News channel CNN has cited an anonymous source saying missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 descended to an altitude of 12,000ft after it first diverted from its original flight path from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8.
The source claimed that Flight MH370 was recorded by military radar as it descended in intentional fashion, dropping to an altitude that was clear of usual commercial air traffic.
CNN aviation analyst Miles O’Brien calls the claim a “game changer”.
“You want to get down to 10,000ft, because that is when you don’t have to worry about pressurisation. You have enough air in the atmosphere naturally to keep everybody alive,” he said.
“So part of the procedure for a rapid decompression … it’s called a high dive, and you go as quickly as you can down that to that altitude.”
If true, the new information would tally with scenarios of a flight emergency, such as a fire, put forward by pilot Chris Goodfellow that would have forced Flight MH370’s pilots to redirect the jetliner westward from its flight path.
Former instpector-general for the US Department of Transportation Mary Schiavo agreed with O’Brien’s thesis, saying it would explain some of the actions of MH370’s flight crew during its disappearance.
“Now, if we have a scenario where something happened, the plane made a dramatic turn and dropped from 35,000 feet to 12,000 feet, this scenario would fit what a pilot would do in the event of a catastrophic onboard event, such as a rapid decompression, a fire, an explosion,” Schiavo, now CNN’s aviation analyst said.
The former US official was also among the first to speak out against the suspicion that was increasingly directed at the plane’s two pilots, previously saying that “Sometimes an erratic flight path is heroism”.
It remains unclear how the CNN source determined that Flight MH370 descended to 12,000ft.
Previous disclosure of Malaysian military radar data showed the Boeing 777-200ER climbing to an altitude of 45,000ft, which is above its rated operational ceiling, before falling erratically to a height of 23,000ft.
Story: The Malay Mail Online
