Was it SUICIDE? Industry expert says pilot took Malaysian plane to 43,000ft and caused oxygen to run out

• Plane used on flight has maximum service ceiling of 43,100ft
• Pilots can manually lower the cabin pressure using a cockpit switch
• At 43,000ft or above hypoxia, or lack of oxygen, would quickly set in
• Oxygen masks not enough to keep passengers conscious
• Mystery still surrounds what happened to Malaysia Airlines flight MH370
• Experts have speculated on various theories since the plane went missing

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The Malaysia Airlines ghost flight may have been flown to its maximum altitude as part of a terrifying 'suicide mission'.

Passengers and crew are feared to have suffocated when oxygen levels ran out as it spent 23  minutes at up to 45,000ft.

The jet was tracked by military radar flying at between 43,000ft and 45,000ft shortly after the last communication from the cockpit.

Investigators were last night examining whether the chief pilot deliberately sabotaged the aircraft in a carefully-planned suicide bid.

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New data may have been able to indicate flight MH370 ended in the southern Indian Ocean, but what led to its demise and that of the 239 people aboard is still yet to be discovered

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Solution: Inmarsat's scientists analysed the faint pings from MH370 using a technique based on the Doppler effect, which describes how a wave changes frequency relative to the movement of an observer, in this case the satellite. The changes in ping times indicated that the plane was moving south

A source, who wished to remain anonymous, told MailOnline: 'It was tracked flying at this altitude for 23 minutes before descending. Oxygen would have run out in 12 minutes [in a depressurised cabin], rendering the passengers unconscious.'

The source added that several other experts in the industry had come to the same conclusion.

HOW INMARSAT USED THE DOPPLER EFFECT TO TRACK DOWN MH370'S LAST KNOWN POSITION

British satellite firm Inmarsat discovered on March 9 that MH370 had continued flying for at least another six hours after its last voice transmission from the cockpit at 1.19am on Saturday March 8.

It knew this from an electronic 'handshake' that the plane gave to one of its satellites. This placed it in one of two corridors, running north to kazakhstan, or south to the Indian Ocean.

The satellite received several more pings from the aircraft, but Inmarsat weren't immediately able to work out its trajectory because the satellite isn't GPS enabled.

However, the pings contained hidden clues in their wave frequencies. Inmarsat, using some very clever mathematical modelling, deduced that the frequency of the waves were changing in a way that gave away the plane's locations.

It's called the Doppler effect, named after the Austrian physicist Christian Doppler, who proposed it in 1842.

He noticed how wave frequencies changed as an observer moved around the source. In modern life we experience it frequently as the sounds of sirens from emergency service vehicles change as they move away from us.

A similar effect was occurring with MH370 that enabled Inmarsat to rule out a northerly trajectory. The frequencies of the pings it was returning meant it was travelling south.

Oxygen masks would have dropped down, but these only supply between five and 10 minutes of gas.

Andrew Rae, Professor of Experimental and Applied Aerodynamics at the University of the Highlands and Islands, said: 'The venting of cabin pressure would be a problem at 10,000ft, 30,000ft or 43,000ft, but the extra height might perhaps make things happen more quickly. The fact that the aircraft flew at 43,000ft should not itself trigger the emergency cabin oxygen supply.'

The air used for pressurising the cabin comes through the engine and wing and is filtered before it enters the passenger environment.

A pilot might need to turn off the pressurisation system if the aircraft enters dirty air, but investigators are looking at the possibility that it was disabled for sinister reasons on MH370.

Scientists at British satellite firm Inmarsat used a wave phenomenon discovered in the nineteenth century to analyse the seven pings its satellite picked up from MH370 to determine its tragic final destination in the southern Indian Ocean.

From the time the signals took to reach the satellite and the angle of elevation, Inmarsat was able to provide two arcs, one north and one south that the aircraft could have taken.

Inmarsat's scientists then interrogated the faint pings using a technique based on the Doppler effect, which describes how a wave changes frequency relative to the movement of an observer, in this case the satellite, a spokesman said.

Britain's Air Accidents Investigation Branch and experts from the European space industry were also involved in the analysis.

The Doppler effect is why the sound of a police car siren changes as it approaches and then overtakes an observer.

Using this technique, Inmarsat was able to rule out that the aircraft had travelled in a northerly direction.

source from: http://www.dailymail.co.uk