on. If they want to read the whole article further, a good, catchy introduction is desirable. To me, I could not finish reading it, despite good changes, because... well, I didn't like the overemphasis by journalists and the press coverage execution (i.e. press quality) of the crash. There is no need to drag the readers on with each paragraph about, respectively, the search and the discovery, is there? George Ho (talk) 01:28, 8 June 2016 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but your comment doesn't make a lot of sense. What does readers 100 years from now have anything to do with the lead!? You don't seem to understand the purpose of the lead. It provides an overview of the subject. Per MOS:INTRO: The lead section should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it can stand on its own as a concise version of the article. That's exactly what the current lead does.

You said because... well, I didn't like the overemphasis by journalists and the press coverage execution (i.e. press quality) of the crash. There is no need to drag the readers on with each paragraph about, respectively, the search and the discovery, is there? How does that relate to the lead of this article? Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and the lead provides the key details relevant to understanding the subject. The search is a significant element of this subject and certainly needs to be mentioned in the lead. Also, I will bold an important part of the policy you quoted: The length of the lead should conform to readers' expectations of a short, but useful and complete, summary of the topic. How can the lead be "useful" if it didn't provide a brief overview of the search!?

If the discovery of the aircraft's fuselage was announced tomorrow, this page would be one of the top 10 most viewed pages on Wikipedia. The article is long and so it is all the more important that the lead is useful to people who just want to briefly learn about the subject rather than forcing them to dig through the article.

By the way, this is the lead revision after the first discussion and this is the end result of the second discussion, which is very similar to the present lead. AHeneen (talk) 22:17, 8 June 2016 (UTC)

I apologize. I just... well, the topic itself got press coverage so much, so I couldn't get well tuned into it. For now, I guess the current state of the lede is "useful", like you said. Maybe, when the whole "bulk of aircraft" is found, we might reconsider the usefulness of certain information. Or, when the complete discovery happens, we might re-edit the lede some other time or discuss re-editing it. George Ho (talk) 01:38, 9 June 2016 (UTC)

@George Ho: Can the lead too long tag be removed from the article now? Also, I agree that in the future, when there's much more information (not simply the discovery of the aircraft, which would probably just add a sentence, but details of the investigation that follows), then the lead may be trimmed. Also, I hope you (along with other editors who read this conversation) don't think that I am trying to act as the WP:OWNER of this article. I am trying to be a WP:STEWARD of the Flight 370-related articles (except the unofficial theories article, which I haven't edited much), although I haven't been particularly involved with the addition of the "Marine debris" section which could use some clean-up. You seem to think that this article is too much like press coverage, but I think it is a very appropriate and thorough coverage of the topic, although (again) the "Marine debris" section needs some clean-up. I'm just trying to keep the article at a good quality level consistent with Wikipedia policies (like the comprehensive and useful lead), not trying to deter potential editors. AHeneen (talk) 23:13, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

Flight sim evidence

The revelation that pilot had been practicing the flight path on his simulator prior to the flight seems like a bombshell, the first solid evidence of foul play (though not conclusive). It's covered in the article but buried in a lot of other text. Does it need more weight in the lead section? The lead section seems overdone in some areas, and lacking in others. -- GreenC 14:21, 23 July 2016 (UTC)

Seems pretty overblown to me. We only have a leaked document from New York Magazine, which Malaysian authorities claim is not even real [11], and isn't quite the path the plane actually followed. We also have insufficient context: How many flight paths did Shah have programmed into his computer? How many pilots have run weird random flight paths on their simulators? I'd wait a bit longer before making this information so prominent. Someguy1221 (talk) 21:43, 25 July 2016 (UTC)

"..to U.S. and Australian investigators it provided compelling confirmation that the captain had indeed planned a suicide flight into the remote southern Indian Ocean'. They were convinced that they were on the right track."[12] -- GreenC 13:54, 26 July 2016 (UTC)

I feel like that could just be the journalist taking dramatic license, though. As far as we know, the only official source is the New York Magazine article, and even that says "However, it’s not entirely clear that the recovered flight-simulator data is conclusive. The differences between the simulated and actual flights are significant, most notably in the final direction in which they were heading. It’s possible that their overall similarities are coincidental — that Zaharie didn't intend his simulator flight as a practice run but had merely decided to fly someplace unusual." – FenixFeather ^{(talk)(Contribs)} 19:06, 26 July 2016 (UTC)

I think it should be removed from the article for the time being - until sources better than an unnamed "leaked document" are found. WikiHannibal (talk) 22:36, 26 July 2016 (UTC)

Flight MH370 was flown into water, says crash expert

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/01/flight-mh370-was-flown-into-water-says-crash-expert Xx236 (talk) 05:59, 2 August 2016 (UTC)

Missing changing to Crashed

With several pieces now confirmed, flaperon from Reunion Island, and two interior parts near Madagascar, it is now official that the plane had indeed crashed in the Indian Ocean. The parts floating and ending up in Reunion Island and Madagascar is evidence that this is so. As a result, I am changing the "missing" to "crashed."

Discuss here BEFORE YOU CHANGE MY EDIT. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.8.49.109 (talk) 14:55, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

I a have reverted it to the current consensus, if you have a reliable source rather an assumption then it can be discussed, thanks. MilborneOne (talk) 15:00, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

Excuse me? I did NOT give an assumption. It is a FACT that a flaperon from MH370 was discovered on Reunion Island. It is a fact that an interior cabin trim piece was found near Madagascar. Why would you change it without offering ANY evidence for doing so? With both exterior and interior parts found for MH370, it is by definition crashed. Not missing. How can a plane be missing when parts of it have already been found?

I am changing it back. Do NOT change it again. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.8.49.109 (talk) 16:03, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

So we know it wasn't a bombing? Martinevans123 (talk) 16:06, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

No one said anything about knowing the cause of the crash. I am not proposing a cause, because the cause is unknown. What IS known is that random pieces have been recovered at two different places in the water: Reunion Island and Madagascar. By definition of finding partial plane parts, the plane has crashed. It is no longer accurate to say "missing." The airplane is officially crashed, by definition. No cause has been assigned. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.8.49.109 (talk) 16:10, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

So the airline has made an official statement, supported by a full report from the relevant safety authority? I must have missed that. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:15, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

This should remain as missing, until it can be verified (WP:VERIFY) that the plane was in fact crashed. Finding two pieces does not equate to a crashed plane - at least not for an encyclopedia. Garchy (talk) 16:20, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

Once an aircraft takes off, there are only two possible outcomes: it lands or it crashes. It's being changed back. Just look at the Egypt Air 804 crash yesterday, the wiki page, it already says crashed.... They haven't even found a single piece yet, but the wiki police are saying it is crashed. How's hat any different? No evidence! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.107.58.201 (talk) 16:27, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

I have reverted your change. Do not make this change again until and unless WP:CONSENSUS is established in support of it. The facts at EgyptAir Flight 804 are different, and rarely will the argument that something was recently done in another article so should be done here hold up. General Ization ^Talk 16:33, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

That's a little too simplistic. "Crashed" is not really a preferred term in aviation accident investigation. A bombing isn't really "a crash", is it? It's also possible to have a "crash-landing" where everyone survives. Or even a glider-landing onto water, which is an accident, but hardly "a crash". Curiously the AAIB tells us, on their page for Definition of Aircraft Accident and Serious Incident, that a missing aircraft falls into the definition of "an accident". Martinevans123 (talk) 16:47, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

And what consensus would that be? A bunch of people here with no aviation experience? Most reputable sources, including the already quoted Malaysian authorities have already stated the flight path ended in the Southern Indian Ocean. It's not my fault that wiki editors like yourself have selective memory. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.107.58.201 (talk) 16:46, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

That's the consensus that User:General Ization and I, amongst many others, have established. Try not to dismiss the efforts of other editors who all edit in good faith, whether they see themselves as "experts" or not. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:50, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

There's no need to attack other editors, or their knowledge. This is simply about consensus, and consensus is currently that there is not enough verifiable and credible information to list the aircraft as "crashed". There are plenty of other edits we could all be making on Wiki right now that would be more constructive than this, so let's please leave it with the consensus we have right now, until more information is available. On another note, the end of a flight path does not, in fact, correlate to the end of a flight ;-) Garchy (talk) 16:52, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

Among other differences between MH370 and MS804, an aircraft that is tracked making the kind of extreme altitude changes and maneuvers that MS804 is reliably sourced and officially verified as having made immediately before loss of radar contact cannot be reasonably assumed to have done anything but crash, whereas an aircraft that simply disappears from radar flying at its assigned altitude and airspeed and (though off its plan) in a straight-line flight path cannot. General Ization ^Talk 16:53, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

Wiki does not run on consensus when fact shows otherwise. Besides, your last statement is extremely biased and 100% opinion. You're saying that because the altitude and heading varied greatly for EgyptAir, it cannot have done anything but crash, yet MH370 also made heading and course changes and then flew on for several hours, but it somehow did not crash? That's your "consensus" on what constitutes a crash? Sounds like consensus here is heavily biased on personal opinion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.8.49.109 (talk) 16:57, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

My comment was largely intended to explain to you why reliable sources are already describing MS804 as having crashed, whereas they are not doing so for MH370. In order for Wikipedia to use language different from that used by reliable sources, there must be consensus to do so, and there is no such consensus at this point, whatever assumptions you may wish to make about MH370's fate. Since your edit has been challenged, and consensus is against it, consensus will prevail. General Ization ^Talk 17:02, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

Well then you boys have fun with your little wiki page control. It'll be interesting to see what you change the page to after August when the search is called off for good. The editors here will probably live in denial mode for ages to come. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.8.49.109 (talk) 17:17, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

I read the above and I think that the process followed requires a reality check. I understand and support the consensus process; however, when common sense is not verified explicitly by reliable sources then we should validate that the consensus takes into account common sense as well. For example, in this case, we say that no RS has declared the accident as a crash. However, see the conclusion text from an official document from ATSB issued in August 2015:

The surface search in the southern Indian Ocean commenced 9 days after MH370 went missing. By this time much of any debris left floating after the crash would likely have either sunk or have been dispersed. The surface search initially, briefly, targeted the correct area based on the initial, and then subsequent work, to reconstruct the aircraft’s flight path and therefore the surface search at this point in time represented the best chance to identify and recover any floating debris.

I consider that the wording of such documents is not done haphazardly and when they talk about "the crash", they do imply that MH370 has crashed. The complete document presents an analysis of where debris from "an aircraft impacting the sea surface...at high speed". So, I believe that there is substantial support from a reliable source to overturn the consensus and bring it closer to what is reasonably expected to have happened to MH370. Rentzepopoulos (talk) 09:58, 7 June 2016 (UTC)

Martinevans123 and his sockpuppet army of supporters have been blocked. I am changing the summary to "crashed ..." which seems to have been the consensus of logged in users. I doubt anyone will have an issue with it, but if so please revert and I will follow the page to watch for responses and respond myself. Lipsquid (talk) 02:40, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

Regardless of the aircraft having crashed, it is actually still missing, unless "somewhere on the floor of the Indian Ocean" does not equate to "missing". YSSYguy (talk) 09:08, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

Regardless of parts being missing, when parts of it have been found, it has crashed. The summary says "crashed, search ongoing", which means the crash location is unknown. This is what the vast majority of sources say also. I am not the owner of the article, if you have better wording, go for it. It just seems silly to only say "missing" when parts of the debris has been found. It crashed. Where? Don't know. Why? Don't know. But it definitely crashed. Lipsquid (talk) 15:04, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't agree. The plane is still missing, and will be until it is found. Please form a consensus here before changing the article. --John (talk) 16:14, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

You don't agree with what? The majority of sources say it crashed in an unknown location and you will need to source that it has not crashed but is just missing, even if you are an admin. Lipsquid (talk) 16:16, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

Per WP:LEAD the infobox should summarize the article. The article does have the sentence "As there were no places there where it could have landed, the aircraft must therefore have crashed into the sea." so I think it would be okay to have it say "crashed". Nevertheless, this is such a minor detail I don't know if it's worth the effort or the stress to change it. – FenixFeather ^{(talk)(Contribs)} 17:54, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

As discussed a million times. After a plane takes off it either lands safely or crashes, period. There is no plane that is missing for days, weeks or months, except for the always awesome argument of alien abduction. You are right though it is probably not worth the hassle, as an Admin has already reverted the change as "needs consensus" without saying anything on the talk page other than "I don't agree" and running off to revert the next change. Also, many of the old discussions said that the plane should be considered "Missing until Debris is found", we have debris now. Maybe the "missing" plane is flying around with one missing wing. Lipsquid (talk) 21:56, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

For my part, I should have made myself more clear; it has crashed and it is missing. How about we have "crashed, location unknown, search ongoing..." or "missing, believed crashed in the Indian Ocean, search ongoing...", which have the benefit of being accurate. At the risk of muddying the waters, I think we should get rid of the WL to the list of missing aircraft behind the word "missing", which is WLed as a See also anyway. YSSYguy (talk) 22:04, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for clarifying and I would be fine with either of the two options you listed. "crashed, location unknown, search ongoing..." or "missing, believed crashed in the Indian Ocean, search ongoing..." I think the first makes more sense now that they have debris, but your choice and I won't complain either way. Lipsquid (talk) 22:17, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

Even though my own opinion (not relevant) is that the aircraft has well-and-truly crashed, my expectation is that if you ask most people about MH370, the most common response you would get is that it is still "missing", and this probably won't change until the fuselage or similar large body pieces are located. So I would put emphasis on that point first, via a summary that the aircraft is "missing, presumed crashed in the Southern Ocean, with search ongoing ...". Saying it is crashed as the primary condition fits better when you have an actual wreckage site to point to, IMO. ❮❮ GEEKSTREET ^{Talk Lane ❯❯} 11:08, 5 November 2016 (UTC)

"Bayesian Methods in the Search for MH370" publication already referenced?

A document "Bayesian Methods in the Search for MH370" is referenced in the Executive Summary of (latest) ATSB debris update report of 2 Nov 2016. It appears to be a sizeable publication, but I am unsure as to how much of this material is already referenced in Wikipedia's MH370 article.

Possibly someone more familiar with the current state of the article could take a look at it? ❮❮ GEEKSTREET ^{Talk Lane ❯❯} 02:04, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

Hi @AHeneen:, is this something you can advise me on? I did a quick search of the main article for matches to the "Bayesian Methods" doc & nothing turned up. I'm not convinced that means that that document's contents haven't already been included 1 way or another. I didn't want to start digging into it all if has already been done prior. Thanks! ❮❮ GEEKSTREET ^{Talk Lane ❯❯} 00:07, 7 November 2016 (UTC)

Hello. I think the use of Bayesian Methods for determining the final location of MH370 is a topic that should be discussed in the article Search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. The search article could be expanded with a section about the use of Bayesian Methods and drift analysis of debris. I don't really think that that is a subject that deserves discussion in this article, since in my opinion it is too detailed for the WP:Summary style overview in the "search" section. AHeneen (talk) 02:04, 9 November 2016 (UTC)

Do current autopilots still ‘automatically’ cause a steep or vertical dive when thrust is lost?

It evidently did so for MH370 if the following, as the article states, is true: "If no control inputs were made following flameout and the disengagement of autopilot, the aircraft would likely have entered a spiral dive..." This seems to have been the case in multiple other tragedies as well, such as the 1999 Learjet crash which killed Payne Stewart. If so it's a profound, entirely unnecessary, and truly tragic technology oversight. I posted a detailed comment about this matter on the talk side of the Autopilot page.

Autopilots, especially for large modern airliners, should not become abjectly stupid nor simply bail in response to loss of thrust. If they still do so the aviation community is suffering from a massive blind spot which will cause further wholly unnecessary tragedies.

I'm genuinely mystified. Please comment. --H Bruce Campbell (talk) 08:45, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

H Bruce Campbell has asked a similar question in another place. My reply is here. Dolphin (t) 10:52, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

Payne Stewart's plane did not automatically enter a steep or vertical dive when thrust was lost. It ran on the set course until it ran out of fuel. See our article. Britmax (talk) 11:00, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

In the case of that accident, it is known that when thrust was lost, the autopilot disconnected, and the aircraft entered a spiral dive. I have added wikilinks to both articles in order to clarify. Hope this helps. Burninthruthesky (talk) 12:01, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

Your hypothesis that APs "automatically cause a steep or vertical dive when thrust is lost" is not really correct. Upon AP disconnection, for whatever reason, the aircraft will continue flying in the trim configuration the aircraft had prior to disconnection, less any corrective actions the AP may have applied. The fact that an aircraft may subsequently enter a spiral dive, stall or develop other unusual attitudes after AP disconnection comes down to what ongoing balance exists between 3-axis trim, longitudinal & lateral weight distributions, control surface manipulations and engine power (or lack of). In theory there is no reason why an aircraft couldn't continue straight & level after the AP drops out (albeit unlikely for extended periods) despite no further inputs being made by the flight crew. No aircraft is designed to "automatically" go into a steep dive under this operating condition. ❮❮ GEEKSTREET ^{Talk Lane ❯❯} 11:30, 5 November 2016 (UTC)

Please keep in mind that the talk pages aren't a general forum for discussion of a topic. It should be used for issues relating to improvement of the article. See WP:NOTFORUM. That said, one engine would flame out before the other. The engines generate electricity to run the aircraft. When the second engine stopped, that cut the power supply that ran the aircraft's electrical system and the ram air turbine was deployed and the auxiliary power unit was started. However, there was still a complete power loss for a minute or two. The AP disengaged after the second engine stopped. At that point, the flight controls would have been configured to keep the plane flying straight with one engine producing thrust and so without any engine thrust or AP, the plane would turn in the direction of that engine and enter a spiral dive. When the power was restored, the AP would need to be reset. The AP didn't cause the spiral dive, it was the disengagement of AP combined with the fact that the control surfaces remained configured for one-engine producing thrust after the flameout of the second engine. AHeneen (talk) 02:32, 9 November 2016 (UTC)

Agreed, it is not the place for general discussions however I was attempting to answer the OP's question in general terms, & not necessarily specific to this accident. Until MH370's Flight Data Recorder is recovered any assumptions more specific to MH370 are really just conjecture. Re AP operation, in general any control inputs applied by the AP unit itself (ie to correct for single-engine operation, etc) will be lost upon AP disengagement, however those previously applied by flight crew (which may have been over-ridden by the AP) will be retained. ❮❮ GEEKSTREET ^{Talk Lane ❯❯} 07:47, 9 November 2016 (UTC)

Misinformation is a problem, turn near penang

This might be a general problem for wikipedia, but is very evident in this case. I believe wiki should only state facts and not speculations. the problem is when an authority takes a possibly fake or speculative view and treats it as a fact. Specifically, the turn near penang, is sourced by 50 and 51, speculative articles, and this view has later become an official story, with no verifiable source. The source would be military radar. It has never been shown to the public. The relatives have been shown an image in a presentation, and some took pictures of it. Analysis of those pictures have ruled out the authenticity of those images. Thus, the claim of a turn near penang seems to be sourced on thin air and should not be part of wiki without explaining the situation. see also https://sites.google.com/site/mh370debris/home/turn-back-debunked — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.4.0.236 (talk) 10:45, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Verifiability#Reliable sources. AHeneen (talk) 00:52, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Strange mistake - the wrong distance between Penang island/airport and MEKAR waypoint!

I have spotted a very strange and sad mistake: both maps (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_370#/media/File:MH370_initial_search_Southeast_Asia.svg and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_370#/media/File:MH370_flight_path_with_English_labels.png) shows wrong distance from Penang to MEKAR waypoint and in the text we can see the same error: "The last known location, from and near the limits of Malaysian military radar, was at 02:22, 10 nmi (19 km; 12 mi) after passing waypoint MEKAR[9]:3, 7 and 200 nmi (370 km; 230 mi) northwest of Penang at an altitude of 29,500 ft (9,000 m).[50][51]" The real distance from Penang airport (N 05°17.73' E 100°16.33') and MEKAR waypoint (N 06°30.23' E 096°29.47') is around 237 nmi or 440 km! Probably the source of the error is that the first author wrote 230 mi instead of 230 nmi. I have checked the real distance using the Wikimapia.org distance measurement (around 264 mi or 436 km) and using the SkyVector map routing WMKP -> MEKAR -> WMKP which gives 237.3 nmi - look here for the screenshot of the map made by Skyvector.com: See, that can happens if one blindly trusts the journalists in the media! KOT-TOK (talk) 22:25, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

I see that there were no objections, so to finalize the discussion I will make a correction in the article. KOT-TOK (talk) 21:09, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

References

Witnesses on Maldive Island

Many people saw a plane that could have been MH370, flying low over Kuda Huvadhoo island (Maldives) on March 8,2014 at around 6:15am local time. The plane was heading south.dailymail --Jane955 (talk) 17:04, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

The daily mail is not a reliable source. Please provide reliable sources for any change request on this article. --McSly (talk) 19:37, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

Is "The Australian" a reliable source? The title of the article is "The Maldive islanders who say they can help find MH370"/Aviation -The Australian: April 4, 2015 (The link does not work) I will also add a link to a youtube video where the witnesses are interviewed. (There are no subtitles here). Let me include here a few quotes that you will find in the article: “I watched this very large plane bank slightly and I saw its colours — the red and blue lines — below the windows, then I heard the loud noise. It was unusual, very unusual. It was big and it was flying low. It was a holiday (Saturday) and most people had gone to bed after praying.” “I saw the blue and red on a bit of the side," ­Humaam says. “I heard the loud noise of it after it went over. I told the police this too.” “This was not a normal sight — the plane was different," he says. “It was very big, very noisy, flying low. Later that afternoon on the beach I was told the news about the missing plane. I think this is the same flight.” Witnesses youtube There are several articles that talk about the direction the plane was flying. I'll add one link. "Eyewitnesses from the Kuda Huvadhoo concurred that the aeroplane was travelling north to south-east."Indo-Asian News--Jane955 (talk) 01:41, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Suicide?

Maybe the pilot comitted suicide, ref: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/europa/piloto-del-vuelo-mh370-simulo-ruta/16652254 Dipper Pines251 (talk) 19:15, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

I thought you were interested in establishing where the aircraft ended up? Martinevans123 (talk) 19:18, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

The Malaysians reported that the pilot was acting odd in the days leading to the disappearance, but he wasn’t acting depressed. He saluted the guards with a military Salute. He also practiced landing on a remote Island, on his home flight simulator. This leads to the conclusion that he was hired by some military organization to hijack the plane and land it on a remote location. Also, if he wanted to plunge the plane into the ocean, why turn the plane where he could just plunge the plane into the South China Sea.--Jane955 (talk) 17:17, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

No, that doesn't lead to any of those conclusions. --McSly (talk) 19:38, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

From India Today “Investigations revealed that Captain Zaharie normally wished the Nepali security guards posted outside his colony with a Muslim style of salutation as if he was saying salam to him. But on the night when he took the flight nine days ago, he had saluted the guards in the military style."There was a striking change in the way he had saluted us that night," said one of the security guards posted outside his house on condition of anonymity, adding, ‘‘It was very unlike him."

A military salute in its self is not enough to conclude that he was hired by some militant group, but he also practiced landing on a remote runway and knew how to avoid being detected by radar. This was obviously very well planed and would be impossible for a rouge pilot to do on his own.--Jane955 (talk) 02:31, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Not Taiwanese

People with citizenship of Republic of China/Taiwan are not necessarily Taiwanese. I know it sounds crazy since citizens of the Canada are all Canadians. The people whose ancestors are from Taiwan are Taiwanese. They also consider themselves Chinese. The people who came to Taiwan in the late 1940's and later are often not Taiwanese.

The way to fix it is to not use terms like "Malaysian" or "Chinese" in the table. Use the country, like "Malaysia".

Not addressed in this section is whether to use the standard Wikipedia agreement to be neutral. Taipei claims all of China. Beijing claims all of Taiwan. Taipei says it is the Republic of China. Beijing says it is the People's Republic of China. Wikipedia has agreed to be neutral. Vanguard10 (talk) 06:00, 30 March 2017 (UTC)

Dont have a problem with the change to country names but note consensus on wikipedia is to use Taiwan as the country name per the related article. MilborneOne (talk) 14:34, 30 March 2017 (UTC)

Innacurate information regarding first call for ULB battery life to be increased.

The loss of SAA flight SA295 in 1987 final report made a formal reccomendation that the battery life of ULB be increased to at least 60 days. The suggested methodology based on then current battery tech was to have one set active for 30 days and the a second to take over for an additional period.

The board also looked at the suggestion of making recorders float so that, too was a matter that is not just a recent suggestion.

Thus the statement in this article that it first came only after the loss of AF447 is historically inaccurate.

You can see the official report on the SA295 loss and its suggestions here: and it's again not limited by the 7th arc - full drift analysis should not be limited by 7th arc or even a part of the 7th arc as CSIRO did. So, the GEOMAR new results are again different from "official" CSIRO map: possible crash site places on the 7th arc are just a small part of other possible crash sites which can be seen on page 9 (Fig.5). The old results cannot be called outdated because of the more detailed new ones (since they were available already in September 2015 during the first underwater search). 3) The flaperon still is the biggest, heaviest and sturdiest part of MH370 debris found, important as having the full serial number which belongs to the MH370 hull. The drift calculations of other MH370 objects are similar in methods, regardless if one limited the drift analysis by the 7th arc or not. Again: possible origin of the flaperon itself is the crash site and the location of the aircraft (otherwise drift analysis just useless). NB: I can propose a compromise: just increase the subsection with map MAP and mention a list of drift analysis which different from CSIRO analysis. The GEOMAR map VS CSIRO map would be a good illustration of these discrepancies. KOT-TOK (talk) 22:45, 13 June 2018 (UTC)

• Exclude I agree with the justification by User:WikiHannibal, And will not repeat what is already said by him. Personally I dont agree with the justification to keep an outdated (from publisher) map in the article. It just creates more confusion. I am ok to add a new one, if we have a consensus for a recent map. The publishers have released latest maps. They are the experts, we are not here to decide WP:TRUTH --DBigXray 08:46, 15 June 2018 (UTC)
• Restore or replace with better maps if available, as DBig references. JonRichfield (talk) 07:40, 20 June 2018 (UTC)
• Exclude/Delete These maps are pretty bad. This one is maybe good or bad, who knows, but it is confusing. Of course, I remember this accident/event very well, but was happy to read this article to get all the info from the past years. I'm not sure I got it. So many of these maps show the red line of the flight path that ends moving towards India. I was pretty convinced that must be where the plane went down. Only one of the maps, the one with the green/yellow cone stretching down towards western Australia shows the presumed flight path, and it made me go, "Oh, that little red line means nothing". This particular map is bad because it shows the little red line, and then the black arc below and then this nonsense red and pink areas. As a lay person looking at this map, I have to think, "how can the red area be a 95% chance when there is so much of it, and isn't there any "middle ground" between 95% and 5%?" additionally, I would wonder two things, if the red area is a 95% chance, and the black arc only touches a small portion of the red area up near land, why wouldn't that be where the plane crashed? and 2, this black arc is part of a circle that a satellite has identified where the plane could have been. If you project that arc, it goes up into Thailand and Vietnam, but those aren't shown as possible flight paths. Now, I'm not looking for answers to these questions, I'm only here to comment on what's been asked, if this picture should be included, and I would have to say, No, because it raises more questions then it answers. StarHOG (talk) 13:52, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

References

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Did the plane crash in a Cambodian jungle?

Like I said here, Ian Wilson, a British tech expert, claimed to have spotted the aircraft's remains in Cambodia, using images from Google Maps which were dated to 2018. The images show a what appears to be a plane about 70 m (230 ft) (similar to the MH370's official measurement of 63.7 m (209 ft)), with a gap between the tail and the body, indicating where the plane broke up upon crash-landing in a thick, high-altitude jungle. In addition, the Cambodian jungle is roughly near where air traffic controllers lost contact with the aircraft, on the route from Kuala Lumpur to China. Leo1pard (talk) 04:37, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

References

Interesting, but these are both tabloids at the end of the silly season. Let's see if it shows up in the grown up press, shall we? Britmax (talk) 09:14, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Summary Cause of Accident

The likely cause of this accident is widely known to be "suspected Deliberate Action" i.e. suspected hijacking by pilot or third party, and not "Cause: Unkown" as currently worded. Deliberate action was first announced by Malaysian Prime Najib Razak in his speech of 15-March-2014 about one week after the accident. Razak reportedly maintains this position to this day. The recent Malaysian Safety Investigation Report July_2018 effectively rules out mechanical failure or other causes and essentially confirms the deliberate action hypothesis. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TBILLT (talk • contribs) 14:37, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Find a reliable source and it will be considered.Britmax (talk) 17:29, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

"The recent Malaysian Safety Investigation Report July_2018 effectively rules out mechanical failure or other causes and essentially confirms the deliberate action hypothesis" - without finding the wreckage such a conclusion is worthless. There is little or no evidence of anything. The entire sum of information available is little more than than unsubstantiated rumours about one of the pilots, and strange radar and radio results.

The Inmarsat data has still not led to successfully finding the aircraft and one would hesitate to consider the data supplied by the onboard Inmarsat system to be in any way a reliable way of determining an aircraft's location. If the aircraft had come down in the sea then there would be a considerable amount of floating debris, in fact, a vast amount of it. See the 1998 Swissair Flight for an example. Before relying on the Inmarsat data I would fly some tests with a test aircraft to see just exactly what location data could be derived from the system, and what its accuracy was.

The most likely course of action upon encountering problems with the aircraft (such as an onboard electrical fire causing progressive systems failure, or a gradual cabin pressurization problem) is for the crew to turn round and head back to Malaysia. Assuming the aircraft made a landfall then the wreckage is therefore likely to be on the floor of the Malaysian jungle somewhere remote. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.144.50.176 (talk) 15:57, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

If you dont have a reliable source then perhaps you can mention your theory on the talk page at Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 unofficial disappearance theories MilborneOne (talk) 16:37, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

Good luck with your test flights. I trust they won't involve 11 other crew and 227 passengers. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:52, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

2015 Interim Accident Report missing

For some reason it appears the March 8, 2015 Interim Accident Report, has been removed from the Internet (Factual Information: Safety Investigation for MH370 – Interim report released 8 March 2015, 586 pages). I think it could be important for purposes of comparing findings in that one, with the findings in the recently released final report. I have attempted to find it saved somewhere else besides the Malaysia/AAIB website, which seems to have scrubbed it, but so far, no success. If anyone else has the expertise to find a copy, I think it would be a plus for this article to have that Interim Report as a supporting citation source. EditorASC (talk) 17:25, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

I don't like to use the l-word in public, but from a legal standpoint, doesn't the final report always supersede any interim report(s)? What has typically happened in the (thousands of) other aircraft investigations? I guess once published into the public domain, a report can never be "unpublished", regardless of whether or not it appears on the internet? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:37, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

I am not suggesting breaking into some protected network. Just trying to find another source that still has that publication displayed on its site, whether it be the Way Back Machine, or Scribd or some other types of sites that specialize in preserving historical documents. I think it might be important to compare those two reports to see if they differ in their cited facts and conclusions, and if they do, WHY? AND, most importantly, WHY that Interim Report seems to have disappeared?

I cannot remember other accident investigation cases where previous reports, whether Preliminary or Interim, or even TWO FINAL REPORTS, have done a disappearing act, when the final report was issued. That such has happened in this case, is not only very strange just by itself, but also suspicious (to me, at least) since Malaysia's Prime Minister, Najib Razak was attacked by some who claimed he had put out deliberate lies and false information following the disappearance of MH370.

"Malaysia spent a full week directing a major search-and-rescue effort focused on the Gulf of Thailand, along the plane’s scheduled flight path, even though the Malaysian military had tracked an unidentified aircraft flying in nearly the opposite direction — westward and out into the Indian Ocean — which investigators later concluded was Flight 370."[13] EditorASC (talk) 23:53, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

Not sure what this post is about but the 2015 Interim Report, as of 9 March 2015 is archived; the Preliminary report and the "Final Report" of 2017 are accessible via the original links. Much more can be found at mh370.gov.my/en/. Maybe even the Interim Report - have not checked that. Sometimes the connection is slow/not working. If any links to reports are broken in the article, you may want to amend them with archived or mh370.gov.my/en links. WikiHannibal (talk) 08:28, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

For me that link produces: "The specified URL cannot be found." And how many "final" reports are there? I think most readers would expect the word "final" to mean just that. I know I would. Martinevans123 (talk) 09:00, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Because I did not add the archived link... Both final reports are (now) at the very end of the Reports list in the article. None of them is titled "final" but labeled that way by the media and, I suppose, politicians as well. They were created by different bodies, however, and so there can be in fact two final reports. WikiHannibal (talk) 09:15, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for that archive link, which works fine for me. Well, yes. If there are two different bodies, each can have its own "final" report. I can understand that. Even then, however, I think the layman might see the one that was published last as the final one. That's just the commonly accepted use of the word, isn't it. Especially if there isn't any third body that has yet to publish something? Martinevans123 (talk) 09:49, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

@Martinevans123: While generally—yes—a final report supersedes the interim reports, the interim reports have been used extensively (the 2015 report is cited 41 times!) as a reference in this article and in other MH370-related articles and so an archived link should be used in the references to them until someone has hours to replace all references to interim reports with one to the final report.

As for the two "final" reports...By international agreement, the oceans are divided into zones for search-and-rescue responsibility for maritime and aviation. The final location of Flight 370 was in a part of the southern Indian Ocean where Australia has the responsibility (under international conventions) for search-and-rescue (overview of conventions binding on Australia, map), which is why Australia was so involved in the search. The ATSB is the Australian government agency for transport incident investigations, so they were involved in determining the search area and where the plane most likely ended up. Like most agencies that are involved in complex ventures and like other transport incident investigative agencies, they issued a final report about what they did. Malaysia, as the country of the aircraft's registration and operator (since the plane vanished outside the territorial jurisdiction of another country), has a responsibility to issue a report on the investigation under ICAO rules (some small or third-world countries give this job to the agency from the country of the plane's manufacture—eg. US, France, Brazil, or Russia—or registration). Here's more info about ICAO-required "Annex 13" reports: ICAO FAQs for media, ICAO database of final reports (all reports must be in a UN official language; most non-English ones have an English translation), history background of Annex 13 investigations.

So basically what has happened here is that Australia's ATSB has released a final report about the search and rescue operation in their area of responsibility (which necessarily touches on some topics related to the aircraft's possible flight path), while Malaysia has released a final report under ICAO protocol (Annex 13 of the Chicago Convention) about the entire investigation (overlapping to some extent with what Australia's final report covers). AHeneen (talk) 11:29, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

Thank you very much, AHeneen, for your prompt and very clear explanation. I think we might consider adding some or all of that into the article, perhaps in a footnote? Martinevans123 (talk) 12:42, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

In response to this very legitimate question:

And how many "final" reports are there? I think most readers would expect the word "final" to mean just that. I know I would. Martinevans123 (talk)

Good point. At the time I started this section, I had in mind the TWO "Final" NTSB Reports which are still available for the UAL 585 and UAL 811 accidents. The first "final" reports of both were not mysteriously removed from public access, like the 2015 interim report was for MH370. THAT is why I thought it suspicious in this case -- because removal of previous reports is not the normal protocol, even when a second "final" report super-cedes the first "final" report.

My thanks to WikiHannibal (talk) for digging out that missing 2015 Interim report from the Way Back Machine. I had tried to find it there, but I don't have the necessary expertise for that kind of research, so your help is greatly appreciated. EditorASC (talk) 10:21, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

The NTSB or frankly much of the US federal government is quite a different organisation from pretty much anything from the Malaysian government. While I think some of the criticism of the Malaysian government is at times unfair, one thing that is true is that their use of the internet is still often crap as is for that matter a lot of countries especially developing ones. There's absolutely no reason to think there's anything suspicious about one of the links to the report no longer working especially when it's a few years old and it's now outdated. (Note my phrasing here. It's possible the report is still somewhere on some Malaysian government website. Just hard to find.) That said, even the US government is prone to change stuff around and break old links, although they are generally better at archival than a lot of other governments. Especially given the way their government can change drastically every 4-8 years although this is more with stuff like the environment. The big kicker against 'suspicious' is probably that beyond archive.org (and note that whoever is in control of the website could change their robots.txt which unless archive.org have changed their policies could be use to kill the archive), there are probably millions of copies of the report all over the place, so they actually achieve little by removing it. Nil Einne (talk) 16:13, 22 September 2018 (UTC)

Mini-Series About Missing Malaysia Flight

Mini-Series About Missing Malaysia Flight

• https://variety.com/2018/tv/global/spiral-co-director-set-to-write-helm-mini-series-about-missing-malaysia-flight-1202982644/
• https://www.amazon.co.uk/Vol-MH370-Une-vie-d%C3%A9tourn%C3%A9e/dp/2081422239

Ghyslain Wattrelos’ wife and two children were on board Flight MH370

• https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/07/world/europe/mh370-families-victims-search-for-answers.html
• https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/malaysia/11454444/MH370-Investigator-with-secret-service-links-helping-French-father.html
• https://www.france24.com/en/20180604-perspective-ghyslain-wattrelos-flight-mh370-malaysia-france-search
• https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/7577603/mh370-france-information-dad-lost-wife-kids/
• https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1035834/mh370-news-third-entity-hacked-missing-plane-malaysia-airlines-flight-france
• https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/malaysia/11457008/No-one-thinks-its-an-accident.html
• https://www.gettyimages.com/photos/ghyslain-wattrelos-portrait-session
• "Ghyslain Wattrelos" MH370 site:fr

69.181.23.220 (talk) 18:03, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Is the area searched in intro the wrong number?

Did the numbers get messed up in the intro? It seems like the Ocean Infinity search became entangled with the initial search in the intro (as, according to the search section, a total of 1,843,000 sq mi), or am I reading this incorrectly?

Intro:

"After a three-year search across 120,000 square kilometres (46,000 sq mi) of ocean failed to locate the aircraft, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre heading the operation suspended their activities in January 2017. A second search launched in January 2018 by the private contractor Ocean Infinity also ended without success after six months."

Search section:

"Between 18 March and 28 April, nineteen vessels and 345 sorties by military aircraft searched over 4,600,000 km2 (1,800,000 sq mi).[77] The final phase of the search was a bathymetric survey and sonar search of the sea floor, about 1,800 kilometres (970 nmi; 1,100 mi) southwest of Perth, Western Australia.[78] With effect from 30 March 2014, the search was coordinated by the Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC), an Australian government agency established specifically to co-ordinate the search effort to locate and recover Flight 370, which primarily involved the Malaysian, Chinese, and Australian governments.[79]

In January 2018, a private U.S. company named Ocean Infinity resumed the search for MH370 in the narrowed 25,000 km2 (9,700 sq mi) area using the Norwegian ship Seabed Constructor.[89][90][91][92] The planned search area of site 1, where the search began, was 33,012 km2 (12,746 sq mi), while the extended search area covered a further 48,500 km2 (18,700 sq mi).[91] By the end of May 2018, the vessel had searched over 112,000 km2 (43,000 sq mi) of the area using eight autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs).[93][94] The contract with the Malaysian government ended soon thereafter and the search was concluded without success on 9 June 2018." --Stevehim (talk) 21:31, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean/compare. I did not find 1,843,000 sq mi in the article. 1,800,000 sq mi were searched after the disappearance = surface search. After that, 120,000 square kilometres (46,000 sq mi) of underwater search. After that (2018) 112,000 km2 (43,000 sq mi) of underwater search. WikiHannibal (talk) 23:54, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

The figure in the intro of 120,000 km² (46,000 sq mi) refers to the detailed sea floor survey. In the Timeline section, it states: "From October 2014 to January 2017, a comprehensive survey of 120,000 km² (46,000 sq mi) of sea floor..." This relates to the painstaking seabed search, which lasted for 2 or 3 years, and not the initial visual search of the ocean, which was carried out by naval vessels and aircraft in the early days of the disappearance, covering over 4,600,000 km² (1,800,000 sq mi) of ocean. Ocean Infinity then searched a total of 112,000 km² (43,000 sq mi). So I think the figure in the intro is correct, but I agree that the presentation of the figures is a little confusing and this maybe needs to be readdressed to make things clearer for the discerning reader. Rodney Baggins (talk) 00:21, 6 January 2019 (UTC)

Manifest tv show

The manifest tv show was made after this event. Should it be included? The idea they jump into future and return after time travelled, was the novel bit ;-) 120.29.50.182 (talk) 14:42, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Do you have a link to it? Britmax (talk) 14:55, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

If you're talking about Manifest (TV series) then it's already mentioned at the end of the In popular culture section. Rodney Baggins (talk) 15:56, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Original research

User:KennethPark1 is edit warring to include details of a work of fiction saying "The work of fiction can prompt ideas and invigorate discussions" this is original research and NOT acceptable. Theroadislong (talk) 14:39, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

Agree - there's no way a work of fiction can be considered a reliable source for an encyclopedic article. Even if a precedent were to be set, I'm not convinced of the novel in itself - Google has no idea who "the sky robber olaf junegrass isbn 9781798478523" is, and brings back no relevant results. Chaheel Riens (talk) 14:46, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

Items included in "In popular culture" are often difficult to judge in terms of notability. Works of fiction can certainly be included if a strong connection can be shown by a secondary source. I have not searched for anything myself. But it seems that even the primary source, i.e the novel itself, may not be widely known. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:56, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

I found it on Goodreads, so it exists. [14]. Britmax (talk) 15:01, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

And is it a "good read"!? I see Seon Howard gives it "5 stars". But his extensive review does not seem to mention Flight 370. Martinevans123 (talk) 15:06, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

On GoodReads it says "Published March 1st 2019 by Independently Published" - which suggests it may be a vanity press publisher. That makes it even less likely to be valid for inclusion. Chaheel Riens (talk) 19:02, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

Mentioning a work of fiction is appropriate in "In popular culture" sections, but only in a few circumstances: the plot directly incorporates the subject or (in certain circumstances, namely when the book/film is independently noteworthy) where the author notes that parts of the plot were inspired by the subject of the Wikipedia article (and even then, only certain Wikipedia articles would be appropriate to mention).

This book description is not relevant enough to the article. The Amazon page that the user included in an edit I reverted says: "While the aircraft in the novel is not Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 that mysteriously disappeared five years ago, the book gives new ideas for solving the MH370 mystery. The on-board incident described by the author may open a new avenue in the investigation. As such, “The Sky Robber” could be of interest not only to the readers, but also to investigators and aviation authorities." There are a couple red flags that this is spam: the author hasn't made other contributions to Wikipedia and seems to be trying hard for the mention of the book to be included (contributions), the first attempt to add the remark was made on the same day the book was published by an independent publisher, the Amazon page for the book that I mentioned has one review (archive URL; it was NOT a verified purchase, but claims that the edition reviewed was the Kindle edition) that ends "Moreover, as the advert indicated, the novel may provide an interesting theory of what may have been behind the disappearance of flight MH370." (this seems fishy like it was written just to support the inclusion on Wikipedia), the attempt to add the book is a few days before the 5th anniversary of the disappearance when this article will likely get lots of views (that might not be suspicious by itself, but is when considering the other factors). AHeneen (talk) 01:56, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

Presumed fatalities

I propose we do something about the inclusion of presumed fatalities in the infobox. It's safe to assume all aboard have died, yes, but since there are others who disagree and since there's some theories floating around, I think it would be best to just remove the fatalities and injuries parameters altogether. Firstly because although presumed by many, including myself, it is unverifiable—adding presumed in parenthesis doesn't negate this. Secondly because it may be welcomed by those who do still believe in alternative outcomes. Lastly because of neutrality. Any thoughts? Jay D. Easy (talk) 14:14, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

For me, the slight problem of WP:Verifiability does not justify giving even the slightest suggestion of credibility to "some theories floating around". As far as I can see, all of those are complete and utter nonsense. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:00, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

Emil Enchev's new theory

Probably some of you know who this guy is. In a recent conversation he suggested the hypothesis that, probably, not Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah is the culprit of the disappearance, but the co-pilot, 27-year-old First Officer Fariq Abdul Hamid. He was hijacked MH370 plane in the same way as Andreas Lubitz Germanwings Flight 9525. Scandal with the his fiancé Nadira Ramli probably was the reason for his destructive behavior. Emil Enchev suggests that this woman be subjected to a Polygraph detector with only two question: 1. Did they have problems with her fiance Fariq Abdul Hamid before flight MH370? 2. Did she have sexual relations with the Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah? 79.100.143.139 (talk) 13:39, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

Probably most of us don't. Who is Emil Enchev and where did he publish that theory? When and why was the polygraph used, and is that also reported in a [[WP:RS}]? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 13:47, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

He offered to be used, it is not used yet. Also he offered, investigators to question any of the employees, who knew the flight attendants more closely - Can one of the air hostesses have had sexual contacts with both pilots? This may be the reason for the outbreak of the scandal between them too, and Fariq to close in the cockpit while Zaharie was in the toilet, and take control over the plane. 79.100.143.139 (talk) 13:57, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

Thanks 79 but this doesnt appear to be relevant here more akin to the tabloids as it is not encyclopedic material. MilborneOne (talk) 14:01, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

Are you sure. This is the man who predicts the cause of the Germanwings Flight 9525 crash, hour after it - here in Wiki and moderators block him. Look archives for the Germanwings Flight 9525 and you will see. 79.100.143.139 (talk) 14:04, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

So Emil Enchev is wholly unknown. And you have no sources. Not really a compelling start. Your proposal here seems to be pure speculation. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:06, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

By the way, the relatives of MH370 passengers know who Emil Enchev is. http://mh370.radiantphysics.com/2017/04/16/atsb-denies-request-from-mh370-families-for-more-info/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.100.143.139 (talk) 14:09, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

Sorry 79 this is unlikely to be added to this article even if referenced, we cant add every tabloid-ish theory to the article but have a look at Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 unofficial disappearance theories where we park all theses "theories". MilborneOne (talk) 14:17, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

Agree with MilborneOne. WikiHannibal (talk) 16:17, 8 July 2019 (UTC)