The 2014-crash has been confirmed as a murder-suicide
The fate of Malaysian Airlines Flight MH370 has finally been learned, with leading air safety experts concluding that the captain of flight MH370 deliberately crashed the plane into the ocean.
The disappearance of the routine flight gripped the world in March 2014, when the plane travelling from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing disappeared - along with all 239-people on board.
Although the fate of the plane has been known for some time, it wasn't known exactly what caused the aircraft to crash into the Indian Ocean.
That is until now, when satellite findings indicated the plane ran out of fuel and was deliberately crashed in the Indian Ocean west of Australia - thousands of miles from its intended destination.
The findings were revealed by Martin Dolan, who has led the seabed search for the wreckage, for the past two years.
Speaking on a special edition of the 60 Minutes Australia programme, Mr Dolan delivered the grim information: “This was planned, this was deliberate, and it was done over an extended period of time,” he said.
Also speaking on the programme was Captain Simon Harvey, a British pilot who has flown regularly in Asia. He said the mission was “planned meticulously to make the aircraft disappear,” including flying along the Thai-Malaysian frontier to avoid either side taking action.
“If you were commissioning me to make a 777 disappear, I would do exactly the same thing,” he told the programme.
The programme also indicated it was possible Captain Zaharie put on an oxygen mask before depressurising the plane to render the passengers and crew unconscious.
Who was the pilot?
In the cock pit that night were Captain Zaharie, aged 53, was accompanied by inexperienced first officer, Fariq Abdul Hamid – on his first Boeing 777 mission without a training captain overseeing him.
It's thought Zaharie spearheaded the terrible plot, which is being called a murder/suicide.
Several days after the plane disappeared, a search of the Captain's home in the Malaysian Capital suggested he had used flight simulation software to prepare for diverting the aircraft.
Multiple cases of murder-suicide committed by pilots have been recorded in the past, including infamous Germanwings flight 9525 in 2015.
