The relevant quote:
Although U.S. officials previously said they believed the plane could have remained in the air for several extra hours, Najib said Saturday that the flight was still communicating with satellites until 8:11 a.m. — seven and a half hours after takeoff, and more than 90 minutes after it was due in Beijing. There was no further communication with the plane after that time, Najib said. If the plane was still in the air, it would have been nearing its fuel limit.
Greg, thanks for the link and quote!
Pinging this scenario out to all y’all:
Ok if:
the last sat ping was ~90 minutes past the distance to Beijing,
PLUS the ELT’s haven’t gone off,
then it means it landed someplace around 90 minutes past the distance to Beijing,
and someone got in the electronics and defeated the sat system, ID system, etc.
around 90 minutes past Beijing puts it in the northwest quadrant; the southwest is just water (maybe some islands)
Now you’ve got a plane that doesn’t communicate with the satellite, doesn’t have the ACARS running, and probably any other ID’ing systems... other than the ones they want to use to trick ATC’s into thinking its a legit flight.
Now they’ve had a whole week to retrofit it.. and load it :0
Not. Good. At. ALL