RAAP—018
MH370
Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, a Boeing 777-200ER (9M-MRO) with 239 people aboard, vanished on 8 March 2014 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. After a final ATC call about 38 minutes after takeoff, secondary radar contact ceased; Malaysian military primary radar later showed a westward deviation across the Malay Peninsula and Andaman Sea, ending about 200 nautical miles northwest of Penang. The loss is widely regarded as the greatest mystery in aviation and remains the deadliest aircraft disappearance.
The search, the most expensive in aviation history, shifted from the South China and Andaman Seas to the southern Indian Ocean based on Inmarsat satellite data. Debris confirmed from MH370 washed ashore in the western Indian Ocean in 2015–2016, but seabed searches over 120,000 km² (2014–2017) and a private follow-up in 2018 found no wreck. Theories ranged from hypoxia to hijacking; the Australian Transport Safety Bureau judged hypoxia most consistent with available data, but no consensus emerged. Malaysia’s final report (July 2018) was inconclusive. The case prompted global safety changes, including longer recorder durations, stronger locator beacons, and tighter oceanic position reporting.
The search, the most expensive in aviation history, shifted from the South China and Andaman Seas to the southern Indian Ocean based on Inmarsat satellite data. Debris confirmed from MH370 washed ashore in the western Indian Ocean in 2015–2016, but seabed searches over 120,000 km² (2014–2017) and a private follow-up in 2018 found no wreck. Theories ranged from hypoxia to hijacking; the Australian Transport Safety Bureau judged hypoxia most consistent with available data, but no consensus emerged. Malaysia’s final report (July 2018) was inconclusive. The case prompted global safety changes, including longer recorder durations, stronger locator beacons, and tighter oceanic position reporting.