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RUSH: Folks, this is classic of what I've been talking about. I mean, this is all over the media: you go to 45,000 feet and the passengers die. The only way you could do that is if you guys in the cockpit depressurize the cabin, right?...Exactly, Rush - that's what at least some of us holding to the 45000 foot theory say - not your straw man argument that they would be automatically killed, but that someone in the cockpit deliberately cut off their oxygen to subdue them, which would have been more effective at 45000 feet than at 35000 cruising altitude - Rush then went on to talk about there being "no evidence" that this happened, and ironically a bit later mentioned Sherlock Holmes in relation to trying to solve the mystery - too bad he didn't recall Sherlock's most famous case about the dog that didn't bark - in this case we have the passengers who didn't protest - the supposed flight path of the plane has it making an about face turn and then flying back over water and then land for about an hour - how is it possible in all this time not one passenger got on a cell or air to ground phone to try to communicate with someone about something - reception might have been impossible over the water, but surely not entirely absent while it was still over land for about an hour - I'm still with those who think this plane is down on land somewhere.....

that's what at least some of us holding to the 45000 foot theory say - not your straw man argument that they would be automatically killed, but that someone in the cockpit deliberately cut off their oxygen to subdue them, which would have been more effective at 45000 feet than at 35000 cruising altitude

The caller is right, there's no magic about going to 45k in terms of pressurization -- it would throw off the cabin altitude schedule (bring the cabin pressure up a little) but would not automatically cause the cabin to depressurize.

45k seems more consistent with a struggle than a deliberate attempt to disable the passengers.

The crew can control the cabin just fine to any elevation up to the current altitude of the airplane, with just a couple of switches, very quickly. So why go to 45k and depressurize? It's overkill, to the point of seriously jeopardizing the hijackers, even with 100% oxygen. Which is why unpressurized aircraft don't fly above 25k in normal operations (yes, that's with breathing 100% oxygen).