Thread: Contact lost with Malaysia Plane.

like many this has been on my mind all day!

Was thinking that if there had been a catastrophic mid air explosion, the sky being absolutely cloudless...surely somebody would have seen it? Shipping, fishermen someone taking a walk on the beach from Malaysia/Thailand to Vietnam..lots of navy(s) posturing activity in S China sea at present too?

Hell even my wife or I may have seen it if we were out on the veranda ... we view from NNW to SSE from about 300m above sea level...bit ghoulish to do the spherical trig ..but if it was at about 30kft it is likely...

very sad and upsetting this....

Originally Posted by crepitas

like many this has been on my mind all day!

Was thinking that if there had been a catastrophic mid air explosion, the sky being absolutely cloudless...surely somebody would have seen it? Shipping, fishermen someone taking a walk on the beach from Malaysia/Thailand to Vietnam..lots of navy(s) posturing activity in S China sea at present too?

Hell even my wife or I may have seen it if we were out on the veranda ... we view from NNW to SSE from about 300m above sea level...bit ghoulish to do the spherical trig ..but if it was at about 30kft it is likely...

very sad and upsetting this....

I was thinking the same thing, a fisherman must have seen or heard something.

^^ About all anybody can see with certainty is whatever happened was either sudden or overwhelming. As for the two stolen passports the users were to transit China - according to the Telegraph.

Originally Posted by bangkokbonecollector

Originally Posted by crepitas

like many this has been on my mind all day!

Was thinking that if there had been a catastrophic mid air explosion, the sky being absolutely cloudless...surely somebody would have seen it? Shipping, fishermen someone taking a walk on the beach from Malaysia/Thailand to Vietnam..lots of navy(s) posturing activity in S China sea at present too?

Hell even my wife or I may have seen it if we were out on the veranda ... we view from NNW to SSE from about 300m above sea level...bit ghoulish to do the spherical trig ..but if it was at about 30kft it is likely...

very sad and upsetting this....

I was thinking the same thing, a fisherman must have seen or heard something.

If there was an explosion (bomb) it wouldn't have to hit the fuel system to destroy the plane and even if it did, not alot of o2 up there to support a massive fireball.

I also think you are both underestimating just how tiny a jet is when it's 10 kilometers away. Crepitas and order of magnitude even more so.

^
^^

Again.....The Vietnamese navy reported that the AC had gone down in the sea south of the Vietnamese mainland. The news was released by a navy admiral. They were quite clear about it, and that was pretty early on....so how did they know unless somebody sighted it either visually or electronically. Maybe the Viet navy just makes shit up..... do they have people posting on TD?....

^^ yeah no shit but I thought associated press might be using the local time in which the story was being reported or GMT.

Jesus Christ my tiny f'ing mistake and like 4 of you have called me up on it.

Vietnamese Navy may find MAS' crash site : Thai Navy
March 9, 2014

Thai Navy said its Vietnamese counterpart may find the Malaysia Airlines plane that went missing on Saturday on their way from Kuala Lumpur to Bejing, China.

Thai Navy’s spokesman Rear Admiral Karn Dee-ubon said the Thai side was informed that the crash site was 153 miles of Vietnam. There were 239 passengers and crew on the plane.

The spokesman later said however the Vietnamese Navy found pieces of the plane not the body of the plane. Thai Navy attache in Vietnam is assigned to report the latest situation to the Thai Navy in Bangkok.

nationmultimedia.com

Phát hi

What looks to be a window frame or casing as been spotted.

Thai navy sends vessel to help find missing jet

BANGKOK, March 9 (Xinhua) -- The Thai navy on Sunday night sent a vessel to help find the missing Malaysia Airlines plane, Prime Minister's Secretary General Suranand Vejjajiva said.

The vessel is expected to arrive near the Langkawi Island in Malaysia at 2:00 a.m. Monday, Suranand said.

An aircraft will also be sent on Monday morning, he added.

The Boeing 777-200 aircraft operated by Malaysia Airlines left Kuala Lumpur International Airport for Beijing at 00:41 a.m. Saturday (1641 GMT Friday), and was last heard at around 1:30 a.m. Saturday (1730 GMT Friday).

The aircraft was carrying 12 crew members and 227 passengers including 154 Chinese. There has been no confirmed information about the fate of the plane yet.

shanghaidaily.com

Latest news in UK 16:07 (GMT);

Malaysia Airlines: Suspected Fragments Found

View by David Learmount aviation expert;

http://news.sky.com/story/1222938/ma...-what-happened

Sad.....

Makes me not want to fly ever again.

Originally Posted by Rural Surin

Nothing to do with anything, except that these incidents do happen now and again.
Mechanical failure, faulty maintenance, pilot error, etc.

Not usually without a Mayday alert...

What's the hold up showing these 2 fake passport passengers ?
they must have images by now.
I want to see what kind of monkey they are .

^ Not sure any pics of them yet but the fella who had his passport nicked is below



^ The Thai police were parading him on BBC this morning ... news says the tickets were purchased in Pattaya

Source: Stolen passports booked onto second flight - Yahoo!7

Thailand’s crime-busters set sights on passport fraud gangs
15/08/2012

Recent arrest of Pakistani ‘kingpin’ highlights the international menace of passport forgers, writes Maxmilian Wechsler

TERRORISTS, fugitives, drug smugglers and illegal arms dealers are among those using passports stolen in their millions across the globe to assist in their criminal activities. Ronald Noble, Secretary-General of Interpol, the world’s largest international police organization, once called passport fraud the “biggest threat facing the world.”

Thailand has unfortunately gained a reputation as one of the major centers for the forgery/alteration and trade of stolen passports. A number of foreign syndicates based in Thailand are buying and selling stolen passports – both altered and unaltered – for use mainly by criminals based in other countries. The syndicates set up shop here because until recently this very profitable enterprise has been given little attention by the Thai authorities.

A new unit established by the Department of Special Investigation (DSI) to target these gangs hopes to cancel their profits and their ability to operate in the Kingdom. Called the Transnational Crime Intelligence Operation Centre (TCIC), under the Bureau of Foreign Affairs and Transnational Crime, the new unit is staffed by highly experienced and dedicated investigators who, prior to joining the unit, all scored notable successes against the highly sophisticated gangs.

Tinawut Slilapat, who leads the unit, said: “The syndicates are well organized and sophisticated, so it’s important to have a law enforcement agency whose personnel are able to gather accurate intelligence which can suppress their networks. With the formation of the TCIC, passport syndicates who have been active in Thailand for decades might now be spending decades behind bars.”
High-profile arrests

Mr. Tinawut and his team have gained international recognition for cracking some major passport cases. The most high-profile of these resulted in the arrest and conviction of Muhammad Ather Butt, known as Tony, a Pakistani national. Also arrested were his wife and two other Pakistani nationals.

Mr. Butt was the leader of a gang which had operated out of Thailand for 10 years, supplying passports and fake documents to terrorists and other criminals. He and his Thai wife were arrested in Nong Khai on November 30, 2010, as they were about to cross the border into Laos. It was a routine trip for the pair as they normally went to Laos once a month to deliver passports to customers.

The operation, called Operation Alpha by DSI, created headlines around the world after the gang was linked to terrorist groups in Spain responsible for several bombing and arson attacks, including the 2004 Madrid train bombings that killed 191 people. The gang also allegedly provided forged passports for the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba group, which has been accused of plotting the November 2008 Mumbai attacks, in which 10 militants killed at least 164 people and injured more than 300, and to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam separatist group in Sri Lanka.

“Mr. Butt was labeled as the ‘kingpin’ of the trade and he was the biggest operator in Thailand,” said Mr. Tinawut. “His business expanded year after year until he was the most famous passport forger in Thailand. Everyone in the business admired and feared him because he developed contacts with some influential Thai officials and had a lot of money.


“After the arrests, we searched Mr. Butt’s two-room apartment in Rat Burana in Bangkok. One room was like a small factory, with computers, a high-definition scanner, and a printer. We found almost 1,000 pieces of evidence, including passports from several countries, photos, counterfeit data pages for EU, Canadian, Chinese and Israeli passports, visa stickers for the US and Schengen Agreement countries and various visa stamps,”
Mr. Tinawut said.

“Among the seizures were over 100 passport-size photos of people who look like they are from the Middle East. These photos were sent to him by post and by other means, probably to insert into stolen passports.

“He selected Thailand as a base because it is easy to enter and leave and, more importantly, some officials don’t regard passport forgery as a serious offence. Their attitude is, ‘they are dealing only with foreign passports, but not Thai, so why should we worry.’

“Mr. Butt had been doing this business for 10 years, so you can imagine how big his network was and how many customers he had. Hundreds of people in many countries, including in the Middle East were involved with his group, which comprised about 10 people,” Mr. Tinawut added.

On June 13 this year Mr. Butt was convicted and sentenced by the Criminal Court to 31 years in prison, but as he confessed to his crimes the sentence was reduced to 15 years and 6 months. His two accomplices received 24 and 21 years in prison but because they also confessed, their sentences were similarly reduced.

Mr. Butt’s wife has made no confession and her case will go to trial.

The TCIC led the investigation of another recent major passport fraud bust -- a joint operation also involving the Pattaya Tourist Police, Special Branch police and the Narcotic Suppression Bureau, with the assistance from the Canadian Border Services Agency. The collaboration resulted in the arrest of Iranian national Seyed Ramin Paknejad in Pattaya on June 8. Mr. Seyed was high on the wanted lists of international law enforcement agencies.

According to Mr. Tinawut, Mr. Seyed is suspected of being the leader of a syndicate that has been forging and selling passports on a large scale for eight or nine years. His illegal activities enabled hundreds of cases of illegal migration and human trafficking from Thailand to many destination countries, including EU, US and Australia.

Computers seized from his condominium in Central Pattaya and a small house he rented in Naklua held a database of thousands of people who had already been issued passports. Police also discovered counterfeiting equipment, bio-pages for passports, visa stickers and other forged documents.

Also seized were a shotgun and a brown powder believed to be heroin. Police suspect that Mr. Seyed provided passports to foreign drug couriers and that he had been involved in passport fraud in Thailand for almost a decade.

Much to the surprise of the DSI and other law enforcement agencies involved in the case, Mr. Seyed was granted bail by the Pattaya Provincial Court on June 13.

( a man accused of dealing in fake passports is given bail thailand, you really cant make this stuff up. )


The TCIC is a small and highly specialized division of the DSI, formed to respond rapidly to highly sophisticated transnational crimes, especially those involving migration offences. Its parent organization, the DSI, which was set up in October 2002, is a civilian law enforcement agency under the Ministry of Justice and modeled upon the US-based Federal Bureau of Investigation, with a mission to investigate complicated and sophisticated crimes.

Mr. Tinawut served with the Special Branch police before joining the DSI in 2004, and has been investigating mainly passport fraud since 2008. He is confident that TCIC will be an effective deterrent against the passport syndicates. With a couple of successful operations besides the two mentioned above already under his division’s belt, the confidence seems justified.


“The unit presently consists of eight officers who are specialists in various fields of law enforcement. We have authorization for 15 officers, so we will recruit seven more specialists. The quality of our officers is more important than their number. The structure of the TCIC is designed to respond to transnational and organized crime using primarily intelligence capabilities.

“The TCIC is divided into three sections: Intelligence Administration and Coordination; Data Management and Network Systems Development; and Operations.

Each section will eventually be assigned five investigators.

“After we recruit more specialists, we will expand from migration crimes to other transnational crimes. As for the former, we now have a lot of valuable information. We are involved in migration fraud that includes forgery and alteration of passports and other identification documents.

Most of our work deals with organized crime involving foreigners and requires cross-border investigation.

“Terrorists, drugs or weapon smugglers, or people committing other crimes obviously don’t want to use their own identification documents. We are focusing on syndicates who have the resources and manpower to commit serious crimes, not on one individual who decided to
commit a crime.

“We are also cooperating with about 10 foreign law enforcement agencies and a number of local ones. International cooperation is very important and crucial to put a stop to these kinds of criminal activities. According to the Special Case law, the DSI can request assistance from any Thai government agency. I must say that we are receiving excellent cooperation from all Thai government agencies.

“Migration fraud is usually complicated and cases require a lot of time to crack. We are looking for the kingpins, and not out to arrest a courier or a worker. Normally it takes six to eight months to conclude an operation.”

Mr. Tinawut said intelligence gathered by his division indicates there are about 20 foreign groups that deal mainly with passport fraud in Thailand at this time, and they are spread all over the country.

“Nationals from South Asian and Middle Eastern countries are most likely to be involved in passport fraud, and to lead syndicates,” said Mr. Tinawut.

He added that some of the leaders of these gangs came here 20 years ago or more and started legal enterprises such as jewelry shops, tourist agencies, import-export and garment businesses, which became fronts for criminal activities.

“We have six cases at this moment. We are constantly collecting intelligence from local and foreign sources. We have seized over 1,000 passports, some already altered, from 10 countries. About 90 per cent are stolen, but some are sold by the owners.”

The gangs supply passports to customers inside and outside Thailand. Clients often travel here to purchase passports or they are delivered by couriers. With few exceptions the passports are used to commit crimes outside of Thailand. Sometime passports are stolen abroad and sent to Thailand for alterations, such as replacing photos, said Mr. Tinawut. Counterfeiters will also supply other fake ID items such as drivers’ licenses.

“It is hard to identify which people come here with bad intentions,” said Mr. Tinawut. “Most foreigners arrive here on tourist visas and it is hard to check the criminal background of every foreigner at the immigration checkpoints. Tens of thousands of people arrive, transit or depart everyday at airports and other checkpoints.

“Secondly, it is easy for criminals to find a Thai partner and use them as an assistant, for example to open bank accounts in order to conceal assets obtained by committing criminal activities. When the police arrest the criminal they can’t seize his or her assets immediately because they are in the name of a Thai person who usually has no legal connection to the criminal, even though they may be living together.

“Finally, it is easy to buy any kind of sophisticated equipment in Thailand to make forgeries. All you need is money, and we are talking about a very lucrative revenue source for criminal organizations.

“One stolen passport, if in good condition and with three to five years left before its expiration date, sells for US$1,500 to $3,000, with extra charges for changing photos, adding counterfeit Schengen stickers, rubber stamps, etc.”

Criminals adopting ‘imposter’ strategy

Mr. Tinawut said the syndicates don’t just sell counterfeit passports, as they did in the past, but often add only some counterfeit parts. What’s more, stolen passports are increasingly sold without the syndicates changing anything. In such a case the passport will be used by a person of similar appearance, an imposter who hopes to fool officers at immigration checkpoints, whether departing, transiting or arriving.

“In these cases the passport gangs don’t change the photo or any other information,” said Mr. Tinawut. “They just look through their stock of passports and select a suitable one to fit the customer. So the passport is genuine in every way. It is the person using it who is the fake,” said Mr. Tinawut.

This development makes it very difficult for law enforcement agencies. “If you have another person’s passport in your pocket, I can’t arrest you because I have to first prove the passport was stolen, altered or counterfeited. Only the embassy can confirm that and this is logistically impossible find out on the spot. It takes time. The criminals know this.

“The bosses behind the transnational crime syndicates are professionals. They know the weak points of law enforcement, the gaps in the law, and the limits of our regulations, and they know how to exploit them.

“The technique of law enforcement today should be to develop intelligence. We never enter the wrong premises when making an arrest or a search because before we go we know exactly who is there and what kind of illegal items we will find.

“After we make arrests and seize evidence, we will examine everything, check all phone numbers and email addresses that have been used. They can lead us to other members of the syndicate or to other syndicates. The people behind passport fraud are all connected in some way. We never throw anything away. Our unit ideology is ‘intelligence leads the way.’ We keep every piece of information because it can be useful in other cases.

“For various reasons, Thailand is still the best place for foreign syndicates to operate passport fraud, and they cooperate with each other. There is a big demand for passports, and identity fraud is a tool to support other criminal activities.

“When we started to go after the syndicates for the first time in 2008, we sent a strong message to them. The syndicates now know very well that we are after them, but the money is too good for them to stop. That’s why they don’t care that their products will get into the hands of terrorists and other criminals. They cause big damage to the reputation of Thailand,” said Mr. Tinawut.

“Our message to the syndicates remains the same: ‘The DSI won’t allow you to do business in Thailand as you did in the past. We will watch you and it is only a matter of time before we arrest you. And we are not alone in this pursuit – we have the cooperation of many international law enforcement agencies as well.’”

Origin of passport fraud in Thailand

THE forging of passports in Thailand started in the early 1980s to cash in on the influx of foreigners carrying traveler’s cheques (TC) and credit cards (CC). Because many tourists carried them on their person or in their luggage, or left them in hotel rooms, this opened up a whole new industry for Thai criminals. Several gangs employed prostitutes, hotel staff, tour bus attendants and others to steal or otherwise fraudulently obtain TC and
CC. The big problem the gangs had with TC and CC was finding a way to use them; most of the cheques and cards were made out to foreigners. At about that time several gangs that employed mostly foreigners came on the scene, and worked with Thai gangs to cash the TC or use the CC. These people were called "drivers," and the Thai crooks who recruited them taught them to forge signatures so they could countersign the cheques and use the credit cards.

However, most reputable businesses also required supporting identification, and this is where the forging of passports and other official documents began. The forgers changed photos and altered the original signatures (where possible) and gave the altered passports to the drivers, who used them to cash TC at banks, money changers, hotels, shops, etc, as well as buy items in shops with CC. These forgeries were much less sophisticated than the ones produced today, but they were often good enough. Sometimes the Thais would give the driver supporting documents like counterfeit student ID cards, international driving licenses, etc.

In the late 1990s when TC became almost obsolete in favour of CC (which had better security), the Thai gangs began to focus on passport fraud, which was showing great money-making potential. They got in touch with foreigners who were looking for stolen passports. Some of these foreigners are still here and running the passport fraud gangs.

Today the way the business works is that thieves steal passports from tourists and sell them to Thai or foreign criminals. Some lost and stolen passports are sent from abroad to the foreign gangs. The worldwide demand for fraudulent passports means that these gangs will continue to operate in Thailand as long as they can evade international and local law enforcement agencies.

Thailand

Originally Posted by bangkokbonecollector

a man accused of dealing in fake passports is given bail

Actually a foreigner getting bail...... usually you won't get bail at all, unless someone somewhere has an interest in you getting bail....

Some input from people who actually know stuff about Boeing 777's and aviation safety in general.

It could take investigators months, if not years, to determine what happened to the Boeing 777 flying from Malaysia's largest city of Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
"At this early stage, we're focusing on the facts that we don't know," said Todd Curtis, a former safety engineer with Boeing who worked on its 777 wide-body jets and is now director of the Airsafe.com Foundation.



The Boeing 777 has one of the best safety records in aviation history. It first carried passengers in June 1995 and went 18 years without a fatal accident.

That streak came to an end with the July 2013 Asiana crash. Three of the 307 people aboard that flight died. Saturday's Malaysia Airlines flight carrying 239 passengers and crew would only be the second fatal incident for the aircraft type.



"It's one of the most reliable airplanes ever built," said John Goglia, a former member of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board.



Some of the possible causes for the plane disappearing include:


1. A catastrophic structural failure: Most aircraft are made of aluminum which is susceptible to corrosion over time, especially in areas of high humidity. But given the plane's long history and impressive safety record, experts suggest that a failure of the airframe, or the plane's Rolls-Royce Trent 800 engines, is unlikely.


More of a threat to the plane's integrity is the constant pressurization and depressurization of the cabin for takeoff and landing. In April 2011, a Southwest Airlines Boeing 737 made an emergency landing shortly after takeoff from Phoenix after the plane's fuselage ruptured, causing a 1.5-metre tear. The plane, with 118 people on board, landed safely. But such a rupture is less likely in this case. Airlines fly the 777 on longer distances, with many fewer takeoffs and landings, putting less stress on the airframe.


"It's not like this was Southwest Airlines doing 10 flights a day," Hamilton said. "There's nothing to suggest there would be any fatigue issues."


2. Bad weather: Planes are designed to fly through most severe storms. However, in June 2009, an Air France flight from Rio de Janeiro to Paris crashed during a bad storm over the Atlantic Ocean. Ice built up on the Airbus A330's airspeed indicators, giving false readings. That, and bad decisions by the pilots, led the plane into a stall causing it to plummet into the sea. All 228 passengers and crew aboard died. The pilots never radioed for help.

In the case of Saturday's Malaysia Airlines flight, all indications show that there were clear skies.


3. Pilot disorientation: Curtis said that the pilots could have taken the plane off autopilot and somehow went off course and didn't realize it until it was too late. The plane could have flown for another five or six hours from its point of last contact, putting it up to about 4,800 miles away. This is unlikely given that the plane probably would have been picked up by radar somewhere. But it's too early to eliminate it as a possibility.


4. Failure of both engines: In January 2008, a British Airways 777 crashed about 300 metres short of the runway at London's Heathrow Airport. As the plane was coming in to land, the engines lost thrust because of ice buildup in the fuel system. There were no fatalities.

Loss of both engines is possible in this case, but Hamilton said the plane could glide for up to 20 minutes, giving pilots plenty of time to make an emergency call. When a US Airways A320 lost both of its engines in January 2009 after taking off from LaGuardia Airport in New York it was at a much lower elevation. But Capt. Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger still had plenty of communications with air traffic controllers before ending the six-minute flight in the Hudson River.


5. A bomb: Several planes have been brought down including Pan Am Flight 103 between London and New York in December 1988. There was also an Air India flight in June 1985 between Montreal and London and a plane in September 1989 flown by French airline Union des Transports Aériens which blew up over the Sahara.
6. Hijacking: A traditional hijacking seems unlikely given that a plane's captors typically land at an airport and have some type of demand. But a Sept.11 attacks-like hijacking is possible, with terrorists forcing the plane into the ocean.


7. Pilot suicide: There were two large jet crashes in the late 1990s — a SilkAir flight and an EgyptAir flight— that are believed to have been caused by pilots deliberately crashing the planes. Government crash investigators never formally declared the crashes suicides but both are widely acknowledged by crash experts to have been caused by deliberate pilot actions.


8. Accidental shoot-down: There have been incidents when a country's military unintentionally shot down civilian aircraft. In July 1988, the United States Navy missile cruiser USS Vincennes accidently shot down an Iran Air flight, killing all 290 passengers and crew. In September 1983, a Korean Air Lines flight was shot down by a Russian fighter jet.

So choose your favorite theory and carry on....

No Thais were on board, they won't give a shit...... guilt would not even occur to them if they pulled the trigger themselves..... just not in their nature.

^Minimal coverage here as well - no Filipinos on board.

I doubt the fake passport holders had anything to do with it.

Originally Posted by Koojo

I doubt the fake passport holders had anything to do with it.

The Hollywood style press will make sure they do.

Anything to gain media time.