4 oddities about the crash: Is it a deliberate crash or a malfunction? What happened to the Boeing?

on monday march 21st china eastern airlines flight mu-5735 crashed on its way to guangzhou flight records show that the plane had plunged more than 20 000 feet in just over a minute before crashing western aviation experts have referred to this violent dive as unprecedented given the boeing 737 800's outstanding safety record other experts speculate that some unusual event may have occurred during the flight onboard the aircraft were 123 passengers and nine crew members industry insiders have identified four odd events that preceded the crash the most bizarre one was that while cruising flying at an altitude of twenty nine thousand one hundred feet it began a sudden and dramatic drop followed by a brief recovery of more than one thousand feet and then swooped again descending more than twenty five thousand feet in roughly one minute this has sparked all kinds of speculations among professionals globally was this a malfunction of the plane or was it a deliberate move by the pilot beijing's official media said that as of tuesday the day after the crash no survivors had been found the plane was a boeing 737 800 belonging to china eastern yunnan airlines number b1791 which took off from kunming's international airport at 1315 beijing time and was expected to land at guangzhou airport at 1457 but the plane's information disappeared at around 1425 on the flight app and the plane's status suddenly changed to missing at around 1510 footage of wing fragments and mountain fire smoke was seen online taken by villagers in guangxi the professional aviation enthusiast therefore concluded that the plane had crashed at 1603 the guangxi emergency management department released a message claiming that a boeing 737 of china eastern airlines had an accident and that rescue teams had assembled and were closing in on the crash site a mining company surveillance camera which was only 5.8 kilometers from the crash site captured the moment it's some of the most notable footage so far after the crash local villagers arrived at the scene at the first opportunity and took pictures of some of the debris of the plane as well they said that it was a passenger plane but not a single body was seen and the entire shell of the aircraft was scattered around it seems to have been smashed to pieces after hitting the mountain i heard a loud bang at that time some people were doing their work peeling tree bark they put their work down and rushed to see the crash the police then arrived later the fire department arrived on site footage taken by drones shows that there are no large parts of debris at the scene suggesting that the plane had suffered a shattering demise this is rather rare for a plane crash according to the chinese media president xi jinping called for an investigation and an all-out effort to organize a search and rescue effort and deal with the aftermath premier li ker chong gave similar instructions and also asked for truthful timely and accurate information a serious investigation into the cause of the accident and strong measures to strengthen civil aviation safety management the crash sparked a lot of attention on china's internet with the hashtag mu5735 being read 1.67 billion times on china's social media weibo within a few hours according to travel analytics firm cerium there are more than 4 200 boeing 737 800s in service worldwide with 1177 of them in china's airline fleet because the plane was made in the u.s the american national transportation safety board said it has appointed an investigator to assist in the investigation of the crash investigators will work to recover the black box containing cockpit voice recordings and flight data they will also likely examine the plane's previous flights maintenance history weather data and pilot health unlike the essex air accident in 2019 in the indonesian airline accident in 2018 which involved the fourth generation 737 max aircraft of the boeing 737 the jet that crashed in china is a mature model 737-800 by boeing that was six years old according to the normal service use of 20 years this jet is considered young and strong so factors such as aging conditions can be pretty much ruled out this is not a 737 max which is the latest generation of the 737 so i think for some folks may not be aware of the fact that the aircraft the 737 model has uh iterated if you will over the years there have been several generations this particular aircraft is a 737 800 aircraft that was introduced in the late 1990s the aircraft itself that crashed uh earlier today was delivered new in 2015 so it's about six years old but the model has over 20 years of experience and has a relatively positive strong track record so this is not a max and frankly the system that was at the core of the max situation uh is not on this aircraft in terms of weather it can basically be ruled out as well the plane was flying in the easternmost part of the guangxi region where weather reports didn't indicate any possible influencing factors the temperature reached 86 degrees fahrenheit around 2 pm according to the china meteorological administration winds were moderate at just under 12 miles per hour and visibility was 10 miles rain was expected during the night but no precipitation was measured at the time of the crash yet the accident happened anyway the plane crash revealed four main oddities first the plane is completely disintegrated as seen in slow motion footage the wings for instance were still intact while the plane was in the air it suggests that the disintegration of the plane body occurred after hitting the mountain second no emergency code was sent after an aircraft takes off it is set to cruise to allow the plane to stabilize itself unlike when it's taken off or landing the crew generally has time to send an emergency code or at least communicate with the ground at cruising altitude the flight crew didn't send an emergency code to the ground it's strange that not only did this aircraft not send an emergency code it didn't answer ground calls either third the last moment of the plane shows a diving vertically at high speed descending up to more than 20 000 feet in a minute the shape of the aircraft is designed to be aerodynamic and in cruise if it's an engine failure then a glide state will occur which means that it will continue to wobble forward while descending slowly the normal emergency descent rate is about six thousand to seven thousand feet per minute but this jet was five to six times the descending speed almost heading down in a high speed manner why fourth during the descending course there was a mysterious momentary pull-up an aircraft professional described it as such the aircraft lasted almost for about a minute going down at 31 000 feet per minute and flying at an angle of almost 70 degrees nose down then the aircraft rose sharply as it showed 8 400 feet per minute which was a very steep climb it's a strange move it suggests that the pilot at least at the time was not in a state of coma but out of a clear mind pulling the plane upward again during its rapid descent but for whatever reason the plane headed downward again this has led to speculations about whether there were two pilots fighting for control of the plane and whether one of them was trying to destroy the plane and himself online sources in china also claimed that the flight had a second co-pilot meaning that in addition to the usual first and second pilots there was also a pilot in training the former head of the faa's accident investigation told bloomberg that it's odd because it's very rare for a plane with an outstanding safety record like the boeing 737-800 to crash an independent aviation analyst told cnbc in an interview that air travel is the safest form of transportation and if accidents do happen it's not in situations like this at china eastern airlines this dramatic drop is unprecedented especially at cruising level which is where the aircraft spends most of its flight maintaining a steady horizontal speed and that's the safest phase of a flight that's why we need to find out the reason as soon as possible he also said that the boeing 737-800 that crashed in guangxi made its first flight in june 2015 and has a world-class safety record it's widely used by other airlines boeing 737-800 is used to work in very difficult conditions alex machieris said the black boxes will eventually help investigators find answers for now the plane will raise questions from many regulators around the world because the crash isn't entirely explainable bloomberg reports that according to analyses by experienced crash investigators while passenger planes had crashed from cruising altitude before there have been almost no cases of planes rushing to the ground as sharply as this one from china it's a strange phenomena said john cox an aviation safety consultant and former 737 pilot and it's hard to get an airplane to do that an aerospace and defense analyst told cnbc that the plane's safety records suggest that something unusual probably happened during the flight saying given the safety record of this plane and the fact that it has only had nine fatal accidents in 25 years i am highly skeptical of the idea that it was a manufacturer problem the idea that this was a manufacturer problem is highly doubtful however she also conceded that it is too early to consider this issue or draw that conclusion the last major air disaster in china was 12 years ago on august 24 2010 a passenger plane from hernan airlines crashed during the landing phase killing 44 people and injuring 52 mainly due to pilot error plus meteorological complications as for this one it's eastern airlines worst accident ever and the eighth most severe accident in the boeing 737 series one man surnamed yan said that one of his colleagues mr tan had been on board the flight thanks for joining when we first heard about this news our company asked all our colleagues and clients to call the mobile phone of mr tan and we called for a few hours and it never went through then we suspected he was on the plane then we came to the airport to confirm whether he's on the list of the victims according to the information we got from hr and his id number we then confirmed he was on the list of victims the close attention and heated discussion of this incident by chinese netizens also reflect the feeling of insecurity brought about by the current economic depression in china china eastern airlines group limited headquartered in shanghai is one of china's three state-owned backbone air transport groups and the first chinese carrier to be listed in new york hong kong and shanghai at the same time a report released by the international air transport association in october 2021 predicted that the global airline industry was expected to incur a net loss of 51.8 billion us dollars in 2021 due to the impact of the pandemic chinese media outlet itsai.com reported on march 20th that a senior official from the aviation industry recently said in a seminar that mainland china's airline industry is still losing money from january to february 2022 due to the pandemic with losses having reached nearly 3.5 billion u.s dollars since the outbreak of coven 19 the civil aviation industry as a whole has accumulated a loss of u.s 33.16 billion another high-ranking official revealed in a meeting that compared with a period before the outbreak began the scale of airline liabilities had increased by more than 30 percent in airport liabilities by more than forty percent chinese media tsai shin reported that eastern airlines shares listed in hong kong plunged over six percent on the day of the crash as of 2140 beijing time its american depository receipts plunged 8.7 percent after having previously dipped 17 percent shares of boeing company dropped more than 5 at the opening tai sheen said that china's most recent major air disaster in 2010 by hernan airlines had led to years of stagnation in the development of the civil aviation industry in mainland china the crash triggered fears of flying among others as local media reported on long queues at the counter for china eastern airlines at the guangzhou bay yoon airport citing some travelers as saying they had decided to refund their air tickets after the incident it was especially shocking for us as we are flight attendants our entire industry is in shock therefore in the future our work and training will definitely be stricter and will be more serious and responsible i feel extremely sad but this is how can i put it just an accident we'll still take a flight if we have to take it maybe it's just an accident a handful of people gathered near the crash site on tuesday march 22nd for a small buddhist ceremony to help the souls of the victims find peace they said they drove over from a nearby city and wanted to help with relief work but were not allowed into the crash site zone instead they chanted offered prayers and made circles of candles and a small fire for the victims under the scrutiny of a pair of police officers who stood a short distance away i'm a buddhist this is the only thing we can do we cannot go to the crash location so we feel very sad [Music] we can only do a little bit and do whatever we can thank you you