By David Futrelle
With no plausible official explanation for the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 five years ago, and the failures of the assorted attempts to find what survives of the plane in the deep, dark waters of the southern Indian ocean, you may have assumed, as I did, that we would never know what happened to the mystery plane, or why.
In a must-read story in the latest Atlantic magazine, William Langewiesche argues that — despite the bungled investigation of the matter by the corrupt and inept Malaysian government, and the assorted roadblocks government officials have put in the way of other investigators — we actually have a very good idea not only of what transpired in the final hours of that doomed flight, but also why it may have happened.
It looks, in short, like a murder-suicide by an aggrieved middle-aged pilot, depressed and angry over the dissolution of his marriage and possibly also by his inability to attract the attention of several younger women he had become at least slightly obsessed with.
Usually, these sorts of murder-suicides — which are shockingly common — involve a man taking the life of a woman who has left him or otherwise threatened his sense of control over the relationship, and possibly a few other family members, before taking his own life. (Murder-suicides involving women as the murderers are rare.) In the case of MH370, it appears the alleged murderer took out 227 passengers and 12 crew in his act of “revenge” on the world.
Looking skeptically at the official Malaysian government report, and largely ignoring the vast array of spurious conspiracy theories that have sprung up around the plane’s disappearance, Langewiesche examines the sparse but revealing electronic and physical clues left behind by the plane as it veered sharply off its original flightplan and then, after a series of puzzling maneuvers, ultimately flew six more hours in the wrong direction until it ended up crashing violently into the ocean thousands of miles from its intended destination. He concludes, confidently, that the plane
did not catch on fire yet stay in the air for all that time. No, it did not become a “ghost flight” able to navigate and switch its systems off and then back on. No, it was not shot down after long consideration by nefarious national powers who lingered on its tail before pulling the trigger. And no, it is not somewhere in the South China Sea, nor is it sitting intact in some camouflaged hangar in Central Asia. The one thing all of these explanations have in common is that they contradict the authentic information investigators do possess.
What did happen? It appears the plane was deliberately taken down, almost certainly by one of the two men installed in the cockpit at the beginning of the flight — either the pilot, 53-year-old Captain Zaharie Ahmad or his co-pilot, 27-year-old Fariq Abdul Hamid. (There is zero evidence of a hijacking, and Langewiesche argues convincingly that it would have been exceedingly unlikely.)
“[I]t is difficult to see the co-pilot as the perpetrator.” Langewiesche writes.
He was young and optimistic, and reportedly planning to get married. He had no history of any sort of trouble, dissent, or doubts.
But Zaharie, the pilot,
was often lonely and sad. His wife had moved out … By his own admission to friends, he spent a lot of time pacing empty rooms waiting for the days between flights to go by. … He is known to have established a wistful relationship with a married woman and her three children … and to have obsessed over two young internet models … for whom he left Facebook comments that apparently did not elicit responses. … Zaharie seems to have become somewhat disconnected from his earlier, well-established life.
What happened that awful night? Langewiesche suggests that shortly before turning the plane around a hour into the flight, Zaharie either killed or incapacitated his co-pilot, then depressurized the cabin before sending the plane climbing to 40,000 feet in a deliberate attempt to kill the passengers and the rest of the crew.
Langewiesche paints quite a chilling scene of what likely happened:
An intentional depressurization would have been an obvious way—and probably the only way—to subdue a potentially unruly cabin in an airplane that was going to remain in flight for hours to come. In the cabin, the effect would have gone unnoticed but for the sudden appearance of the drop-down oxygen masks and perhaps the cabin crew’s use of the few portable units of similar design. None of those cabin masks was intended for more than about 15 minutes of use during emergency descents to altitudes below 13,000 feet; they would have been of no value at all cruising at 40,000 feet. The cabin occupants would have become incapacitated within a couple of minutes, lost consciousness, and gently died without any choking or gasping for air. The scene would have been dimly lit by the emergency lights, with the dead belted into their seats, their faces nestled in the worthless oxygen masks dangling on tubes from the ceiling.
Zaharie, or whoever was flying the plane, had access to much more effective oxygen masks with hours worth of supplies; after several hours, he could have re-pressurized the plane, confident that he was the only one left alive. Or he could have taken the mask off after putting the plane on its final course and turning on the autopilot, drifting into unconsciousness and ultimately death long before the plane hit the water.
As Langewiesche is well aware, it’s hard to believe that any pilot would do such a monstrous thing. But, as he points out, there have been several similar cases over the last 22 years, including one that seems to have been inspired by MH370.
In 2015, a year after the disappearance of MH370, a young co-pilot named Andreas Lubitz seems to have deliberately crashed Germanwings Flight 9525 into a mountain in the French Alps after locking the pilot out of the plane’s cabin. As I noted at the time, he was known for his explosive rage — and had just been dumped by his girlfriend, and though he was clearly not an incel, he was quickly adopted as a “legitimate SLAYER” and “incel hero” by the regulars on the incel-centric SlutHate forum (which has since morphed into Lookism). Now that Langewiesche has highlighted the romantic and sexual rejection that may have triggered Zaharie’s alleged murderous act, I wonder if the incels will embrace him as well. (If they don’t, it will likely be because of his age; incels like their “heroes” young.)
As I noted in my posts on Lubitz, men often react poorly to romantic rejection, sometimes lashing out with violence — sometimes as the rejecter herself, other times at the world at large. Roughly a third of all female murder victims in the United States are killed by their exes, and “murder/suicides” in which an aggrieved man kills his partner or an ex-partner are so common in the United States that they’re rarely reported as anything more than local news unless, say, an entire family is killed.
Or, in this case, an entire plane full of people.
Toxic masculinity kills.
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Whoa.
This is new news.
I read about this theory some time ago, so it’s not entirely new to me. But yeah. This guy got greedy, and obviously brought his problems on himself…but still, I guarandamntee that some bozo on some incel forum or other will somehow make this about evil, sexually withholding women.
I read that article yesterday, and found it a fascinating read. Though I believe Langewiesche also made a good case for whoever was piloting that plane to have been alive up to the point the plane hit the ocean. I think he stated that the electronics wouldn’t likely turn back on automatically unless someone living flipped the switch. And the angle of the final descent was far steeper than it would’ve been if it just fell after running out of gas. Either way, that is still one scary way to die.
On the other hand, is it horrible to think that the premise of a lone survivor living on a plane full of dead people for several hours would make a good ghost/horror story? Amongst other things, would they – the sole survivor – be able to walk back through that cabin to the restroom without fearing one or more of the dead trying to grab at them?
Or do I need to stop thinking about these things before bedtime?
This is also reminiscent of EgyptAir Flight 990 back in 1999. The NTSB determined that the relief pilot tried to dive the plane but did not determine a motive. Investigation into the relief pilot had evidence he was getting demoted for creepy behavior while in New York several times over the years. The Mubarak government refused this as an explanation also mirroring the corrupt Malaysian government handling of 370.
Redsilkphoenix,
There’s a Thai horror anthology movie called Phobia or 4bia that has a story with a similar premise. A flight attendant is on a plane all alone with a deceased princess whose husband she’d have an affair with. She experiences all sorts of horrifying visions or is haunted while flashbacks reveal the backstory. The anthology as a whole is uneven as they commonly are, but that particular short was just fantastic. I really recommend it.
There’s also the “B-17” segment of Heavy Metal.
I had occasion to look more deeply into the Lubitz thing. It seems very clear now that his concerns were about career and finance. He believed he was about to be suspended from flying because of an eyesight problem.
The Langewiesche article contrasts Lubitz with the MH370 co-pilot:
@Redsilkphoenix
The dead don’t grab. They grip, very slowly, but very, very strongly.
Since I’m not going to sleep today now, neither are you. 😛
Is there any way we can put a stop to toxic masculinity? It seems like all our efforts are futile.
The article is captivating and do a good job of presenting its hypothesis, but that’s still pretty much speculation, especially on the motives of the would-be killer. Well-thought, credibles speculations, but if I were jury at the trial of that guy, based just on that article, I would not condemn him.
Dear gods. What the plane scene from “The Screwfly Solution” looks like in the real world.
@ Moon Custafer;
(… this is weird…)
When I was younger, I was heavy into WW2 aircraft. When I saw Heavy Metal, I noted during this scene that the pilot never checked the top turret operator’s position….
…
… it seemed important to me at the time….
… I’m’a go back to work now
If this story is confirmed to be true, it’s not about toxic masculinity as much as it is about the mental health issues of pilots. Remember Andreas Lubitz? The pilot of the Germanwings plane that was intentionally crashed somewhere in the Alps? There certainly have been people in stable marriages who carry out murder-suicides.
Pilots with signs of poor mental health, including depression, should be grounded. A profession like this should require periodic psychiatric checkups. And yes, it’s not unheard of for people to suffer depression after marital failure.
@BTGG : if it’s true, it’s about both.
The mental health issue is one thing and a real problem, but people with issues that start killing people are almost invariably men. *MAYBE* the reason for which it’s mostly men who do that (based on other, more documented examples) is for a reason completely unrelated to toxic masculinity, but I doubt it quite a bit.
While it’s better to have nobody be in any kind of deep mental distress, it’s also not terribly realistic on the short term, so if there is a way to make thoses people not homicidal maniac, it’s better.
Doubly so because the link between thoses murder suicides and mental imbalances isn’t anywhere near as well documented as you make it out to be. At the very least, I think most depressive people don’t go out and kill people, which is something to remember when you decide to ground someone, an action which will have nefarious consequences on the suspected depressed people.
Interesting article, this is what I kinda thought happened all along as it makes the most sense considering the sequence of events that happened(I am a pilot). A couple of things I have an opinion about here is first your reference to this being “toxic masculinity”. I have never heard this term before, and even my wife who is a Bryn Mawr graduate had not heard this.
To me the way it is phrased implies that all men are somehow capable of doing this. It is not toxic masculinity, it is that this guy obviously had some serious mental issues and personality disorders in order to pull off this shit. My wife and I have a great relationship but if this did happen to me I cannot imagine doing something like this ever. Even if she broke my heart I would still want to be there for my children at least. And I certainly would not take my frustrations out on 270 innocent people. Normal non-psychopathic men do not do this kind of stuff.
There are issues that are well known in the aviation community that do not have an easy answer. The FAA medical certification process does screen for mental health issues in pilots. Sounds good right?
Only problem is if a pilot is depressed or feels they have issues that could use the help of a therapist or doctor they will not go to one. This is because they know if they do they are giving up their flying career. They are afraid that if they told their aviation doctor on their next medical that they are taking antidepressants or went to see a therapist their medical would not be renewed, hence no more aviation career. So there depression and what ever other issues they may have will fester without treatment for as long as they want to stay medically certified to fly aircraft.
@Mark : if you don’t know what toxic masculinity is, you should learn about it before posting.
While other people here probably have better primer on it, the crux of the issue is how it’s seen as more acceptable or even heroic for men to be violent when in pain. They also disproportionaly do that kind of murder. Women, who aren’t lionized when becoming violent, on the other hand, do that much less often. That point in a correlation between thoses two facts.
We stop it daily… and it starts again immediately. We have to stop teaching men that our worth is measured by our ability to manipulate the toxic elements to our personal benefit. This shit is ingrained in our upbringing to the extent that we do it unconsciously, even as we try not to (if, of course, we DO try not to…)
As example, a friend posted on social media a job application section that asked her for “skills”…. Joking, she said “I have no skills.” Immediately, the response I thought of was “no, but you’re pretty!” I’ve struggled against this shit for decades, but still, it’s always near the top of the pile.
@ Mark – I’ve never heard of ‘Bryn Mawr’, so clearly that is not a thing.
Oh wait, I just googled it, and learned that it is a college. Weird how something really familiar to you would be completely unfamiliar to someone outside of your area/sphere of knowledge, isn’t it? But if you use an internet search engine, something you didn’t know can now be known?
Wonder where else we could apply this lesson.
HMM
How
could
we
apply
this???
@Mark Also, please do not equate mental illness with violence. Many people on this very forum suffer from mental illnesses of various kinds, and yet have not become murderous.
off-topic, the dumpster-fire-in-chief has awakened and is now preparing to respond to Iran’s shoot-down of a U.S. drone… (irresponsible and immature tweets to come soon)
… well, THAT makes me feel better….
Oh hi Mark:
That’s… not how adjectives work. If someone makes a disparaging comment about BMW drivers, do you take it personally, even if you drive a Toyota?
I don’t, you are putting words in my mouth but some of you seem to be equating all men with violence.
Except in this case as I understand it I am the BMW driver by virtue of being a man. And I don’t need to look up the definition of toxic masculinity to infer what it means, I thought it was just a phrase the author came up with as they were writing the article.
My whole point that seems to be lost on people here, is that it takes a special kind of crazy to pull the shit this pilot did. Not all men are capable of doing this kind of thing which the phrase toxic masculinity seems to imply.
Are men not allowed to use Google unless they get permission from the Feminist High Council or something?
You’d think so from the number of them that object to terms even though they don’t know what the term means. Although honestly, it’s not that difficult to figure out what “toxic masculinity” means from context cues. And it’s fairly obvious it doesn’t mean all men are mass murderers.
Ooh, “not all men”!