The search for Flight MH370 has expanded yet again as officials name hijacking as one of the lead causes for the planes disappearance.
Lead investigators believe the Malaysia Airlines plane may have evaded the radar of at least three countries by dropping to altitudes as low as 1524 metres (5000 feet) to engage in a risky flying technique called “terrain masking”.
The plane, with 239 people on board, is understood to have kept to regular commercial airline routes as it flew for more than seven hours after diverting from its scheduled flight path over the South China Sea, officials believe.
“All right, goodnight,” was the last known verbal communication with Kuala Lumpur. Investigators say the final words were spoken by someone in the cockpit minutes after the plane’s main communication system was deliberately disabled on-board, and it was said calmly so as to give no indication that anything was wrong.
Terrain masking is used by military pilots for stealth flights and officials believe that whoever had control of the aircraft pursued commercial routes so as not raise the suspicion of people monitoring radar of the countries it flew over.
Kuala Lumpur’s The New Straits Times newspaper is quoting investigators as saying the “person who had control over the aircraft has a solid knowledge of avionics and navigation and left a clean track”.
So far background checks done by both Malaysian and other foreign intelligence agencies indicate that no one else on board is likely to have had as much flying expertise as Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah.
Malaysia’s police chief, Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar, confirmed that all crew on-board the missing Boeing 777 are being investigated and the luxury home of Captain Shah, 52, has been searched.
“We took possession of a simulator, a flight simulator and we have dismantled it from the home (of the pilot) and we have assembled it at our office and we are getting experts to look at it now,” Mr Abu Bakar said.
Aside from Malaysia, it is unclear which other nations the aircraft masked over but Malaysian Defence Minister, Hishammuddin Hussein said the search now covered 11 different countries as well as “deep and remote oceans” and that 25 countries were now involved.
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