Malaysia Airlines Flight 370: Radar, Satellite Data and WSPR

This long Mentour Pilot episode on Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 tries to separate what is known from what is guessed. The narrator, an airline captain who flies the Boeing 737, works mostly from the official safety investigation report and explains the radar and satellite evidence in detail. The final third is about a new and unproven method for tracking the aircraft.

The crew and the preparations

The video introduces the captain, an experienced 777 pilot and flight simulator enthusiast, and the first officer, who was on his final training flight on the 777 after moving from the Airbus A330. It describes the cabin crew briefing and the preparations in the cockpit, including the data entered into the flight management computer, and explains the aircraft's satellite communications system, which becomes crucial later. There were 239 people on board.

The last calls

The narrator plays the radio calls as the aircraft climbed towards waypoint IGARI and comments on details he noticed, including the captain's relaxed voice and a call that was not read back in full. At 01:19 the crew said "Good night, Malaysian three seven zero." Seconds after the aircraft passed IGARI, the transponder stopped.

Radar

The video explains the difference between secondary radar, which depends on the aircraft's transponder, and primary radar, which detects any object. Malaysian military primary radar tracked the aircraft as it turned back. The narrator says the investigation's simulator tests could only match the turn if it was flown manually, not by the autopilot. The aircraft crossed the peninsula, passed Penang, where a mobile phone mast briefly detected the first officer's phone, and was last seen on radar at 02:22 north-west of Malaysia.

The satellite handshakes

The narrator explains how the Inmarsat data works: the burst timing offset, which gives the aircraft's distance from the satellite and so an arc on the Earth, and the burst frequency offset, which indicates direction and speed. The satellite communications system logged back on at 02:25, which the narrator suggests could mean its power was restored manually, while stressing that this cannot be known. There were seven handshakes in all, the last at 08:19, which matches the aircraft's fuel endurance.

Debris and WSPR

The video covers the debris found on the coasts of eastern Africa and islands in the Indian Ocean, which drift modelling links to the general area of the seventh arc. It then presents work by aerospace engineer Richard Godfrey, who has analysed records of the Weak Signal Propagation Reporter (WSPR), an amateur radio network, to try to detect disturbances caused by the aircraft. The narrator says this data appears to fit the radar and the satellite arcs, and points to a possible end point. He is clear that this method has not been proven, and that it would need physical evidence from a new search to confirm it.

WSPR tracking is a hypothesis. It has not been accepted by any investigating authority, and the official report did not establish where or why the aircraft came down.