A new report by the Australian Transport Bureau (ATB) has argued that a mysterious power cut onboard the Boeing 777 was the likely cause of MH370 in March 2014.
According to the report, Malaysian Airlines’ MH370 suffered a loss of power that disabled two communication systems and caused the plane to fly on auto-pilot until it eventually crashed into the Indian Ocean killing all 239 people onboard. The plane was flying en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
The shutting down of the plane’s electrical systems essentially left the pilots powerless to control the aircraft.
Speculation has been mounting that a fire onboard the ill-fated aircraft brought down the plane, instead of deliberate pilot intervention, and the report seems to support this theory. Any fire in the hold of the aircraft would have damaged the planes’ avionics and incapacitated the crew and passengers from taking control of the flight.
Contact was lost with MH370 only an hour after leaving Kuala Lumpur.
However, the report, which was released by the ATB last week, does not rule deliberate action by Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah or his co-pilot. It says that the power outage could have been caused by the crew using overhead switches in the cockpit.
In any case, the fresh analysis of data on missing jet MH370 confirmed authorities are searching in the right place, with hopes remaining that it will one day be found.
