MH370: The Airliner That Vanished

The Story

Shortly after midnight on 8 March 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 took off from Kuala Lumpur bound for Beijing. There were 239 people aboard. Less than an hour later the Boeing 777 went silent, turned away from its planned route and disappeared.

More than 12 years later, nobody knows exactly why. That gap has made MH370 one of the most discussed aviation mysteries in history and a magnet for theories.

"If nothing else, we can say with confidence that it isn't where we looked." (Oliver Plunkett, Ocean Infinity, 2026)

Some of what happened is known. Satellite communications and later analysis led investigators to conclude the plane flew for hours into the southern Indian Ocean. Pieces of debris from the aircraft have since washed up on shores around the Indian Ocean. The main wreckage and the flight recorders, which might explain the decisions made on board, have never been found.

In July 2018 Malaysia's safety investigation team released its report, which ran to 495 pages. "The team is unable to determine the real cause for disappearance of MH370," its head, Kok Soo Chon, told reporters, according to ABC News. "The answer can only be conclusive if the wreckage is found."

The report did not rule much out. According to NBC News, it said the possibility of intervention by a third party "cannot be excluded." Investigators also believed someone may have deliberately switched off the plane's transponder before it was diverted, ABC reported. And the report identified mistakes by air traffic control, including slow responses after the plane went missing.

That has left room for competing theories. The most widely discussed is that someone in the cockpit deliberately diverted the plane. Others suggest a hijacking, a fire or other emergency, or more exotic claims of a shoot-down or secret landing. The Tinfoil Tribune is not naming or blaming any individual. The official investigation did not reach a conclusion about who, if anyone, was responsible, and we will not go further than the evidence.

Families have been left without answers. "Four years on, we are none the wiser," Grace Nathan, whose mother was on board, said after the 2018 report, according to NBC News.

The search has not stopped completely. After earlier government-led searches ended, the U.S. seabed exploration company Ocean Infinity searched in 2018 and returned in 2025 under a "no find, no fee" arrangement with Malaysia. On 8 March 2026, the 12th anniversary, the company said its latest effort had ended on 23 January without finding the plane. Since 2018, it said, it had spent more than 150 days at sea and mapped over 140,000 square kilometres of seafloor.

"If nothing else, we can say with confidence that it isn't where we looked," CEO Oliver Plunkett said. The company said it hopes to return when circumstances allow.

Until the wreckage is found, the verdict has to stay where the investigators left it: unproven, in every direction.