One intelligence community source told me the other day that he believed it was possible that Malaysian flight 370 would be found, intact because the plane had not crashed but had been hijacked for unknown reasons.
He may have been right. From MarketWatch:
U.S. counterterrorism officials are pursuing the possibility that a pilot or someone else on board the plane may have diverted it toward an undisclosed location after intentionally turning off the jetliner’s transponders to avoid radar detection, according to one person tracking the probe.
And:
But the huge uncertainty about where the plane was headed, and why it continued flying so long without working transponders, has raised theories among investigators that the aircraft may have been commandeered for a reason that appears unclear to U.S. authorities. Some of those theories have been laid out to national security officials and senior personnel from various U.S. agencies, according to one person familiar with the matter.
But here’s where it gets really interesting…and scary:
At one briefing, according to this person, officials were told investigators are actively pursuing the notion that the plane was diverted “with the intention of using it later for another purpose.”
Another purpose? Perhaps as a giant, human-guided, suicide missile?
At the time of my conversation with my intel source I advised him to keep it to himself and we both laughed, nervously.
I’m more nervous now.