Pan Am Flight 6 (1956)

MH370 DECODED
Jump to navigation Jump to search

Pan Am Flight 6


One of the contentious issues relating to Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 is what may have happened when the aircraft ran out of fuel.

The two 'end-of-flight' scenarios are:-

  1. when the fuel was exhausted the aircraft simply rapidly lost altitude in an uncontrolled dive and crashed violently into the ocean, or
  2. a pilot, probably Captain Shah, was still conscious and in control; the aircraft glided for some distance before landing on the ocean in a controlled manner, known as 'ditching'.

Several examples of ditching are included for reference here, including a Boeing 377 Stratocruiser on Pan Am Flight 6 which ditched in the Pacific Ocean on 16 October 1956.

An interesting aspect of this story is that a Coast Guard cutter, the Pontchartrain was involved and several factors enabled this ditching to be successful:-

  1. The pilots were able to wait for daylight so they could actually see the water and attempt to keep the plane level;
  2. the Pontchartrain laid a wake in the ocean to guide the aircraft on the best heading;
  3. the flight crew kept the landing gear retracted, and 'landed' as slow as possible;
  4. the passengers were moved to the rear of the aircraft, beneficial for weight distribution during ditching; and
  5. fuel had been consumed to make the plane as light as possible (and reduce the risk of fire) so it would float for longer.

Even if flight MH370 had ended with a controlled ditching onto the south Indian Ocean it is unlikely that the aircraft could align favourably with both wind direction and swell, and wave height there is typically awful. Just as a wing broke off the Boeing 737 on Pan Am Flight 6 when it hit a wave, the engines, wings and other components could easily be broken from Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 if it was ditched in the south Indian Ocean. These components would either sink or drift; the aircraft will not be found intact on the ocean floor.


The Wikipedia article for Pan Am Flight 6 is embedded below:-



Source:Pan Am Flight 6, Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_Am_Flight_6

Retrieved from "https://mh370wiki.net/w/index.php?title=Pan_Am_Flight_6_(1956)&oldid=62780"