WEBVTT - The Disappearance of Flight MH370, Part I 0:00:00.600 --> 0:00:03.840 Hey, Seattle, will see you Thursday, January sixteenth at the 0:00:03.880 --> 0:00:06.360 More Theater in San Francisco. We're going to be at 0:00:06.360 --> 0:00:11.680 the Castro on January when else? Chuck? Uh? That is it? Man? 0:00:11.760 --> 0:00:14.600 January eighteenth at the Castro, our annual trip to Sketch Fest. 0:00:14.880 --> 0:00:17.480 We'd love performing there. We have great crowds there. Go 0:00:17.520 --> 0:00:19.079 get a ticket. If you want to come see me 0:00:19.120 --> 0:00:21.360 at Movie Crush the next night on Sunday and a 0:00:21.440 --> 0:00:23.640 small venue where you can shake my hand and hug 0:00:23.680 --> 0:00:25.680 my neck. I would welcome that as well. Well, that's 0:00:25.680 --> 0:00:27.200 what I was setting you up for when I said 0:00:27.200 --> 0:00:30.040 what else. I appreciate that. We'll see you guys. You 0:00:30.080 --> 0:00:31.960 can get all the info and tickets you need on 0:00:32.120 --> 0:00:34.400 s Y s K Live dot com or s F 0:00:34.560 --> 0:00:38.760 sketch Fest dot com. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, 0:00:38.960 --> 0:00:47.520 a production of My Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, 0:00:47.560 --> 0:00:50.440 and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark's Charles W. 0:00:50.600 --> 0:00:53.120 Chuck Bryant. There's Jerry over there, and this is Stuff 0:00:53.159 --> 0:01:01.240 you Should Know about. One of the most interesting mysteries 0:01:01.400 --> 0:01:05.160 in modern times. Yeah, like it's really tough to get across. 0:01:05.400 --> 0:01:10.039 What a mystery. The Missing Airliner MH three seventy is 0:01:10.360 --> 0:01:14.160 Malaysian Airlines Flight three seventy. Yeah, and this is uh, 0:01:14.200 --> 0:01:16.280 it's gonna be a two parter because it's pretty robust, 0:01:16.880 --> 0:01:19.039 and boy, hats off to the grabster. He really put 0:01:19.080 --> 0:01:21.440 together a lot of great research for this one. He did. 0:01:21.520 --> 0:01:23.399 I also want to give a huge shout out to 0:01:23.480 --> 0:01:28.040 one of my journalistic heroes, William Langwish. He wrote something 0:01:28.400 --> 0:01:30.640 he writes in the Atlantic, but he's not just an 0:01:30.640 --> 0:01:34.640 Atlantic writer. Um. He wrote what really happened to Malaysia's 0:01:34.640 --> 0:01:37.920 missing airplane, big old long article on it. And this 0:01:37.959 --> 0:01:40.560 guy is an aviation expert to begin with, but he's 0:01:40.600 --> 0:01:43.319 also if you ever read a Tom wolf book or 0:01:43.640 --> 0:01:46.240 article or whatever, he has a really great knack for 0:01:46.360 --> 0:01:50.360 making you feel like you're there in the action. But 0:01:50.480 --> 0:01:53.880 then he also has a knack for making you step 0:01:53.920 --> 0:01:56.480 back and think, how does Tom Wolfe know all this? Was? 0:01:56.520 --> 0:01:59.840 He there? William Languish is the same way, and I 0:02:00.040 --> 0:02:02.360 will I will go ahead and recommend that you not, 0:02:02.640 --> 0:02:06.200 unless you are a very courageous person, read any of 0:02:06.280 --> 0:02:10.560 his work, especially the stuff about airline disasters, any time 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:13.200 around when you're flying, because he puts you in that 0:02:13.200 --> 0:02:16.560 plane when it's going down or whatever. Um, he's really 0:02:16.600 --> 0:02:19.680 really good at it. So I recommend basically anything lang 0:02:19.720 --> 0:02:22.359 Watch has written go read. It's worth it for sure. Yeah, 0:02:22.400 --> 0:02:24.840 and I think this coupled with um the brief times 0:02:24.880 --> 0:02:26.600 that we've touched on this kind of thing in the past, 0:02:27.160 --> 0:02:30.560 whether it was D. B. Cooper or Bermuda triangle, Like, 0:02:30.960 --> 0:02:35.320 there's something about aviation disasters and mysteries that are really 0:02:35.360 --> 0:02:39.200 intriguing to me. And for airline forensics, it's all ri 0:02:39.480 --> 0:02:42.360 just super super interesting. It is. So you talked about 0:02:42.400 --> 0:02:44.600 airline forensics and and that kind of stuff. This is 0:02:44.800 --> 0:02:47.399 lousy with it. But the reason I was saying why 0:02:47.440 --> 0:02:50.400 it's tough to overstate, like what a mystery image three seventies, 0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:56.720 it's the only airliner that has considered disappeared vanished. They 0:02:56.760 --> 0:02:58.640 know where all the other ones are, they know what 0:02:58.800 --> 0:03:01.320 happened to all the other ones. It's the only major 0:03:01.400 --> 0:03:06.040 one that is just where the official investigation said we 0:03:06.120 --> 0:03:09.040 don't know. Yeah, I mean, and you know in part 0:03:09.080 --> 0:03:13.080 two will get to a pretty good well, actually, I 0:03:13.080 --> 0:03:15.720 think the leading theory comes in this episode, but we 0:03:16.120 --> 0:03:18.560 kind of think we know. But it's that thing where 0:03:18.400 --> 0:03:21.400 you like, you can't definitively say yeah. You can't say where, 0:03:21.760 --> 0:03:25.040 and you can't say why. Um, yeah, and that then 0:03:25.080 --> 0:03:28.200 the y is and the where we're both really confounding. Yeah. 0:03:28.280 --> 0:03:30.760 And the reason why air travel in the twenty one 0:03:30.880 --> 0:03:34.800 century is way safer than auto travel is because anytime 0:03:34.840 --> 0:03:38.640 an airliner goes down, everyone in the international community comes 0:03:38.640 --> 0:03:43.080 together investigates it. They do so openly. The airline um 0:03:43.160 --> 0:03:48.720 that the airplane manufacturer, the um, everyone involved is expected 0:03:48.760 --> 0:03:51.120 to like tell the truth and you get it out 0:03:51.120 --> 0:03:52.760 there and you figure out what went wrong, and then 0:03:52.760 --> 0:03:56.160 you make things safer, and then that makes air air 0:03:56.200 --> 0:03:59.200 travel safer for everybody. They couldn't do this for all 0:03:59.200 --> 0:04:01.400 sorts of reasons m Age three seventy and so it's 0:04:01.400 --> 0:04:06.080 a huge failing um among the the international community, not 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:09.800 not for lack of trying, but because it's just an 0:04:09.800 --> 0:04:12.800 asterisk out there. It's the only one. Yeah. And that's 0:04:12.800 --> 0:04:16.800 why airplanes don't crash as much anymore. I mean, growing up, 0:04:17.200 --> 0:04:18.960 it's not like it was every other week or anything, 0:04:19.000 --> 0:04:21.919 but I used to hear about airline crashes enough to 0:04:21.960 --> 0:04:24.720 where it gave you pause. Uh, And you just don't 0:04:24.720 --> 0:04:29.080 hear about it much anymore. It's true. It's still out 0:04:29.120 --> 0:04:31.560 there for sure. Yeah, but there they seem much more 0:04:31.640 --> 0:04:33.760 rare than they used to be, kind of like sky jackings. 0:04:34.400 --> 0:04:37.159 So we'll do our best to uh put you in 0:04:37.240 --> 0:04:40.920 the in the plane, in the passenger seat. Yeah, can 0:04:40.960 --> 0:04:44.679 we at least be in business class? Buckle sure? Okay sure, 0:04:45.040 --> 0:04:47.880 We're about to say a buckle up. Yeah, okay, buckle up, 0:04:48.040 --> 0:04:50.800 because we're going to take off on March eighth, two 0:04:50.680 --> 0:04:55.359 thou fourteen in Kuala Lumpur. It's the very beginning of 0:04:55.480 --> 0:04:59.520 March eighth. UM. The takeoff schedule for Malaysian Airlines Flight 0:04:59.560 --> 0:05:02.960 three seven and DY from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing was 0:05:03.000 --> 0:05:05.560 scheduled for twelve thirty five am. That's right. We're in 0:05:05.640 --> 0:05:10.440 a Boeing seven seven seven Dash two er and there 0:05:10.440 --> 0:05:14.239 are two hundred and twenty seven fellow passengers aboard twelve 0:05:14.480 --> 0:05:17.880 flight crew. It's a lot of people, almost about two 0:05:17.920 --> 0:05:21.880 thirds of the passengers or Chinese nationals. I believe there's 0:05:21.880 --> 0:05:23.960 a bunch of other people from other countries, but for 0:05:24.040 --> 0:05:26.880 the bulk of the people on the plane, we're from 0:05:26.960 --> 0:05:31.320 China and um it's a late night flight. It's expected 0:05:31.320 --> 0:05:36.280 to arrive in Beijing at about six o'clock six thirty 0:05:36.680 --> 0:05:40.240 in Beijing time, and it's gonna fly over the South 0:05:40.360 --> 0:05:44.680 China Sea, UM, over the Gulf of Thailand, through Laos, Vietnam, 0:05:45.080 --> 0:05:50.200 and then uh into China to arrive at Beijing. Um, 0:05:50.240 --> 0:05:53.280 it didn't actually take off at twelve thirty five. They 0:05:53.320 --> 0:05:56.960 took off at twelve forty two. Not too shabby, seven minutes. 0:05:57.000 --> 0:05:59.040 I'm not like sitting there rocking in my seat like 0:05:59.160 --> 0:06:02.400 let's go. Yeah, yeah, that might not have even noticed. 0:06:03.120 --> 0:06:05.640 And UM they take off and it flies up to 0:06:05.800 --> 0:06:09.599 eighteen thousand feet and the air traffic control center at 0:06:09.640 --> 0:06:13.320 Kuala Lumpur says, hey, you guys are cleared for UM 0:06:13.360 --> 0:06:15.520 to to go up to thirty five thousand feet, which 0:06:15.520 --> 0:06:18.200 is cruising altitude for this flight. I think that's right. 0:06:18.560 --> 0:06:20.920 And at this point, at eighteen thousand, they switched from 0:06:20.960 --> 0:06:24.960 the airport's air traffic to Kuala Lampur Area Control Center. 0:06:25.720 --> 0:06:28.080 And you know, the way, the reason we're mentioning all 0:06:28.080 --> 0:06:30.880 these details is because it turns out they're very important, 0:06:31.240 --> 0:06:35.000 very important. So these are all key. Keep rewinding fifteen 0:06:35.040 --> 0:06:38.760 thirty seconds to get every single detail, okay, because you're 0:06:38.760 --> 0:06:41.840 gonna need them for the big finish. So four minutes later, 0:06:41.880 --> 0:06:43.599 like you said, they were cleared to go to thirty 0:06:43.600 --> 0:06:48.000 five thousand talking about fifteen minutes. Uh, And it's here 0:06:48.080 --> 0:06:52.560 where Captain Zahari and there were two people on board 0:06:52.560 --> 0:06:55.600 flying this plane. Captain Zahari and uh, what was the 0:06:55.640 --> 0:07:00.240 other gentleman's name, First Officer Farik abdual Humid and Upton 0:07:00.800 --> 0:07:05.640 Zahari Ahmad Shaw is piloting the plane, UM, first Officer Hamid. 0:07:05.680 --> 0:07:07.960 This is his last training flight. After this he will 0:07:08.000 --> 0:07:11.040 be fully certified to fly Boeing seven seventy seven, which 0:07:11.040 --> 0:07:13.880 if you're a commercial airline pilot, that's pretty much the 0:07:13.880 --> 0:07:16.240 peak right there. Yeah, and that's important too because one 0:07:16.240 --> 0:07:19.560 of them is a very experienced pilot in his fifties. Uh. 0:07:19.600 --> 0:07:21.480 The other one is a brand new kind of greenhorn, 0:07:22.240 --> 0:07:25.320 and that's going to factor in for sure. So uh, 0:07:25.440 --> 0:07:27.160 like I said, it took about fifteen minutes to get 0:07:27.200 --> 0:07:30.280 to thirty five thousand feet. And this is when UM, 0:07:30.360 --> 0:07:35.200 the lead pilot radios that Kuala Lampoor Control Center says 0:07:35.360 --> 0:07:39.040 we're at thirty five thou feet. Then seven minutes later 0:07:39.080 --> 0:07:42.520 he radios again says, by the way, we're sta in. 0:07:42.560 --> 0:07:44.000 This is not me doing him. I don't know what 0:07:44.040 --> 0:07:52.160 he sounded like. There you go, this is Captain Zohari. Yeah, 0:07:52.160 --> 0:07:55.040 everybody sounds like Chuck Yeager. Yeah, I guess so. So 0:07:55.160 --> 0:07:57.720 he confirmed again that they were at thirty five thousand feet, 0:07:58.080 --> 0:07:59.880 and this is where Ed points out that this wasn't 0:08:00.160 --> 0:08:03.880 sort of big alarming thing. But what usually happens is 0:08:04.000 --> 0:08:07.080 you radio in when you leave an altitude, not when 0:08:07.120 --> 0:08:10.000 you arrive. And you also don't radio in seven minutes 0:08:10.120 --> 0:08:12.520 later and say, by the way, we're still at thirty 0:08:12.520 --> 0:08:14.800 five thou feet still here, like once you hit it, 0:08:14.800 --> 0:08:17.120 you're just sort of there that you're cruising altitude, right, 0:08:17.160 --> 0:08:19.440 So it's it wasn't alarming or anything, but it was 0:08:19.560 --> 0:08:23.600 weird that he made those two radio transmissions, but it 0:08:23.800 --> 0:08:26.560 was nothing compared to the weirdness that was about to 0:08:26.600 --> 0:08:31.960 take place um shortly after that, I think at one 0:08:33.520 --> 0:08:37.880 am qual Umpoor Area Control Center. It's like eleven minutes later, 0:08:38.080 --> 0:08:41.640 YEP said, Hey, MH three seventy, you're about to leave 0:08:41.679 --> 0:08:46.920 our jurisdiction and enter ho Chi Min's um jurisdiction. Go 0:08:46.960 --> 0:08:50.400 ahead and contract contact ho chie Man Air Traffic Control 0:08:50.760 --> 0:08:54.240 and let them know you are on with them on 0:08:54.280 --> 0:08:56.679 this frequency. Yeah. I mean, if you remember our air 0:08:56.679 --> 0:09:00.240 Traffic Control podcast, you you're you're handed off, like, don't 0:09:00.240 --> 0:09:02.199 just stick with one air traffic control when you fly 0:09:02.280 --> 0:09:04.880 around the world, you're handed off all along the way, 0:09:04.920 --> 0:09:08.760 whenever you enter the airspace of that whatever district precisely, 0:09:08.760 --> 0:09:10.440 and the way that it's set up is there's not 0:09:10.480 --> 0:09:13.600 supposed to be any time where you're just flying alone 0:09:14.120 --> 0:09:15.920 and then you move into the other one. You're going 0:09:16.040 --> 0:09:18.120 right from one to the other. You want to hand off. 0:09:18.440 --> 0:09:24.320 So um, Captain Zahari responded with good night Malaysian three 0:09:24.520 --> 0:09:27.880 seven zero. Those are the last words anyone heard from 0:09:27.920 --> 0:09:31.920 Captain Zahari as far as we know. And UM, that 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:34.319 in and of itself was kind of an odd transmission 0:09:34.360 --> 0:09:39.040 because typically any airline captain would have replied with the 0:09:39.080 --> 0:09:43.080 frequency we said the frequency back to confirmed that that 0:09:43.160 --> 0:09:45.079 was the right one. But instead all he said was 0:09:45.120 --> 0:09:48.959 good night Malaysian three seven zero, And very shortly after that, 0:09:49.160 --> 0:09:54.640 two minutes later, um MH three seventy disappeared from the radar. 0:09:54.960 --> 0:09:57.160 The moment it showed up on ho Chi Min air 0:09:57.200 --> 0:10:02.839 Traffic Controls radar screens, it just vanished, right without everyone 0:10:02.920 --> 0:10:07.480 having made contact with them via radio frequency. This should 0:10:07.520 --> 0:10:10.280 have like set off alarms with Ho Chi Minh city, 0:10:10.520 --> 0:10:14.160 and apparently they did notice. Kuala Lumpur didn't notice. The 0:10:14.200 --> 0:10:16.560 guy was they had all this other air traffic to 0:10:16.600 --> 0:10:18.680 deal and they were out of their zone at this point, 0:10:19.200 --> 0:10:21.319 and he'd said good night, and you know everybody knows 0:10:21.360 --> 0:10:22.840 good night. You can't go back on that. You have 0:10:22.880 --> 0:10:27.200 to wait until tomorrow to make contact again. UM. So 0:10:28.080 --> 0:10:32.040 the Kuala Lumpur's I don't know about blameless in this, 0:10:32.120 --> 0:10:37.600 but certainly less blameful than um. Ho Chi Minh and 0:10:37.600 --> 0:10:40.560 Ho Chi min noticed that they just disappeared from the screen, 0:10:40.800 --> 0:10:44.040 but it took them a full eighteen minutes before they 0:10:44.120 --> 0:10:46.920 called Kuala Lumpur and said, hey, do you know anything 0:10:46.960 --> 0:10:50.680 about where MH three seventy is because they kind of 0:10:50.760 --> 0:10:53.960 vanished from our radar. Yeah. Like, I don't know the 0:10:53.960 --> 0:10:57.320 exact process. Um. In their defense, they were trying to 0:10:57.320 --> 0:10:59.000 get in touch. It's not like they just said, well, 0:10:59.000 --> 0:11:01.400 we'll see what happens. Uh. They got in touch with 0:11:01.400 --> 0:11:05.559 another pilot who was nearby in that airspace to contact them, 0:11:05.600 --> 0:11:08.760 and this this pilot reported there was interference and static. 0:11:09.160 --> 0:11:10.880 I heard mumbling on the other end. But that's the 0:11:10.960 --> 0:11:13.080 last we heard and we lost connection. Right, we're not 0:11:13.120 --> 0:11:16.400 even sure that who he was talking to the right people? Yeah, so, 0:11:16.440 --> 0:11:18.200 I mean they were trying to get in touch, but 0:11:18.280 --> 0:11:20.960 you're right, I think like sooner than eighteen minutes, they 0:11:20.960 --> 0:11:23.200 should have said, by the way, this plane that just 0:11:23.280 --> 0:11:25.560 left your airspace has disappeared, Like, do you know what's 0:11:25.559 --> 0:11:29.640 going on? Right? Protocol, international protocol is five minutes. Okay, 0:11:29.720 --> 0:11:33.120 So they waited thirteen minutes longer than protocol dictated, and 0:11:33.240 --> 0:11:35.800 it was so so much beyond when they should have 0:11:35.840 --> 0:11:39.480 called that the controller and qual Umpoor actually said on 0:11:39.520 --> 0:11:41.840 the record, like, why didn't you call me sooner? How 0:11:41.880 --> 0:11:43.839 are you just calling me about this? That may have 0:11:43.840 --> 0:11:47.080 MISSI have been yesterday, right, it's missing for eighteen minutes, which, 0:11:47.240 --> 0:11:49.480 as we'll get to later on the stuff that came 0:11:49.559 --> 0:11:53.200 up in the investigation, that was just the first step 0:11:53.240 --> 0:11:56.840 in a series of missteps that led to the reason 0:11:56.960 --> 0:12:01.120 why MH three seventy may never be found. Uh So, 0:12:01.520 --> 0:12:03.880 uh should we take a little break and talk about 0:12:03.960 --> 0:12:35.360 radar radar Oriley. We'll be back right after this. Radar Oriley, 0:12:36.080 --> 0:12:40.040 not radar o Riley radar used by air traffic control 0:12:40.559 --> 0:12:44.800 so different. It is different um than radar oriley. Uh. 0:12:44.840 --> 0:12:48.080 This is called secondary radar, and it sends out a 0:12:48.080 --> 0:12:50.600 little beam that um, it's very narrow and it sweeps 0:12:50.640 --> 0:12:53.120 the area. And on board the aircraft they have a 0:12:53.160 --> 0:12:56.920 transponder that to Texas beam and sends their own signal 0:12:56.960 --> 0:12:59.560 back that says this, how fast we're going, is where 0:12:59.559 --> 0:13:02.800 we're headed in a code that says that, and this 0:13:02.880 --> 0:13:05.160 is who I am? Yeah, maybe even m H three 0:13:05.200 --> 0:13:07.640 seventy as simple as that something like that. That's right, 0:13:07.720 --> 0:13:10.599 that's what's supposed to show up on air traffic controls 0:13:10.679 --> 0:13:14.000 radar screen. That's so they can see, oh, here's MH 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:17.880 three seventy coming toward d L two or whatever at 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:20.920 this speed. Right, Um, they have all this information and 0:13:20.920 --> 0:13:24.240 it's it's called secondary radar. Primary radar is what you 0:13:24.280 --> 0:13:27.080 think where it's like, um, you know, it's a blip 0:13:27.120 --> 0:13:31.559 on a screen that this big um, this big radar 0:13:31.679 --> 0:13:35.360 ray is is bouncing off of and receiving information back from. 0:13:35.400 --> 0:13:38.400 But it's just you see, it's physically there. This has 0:13:38.440 --> 0:13:41.320 far more information and that's why air traffic control around 0:13:41.360 --> 0:13:44.080 the world uses right. And this is very key because 0:13:44.200 --> 0:13:47.360 just a few seconds after it made that switch over 0:13:47.400 --> 0:13:52.840 into ho Chiman's airspace, the transponder stopped sending information. That 0:13:52.920 --> 0:13:55.719 transponder that's supposed to say who you are, where you are, 0:13:55.760 --> 0:13:58.959 and how fast you're going just stopped right. It vanished. 0:13:59.400 --> 0:14:03.240 And this is when the ball was dropped by a 0:14:03.280 --> 0:14:06.120 little bit by Kuala lamp Or not noticing, and definitely 0:14:06.120 --> 0:14:09.360 by ho chi Man not doing anything immediately in response 0:14:09.400 --> 0:14:14.520 to Kuala lamp Or so. UM. Primary radar the radar 0:14:14.600 --> 0:14:16.720 that you typically think of when you think of radar. 0:14:17.240 --> 0:14:20.600 That's there are very few places in the world where 0:14:20.640 --> 0:14:24.800 you can't be tracked by someone on radar. It's fairly 0:14:24.840 --> 0:14:28.160 old technology, it's been around for a while. UM. But 0:14:28.680 --> 0:14:31.840 the places where you can't be tracked can be vast 0:14:32.320 --> 0:14:36.280 over the ocean, in the desert, over extremely mountainous or 0:14:36.320 --> 0:14:39.080 wooded areas. There are places where you can't really put 0:14:39.360 --> 0:14:44.640 a radar tower, and there you can disappear from radar. Right. 0:14:44.680 --> 0:14:46.920 There's this I think what I'm trying to say here 0:14:47.000 --> 0:14:51.160 is if you take your plane out of radar range 0:14:51.200 --> 0:14:54.560 and you turn off your transponder, you can make a 0:14:54.600 --> 0:14:59.640 modern airliner as big as a seven s vanish where 0:14:59.640 --> 0:15:02.000 people don't know where it is. And that's a really 0:15:02.040 --> 0:15:06.200 I think hallmark point or trade to this. This mystery 0:15:06.240 --> 0:15:08.880 that kind of like gets people a little unnerved. Is 0:15:09.120 --> 0:15:11.600 wait a minute, like this is the century, this happened 0:15:11.600 --> 0:15:14.960 in two four. What do you mean? There's times and 0:15:15.040 --> 0:15:18.480 situations where an airliner can disappear and people don't know 0:15:18.520 --> 0:15:21.240 where it is. And that was the situation and as 0:15:21.600 --> 0:15:24.400 um Ho Chi Minh City and Kuala Lumpur starting to 0:15:24.440 --> 0:15:26.920 scramble to try to figure out, you know, where this is. 0:15:27.120 --> 0:15:30.400 Apparently they called Malaysian Airlines and said, hey, do you 0:15:30.440 --> 0:15:35.160 know anything about MH three seventy. Malaysian Airlines said, oh yeah, 0:15:35.160 --> 0:15:37.560 they're flying over Cambodia right now, and they're like where, 0:15:37.600 --> 0:15:39.920 what do you how are you seeing this? After an hour, 0:15:40.080 --> 0:15:43.000 finally Malaysian Airlines is like, no, we're just referring to 0:15:43.080 --> 0:15:45.720 the flight plan. They should be over Cambodia right now. 0:15:45.760 --> 0:15:47.520 What do you mean you can't find them? What's what's 0:15:47.560 --> 0:15:51.080 going on? Yeah? But because of that primary radar, uh, 0:15:51.120 --> 0:15:53.440 the secondary radar wasn't functioning like we said, because the 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:57.000 transponder was off, but the primary radar did track them 0:15:57.000 --> 0:16:01.680 for about an hour after those communications dropped UM because 0:16:01.680 --> 0:16:03.800 of the Malaysian military was able to track it with 0:16:03.840 --> 0:16:07.400 the primary radar. Yeah, apparently it flew through the primary 0:16:07.520 --> 0:16:10.920 radar of five different countries and the only one that 0:16:10.960 --> 0:16:15.960 bothered to track it was Malaysia's um Air Force. But 0:16:16.120 --> 0:16:19.120 they they didn't do anything about it. They didn't follow 0:16:19.200 --> 0:16:21.240 up to see who it was. They didn't scramble any 0:16:21.320 --> 0:16:24.200 jets to go see if everybody was okay, or they 0:16:24.240 --> 0:16:27.040 just knew that there was an unidentified plane flying through 0:16:27.080 --> 0:16:30.080 Malaysian airspace and there force didn't do anything about it. 0:16:30.360 --> 0:16:32.720 This is embarrassing enough that the Air Force didn't reveal 0:16:32.840 --> 0:16:35.640 this to anybody for a while. Which was a really 0:16:35.680 --> 0:16:41.240 important point because during this time, about an hour UM, 0:16:41.280 --> 0:16:43.840 about an hour and a half after the takeoff and 0:16:43.920 --> 0:16:48.240 an hour after the thing disappeared from transponders, the Malaysian 0:16:48.280 --> 0:16:52.800 Air Force was tracking MH three seventy and it saw 0:16:52.880 --> 0:16:55.760 that it seemed to have taken a turn. Yeah, I 0:16:55.760 --> 0:16:58.160 mean they know what happened at this point. For a 0:16:58.240 --> 0:17:01.000 little while, it made a sharp turn that was not 0:17:01.160 --> 0:17:03.600 part of the planned flight plan. No, not at all. 0:17:03.640 --> 0:17:07.400 This is where things definitely took a metaphorical and literal turn. 0:17:08.160 --> 0:17:12.520 It headed southwest at that point, crossed over the Malay Peninsula, 0:17:12.680 --> 0:17:16.320 over Malaysia again and then parts of Thailand. Then it 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:18.919 made a right turn this is very key near the 0:17:18.960 --> 0:17:21.920 island of Penang, just put a pin in that. Then 0:17:22.000 --> 0:17:26.479 headed west by northwest towards the Andaman Sea, and then 0:17:26.520 --> 0:17:30.800 at two a M vanished from radar, from that primary 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:35.280 right radar as well. Right, so the Malaysian Air Force 0:17:35.320 --> 0:17:38.359 saw this happen on this radar, didn't tell anybody for 0:17:38.400 --> 0:17:42.840 a while. The flight plan had it leaving Malaysia, crossing 0:17:42.880 --> 0:17:47.280 over the Straight of Malacca um into the Um the 0:17:47.320 --> 0:17:52.560 peninsula where Thailand is located, into China, right just away 0:17:52.640 --> 0:17:56.000 from Malaysia. And from what the Malaysian Air Force saw, 0:17:56.200 --> 0:17:58.560 this thing doubled back on itself and then went in 0:17:59.000 --> 0:18:02.280 some totally different directions, almost the opposite direction it was 0:18:02.320 --> 0:18:04.600 supposed to be going in. And like you said, it 0:18:04.720 --> 0:18:06.920 dropped off of the radar, and that was the last 0:18:06.960 --> 0:18:11.280 time anyone saw it on radar. But that's not the 0:18:11.400 --> 0:18:15.680 last time we were able to track um M H 0:18:15.800 --> 0:18:19.000 three seventy and that's thanks to a satellite network that's 0:18:19.040 --> 0:18:22.720 run by an outfit called in MARSAT. Yeah, so in 0:18:22.840 --> 0:18:25.080 mar SAT. If you've ever been on a plane and 0:18:25.160 --> 0:18:30.280 you've enjoyed the benefits of watching movies, streaming or connected 0:18:30.320 --> 0:18:34.640 to your computer via WiFi, that is because of satellite communication. 0:18:35.400 --> 0:18:39.320 Um these airplane. Airplanes are equipped with a system and 0:18:39.359 --> 0:18:43.159 it transfers data and all their voice communications via satellite. 0:18:43.560 --> 0:18:46.560 And some of this data from the plane is automatically 0:18:46.560 --> 0:18:49.720 shared with these ground tracking stations, which is a really 0:18:49.720 --> 0:18:52.000 big deal. So not only are there letting you watch 0:18:52.040 --> 0:18:55.320 movies and doing all that, but it's sending this automatic 0:18:55.400 --> 0:18:58.480 data on a regular on the rag basically from that 0:18:58.520 --> 0:19:02.880 satellite to these ground stations. Right. So, um, they think 0:19:02.880 --> 0:19:06.440 by this time, Um, actually I believe they know. By 0:19:06.440 --> 0:19:12.680 this time MH three seventies navigational systems, entertainment systems, UH, 0:19:13.040 --> 0:19:15.959 A bunch of its systems have been turned off. The 0:19:16.000 --> 0:19:21.679 only thing that was still operating was this satellite link. Um, 0:19:21.720 --> 0:19:24.920 I guess beacon. It's called a satellite data unit. Okay, 0:19:25.000 --> 0:19:28.840 So the satellite data unit which was capable of of 0:19:28.920 --> 0:19:34.520 contacting and receiving contact from the m mar SAT satellites. Now, 0:19:34.600 --> 0:19:37.520 at the time, no one knows that this is happening right, 0:19:37.600 --> 0:19:40.320 Like there's no sound being made, there's nobody tracking this. 0:19:40.400 --> 0:19:44.080 This all came out much later when m mar Sette 0:19:44.080 --> 0:19:46.680 realized they were sitting on a bunch of data. Um 0:19:46.800 --> 0:19:52.879 But during different points over the next six seven hours, 0:19:53.520 --> 0:19:56.800 the satellite and the satellite data unit talked to each 0:19:56.840 --> 0:20:00.280 other under a few different circumstances. And because of this, 0:20:00.280 --> 0:20:03.639 this company M Marsett, which is located in or headquartered 0:20:03.640 --> 0:20:08.600 in Great Britain, but literally covers the globe, not just 0:20:08.640 --> 0:20:11.080 with airline stuff but maritime thing, which I think where 0:20:11.080 --> 0:20:15.920 they were originally, um they were originally um founded to 0:20:15.920 --> 0:20:21.280 to do is to to enable maritime communications, like you know, 0:20:21.359 --> 0:20:26.080 satellite phone you're calling through in Marsett, right, Um. So 0:20:26.119 --> 0:20:30.920 they've got this whole constellation of satellites and when in 0:20:31.040 --> 0:20:34.480 Marsett heard about MH three seventy, they were like, we're 0:20:34.520 --> 0:20:37.680 all bet our satellites were tracking this thing in some way, 0:20:37.680 --> 0:20:40.440 ship or form. And it turns out that they were right. Yeah, 0:20:40.480 --> 0:20:42.560 And there's four and this is important here. There's four 0:20:42.600 --> 0:20:47.400 different ways um or circumstances where that satellite data unit 0:20:47.440 --> 0:20:50.600 on the plane is communicating with the satellite in space 0:20:51.359 --> 0:20:54.680 whenever you're making a data transmission or a voice transmission. 0:20:55.680 --> 0:20:59.480 Whenever someone on the ground tries to contact the plane. Uh, 0:20:59.520 --> 0:21:02.760 there's something that happens every hour. If no one has 0:21:03.000 --> 0:21:05.320 made either one of these contacts for an hour, you 0:21:05.359 --> 0:21:07.679 get a check in called a handshake. It's just like 0:21:07.800 --> 0:21:10.600 you're still here, shake hand's buddy, Yeah, just want to 0:21:10.640 --> 0:21:13.119 make sure you're logged on. It's kind of like um, 0:21:13.200 --> 0:21:18.040 when you watch too much Netflix and Netflix message, yeah, 0:21:18.880 --> 0:21:21.240 have you finished all the tub of cookie dough yet? Yeah? 0:21:21.280 --> 0:21:23.960 And then as the thing that says go outside, right, 0:21:24.040 --> 0:21:26.080 or actually it doesn't, it says, watch another one, watch 0:21:26.119 --> 0:21:28.160 some more? Why not have some more cookie dough? It's 0:21:28.200 --> 0:21:30.560 the same thing. It's it's sending a message to the 0:21:30.600 --> 0:21:33.520 planes satellite data unit saying like, just are you still 0:21:33.560 --> 0:21:35.800 logged on? And then the final thing, and this is 0:21:35.840 --> 0:21:39.880 super key, is whenever the uh, whenever you first log 0:21:39.960 --> 0:21:43.439 onto the satellite system, that thing on the plane, whenever 0:21:43.480 --> 0:21:46.320 it kind of checks in and links up. That is 0:21:46.400 --> 0:21:48.959 very key because what can also happen if that thing 0:21:49.000 --> 0:21:52.639 goes down and then reboots, It treats that as a 0:21:52.640 --> 0:21:55.639 new log in, so it'll make another ping. Basically that 0:21:55.680 --> 0:21:59.200 it's logged onto the system, right So in mars goes 0:21:59.240 --> 0:22:02.200 back and looks their data and says, okay, so here's 0:22:02.240 --> 0:22:04.160 a couple of things right now. This is I think 0:22:04.200 --> 0:22:08.440 within the first few days, um, everybody is looking in 0:22:08.480 --> 0:22:12.080 the South China Sea for MH three seventy because that 0:22:12.200 --> 0:22:15.560 was what was along its flight plan. The Malaysian Air 0:22:15.560 --> 0:22:19.280 Force hasn't revealed yet that it tracked MH three seventy 0:22:19.280 --> 0:22:22.360 turn around and go the opposite direction of what its 0:22:22.359 --> 0:22:25.439 flight plane was was where it was scheduled to carry it. 0:22:26.280 --> 0:22:28.880 And m Marsett is now saying, wait a minute, this 0:22:28.880 --> 0:22:32.280 thing didn't crash like an hour and a half after takeoff. 0:22:32.280 --> 0:22:36.600 This thing turned around and flew into the Indian Ocean 0:22:36.680 --> 0:22:40.199 for six or seven more hours because our satellite was 0:22:40.240 --> 0:22:43.280 talking to the to the plane at various points during 0:22:43.320 --> 0:22:45.840 this during this time. Yeah, and we should point out 0:22:45.880 --> 0:22:50.000 to after Air France flight four four seven, which crashed 0:22:50.000 --> 0:22:53.160 in two thousand nine. This is when in Marsett really 0:22:53.200 --> 0:22:55.760 kind of beefed up their system. They added more ground 0:22:55.800 --> 0:22:59.520 stations and they added a lot more capability to add 0:22:59.640 --> 0:23:02.440 story age for this data because they know that this 0:23:02.560 --> 0:23:04.680 can really help out in situations like this that was 0:23:04.720 --> 0:23:07.080 a big one too, Um do you remember that one? 0:23:07.320 --> 0:23:09.520 So that one was the first one that really opened 0:23:09.520 --> 0:23:11.800