Canadian pilot’s theory for Malaysia jet mystery goes viral, then debunked

There's a saying in my business; news abhors a vacuum. In the absence of verifiable information people are left to speculate, seizing on a scanty collection of facts to come up with an explanation for something that happened.

The Internet has made this kind of phenomenon even more intense and fast-moving, which is how you explain the latest surge of interest in a theory about what happened to Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.

No trace has been found of the Boeing 777 jetliner, which disappeared March 8 with 239 passengers and crew bound for Beijing from Kuala Lumpur. The search by more than a dozen countries has ranged over huge swaths of ocean as theories swirl whether the flight encountered some mysterious mechanical problem or was the victim of some kind of inside-job hijacking, possibly by one of its pilots, perhaps even some James Bond-style plot.

All anyone has to go on is an apparently routine sign-off with an air traffic controller by the co-pilot, the unexplained loss of transponder signals, some inconclusive radar data and a few electronic pings to a satellite sent by the plane's engine-management system.

But that's enough to fuel the TV talking heads and armchair experts obsessed with MH370's fate.

[ Related: Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370: What we know - and 3 theories ]

This is where Chris Goodfellow comes in. The Florida-based Canadian pilot says he's got a simple theory of what happened to the plane.

In a post on his Google Plus account, later reprinted in edited form by Wired, the 20-year veteran flyer, who is rated to fly big multi-engine aircraft, said he believes MH370 suffered an electrical fire that caused the flight crew to look for an emergency landing strip. But Goodfellow thinks they were overcome in a way similar to the pilots of Swissair Flight 111, which crashed into the ocean off Peggy's Cove, N.S., in 1998, killing 229 people.

Goodfellow seized on one of the early bits of information that had Malaysian military radar detecting the aircraft making a 90-degree turn off its flight plan just after its transponders were apparently turned off. The jet's new track took it southwest back across Malaysia.

"When I heard this I immediately brought up Google Earth and I searched for airports in proximity to the track towards southwest," Goodfellow wrote.

Veteran pilots like the one in command of MH370 instinctively keep tabs on airports they can use in an emergency, he said.

"We old pilots were always drilled to always know the closest airport of safe harbor while in cruise, "Goodfellow wrote. "Airports behind us, airports abeam us and airports ahead of us."

Goodfellow said his perusal of Google Earth indicated the pilot was headed for the Malaysian island of Palau Langkawi, which had a 13,000-foot runway easily capable of handling the big Boeing and whose approach was all over water with no obstacles in the way for an emergency landing.

The loss of the transponder signal was consistent with the crew throwing the main circuit breakers because of an electrical fire, which would have cut power to the devices. The dire emergency also explains why they didn't send out a distress call, he said.

"Aviate, navigate and lastly communicate."

The pilots also would not have donned their oxygen masks during a fire and an emergency smoke hood would only have afforded a few minutes' protection before they were overcome, Goodfellow explained. The aircraft then flew on for some undetermined time with no one at the controls.

"This pilot, as I say, was a hero struggling with an impossible situation trying to get that plane to Langkawi," wrote Goodfellow. "Smart pilot. Just didn't have time."

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Goodfellow's theory has gone viral since being posted Tuesday and was embraced by distinguished writer James Fallows.

"I think there's doubt about everything concerning this flight," Fallows wrote on The Atlantic's web site.

"But his explanation makes better sense than anything else I've heard so far. [And he has updated it in light of developments since his original post.] It's one of the few that make me think, Yes, I could see things happening that way."

But the flutter of interest in Goodfellow's theory is also encountering deep skepticism. Science writer Jeff Wise, who's appeared on CNN and written extensively on the disappearance of MH370, was quick to poke holes in it.

"Goodfellow’s account is emotionally compelling, and it is based on some of the most important facts that have been established so far. And it is simple—to a fault," Wise wrote on Slate, but added, "Take other major findings of the investigation into account, and Goodfellow’s theory falls apart."

Wise points out that while the jet did turn towards Langkawi airport and wound up overflying it, signal data shows the aircraft continued maneuvering after that point, making at least two sharp turns.

"Such vigorous navigating would have been impossible for unconscious men," he wrote. Wise also pointed out that the timing of an electronic ping to a satellite further undermines Goodfellow's theory.

"According to analysis provided by the Malaysian and United States governments, the pings narrowed the location of MH370 at that moment to one of two arcs, one in Central Asia and the other in the southern Indian Ocean," he wrote.

"As MH370 flew from its original course toward Langkawi, it was headed toward neither. Without human intervention – which would go against Goodfellow’s theory –it simply could not have reached the position we know it attained at 8:11 a.m."

Others, posting on Reddit, also poked holes in Goodfellow's theory, most notably that even while trying to troubleshoot an electrical fire, the pilots would have called into air traffic control to report a problem before shutting down systems.

"In an inflight emergency, pilots are required to contact the ATC and declare an emergency," wrote EliteReporter. "If he was that experienced - up to the point where his training would kick in instinctively, why didn't he follow the protocol?"

Let's give Jeff Wise the last word on this:

"To make a good theory, Einstein is said to have asserted, 'everything should be kept as simple as possible, but no simpler.' Unfortunately, Christopher Goodfellow’s wildly popular theory errs on the side of too much elegance."