[SeekAndFind]

Looking at the Malaysia Airlines international route map, the flight was almost certainly headed to Europe. The map doesn’t show any of those routes flying over the Russia-Ukraine border but perhaps that’s due to projecting the routes on a flat map rather than a globe.

[Dog]

Coming from Europe...

[machogirl]

KLM flies a very similar route on their Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/KLM809/history/20140716/1850Z/EHAM/WMKK

[kabar]

Looking at the Malaysia Airlines international route map, the flight was almost certainly headed to Europe.

The flight originated from Amsterdam. Every day MH-17 flies the same route to KL from Amsterdam.

[Alas Babylon!]

These onboard maps are never 100% accurate anyway. Also, due to other air traffic, turbulence, headwinds, etc, the route can easily be 20-50 KM from the intended path, as directed by air traffic controllers.

I’m a window seat guy, and fly Delta from Atlanta - Seattle- Atlanta multiple times a year, and we never follow the same exact path. For example, last month we flew directly over Omaha, Nebraska, but the return had us at least 100 miles south of there.

[annalex]

The map doesn’t show any of those routes flying over the Russia-Ukraine border

The Amsterdam route goes right over Sevastopol, and there was a warning to avoid flying over occupied Crimea, and especially Russian military base in Sevastopol.

It looks like an evasive action. See Kristinn's map at 91 for another airline.