Resources

MH370 / US Military ISR Working Research Report v1

Working paper · 18 September 2026

Working paper on US military ISR programmes in the MH370 window: MAGIC, Orion, Gorgon Stare, Blue Devil and remote-control patents, read as one overlapping family under BIG SAFARI. The family is documented. A specific MH370 collection is not established and is not ruled out.

Malaysian military primary-radar track

17:21–18:22 UTC · westbound after IGARI

Primary radar paints a left turn off the Beijing airway, a crossing of the peninsula, and a track up the Strait of Malacca until 18:22 UTC. Altitude/speed blip-to-blip in the file are noisier than 777 performance.

OSD PB2012 — MAGIC JCTD primary record

PE 0603648D8Z · pp. 32–33 · USCENTCOM sponsor

Primary OSD budget exhibit: MAGIC is a USCENTCOM-sponsored JCTD. 120-hour sortie, nominal 1,000 lb / maximum 2,600 lb at 15,000 ft. Modular payload classes: EO/IR, SIGINT, GMTI, wide-area surveillance, communications relay, strike. Transition named to USAF 303rd AESW.

BD764 and BE144 — named radar feeds, and a gap after 18:02:59 UTC

Secondary ends with the transponder · primary westbound · later points still to source

The working chart labels two Malaysian Air Defence datasets: BD764 (secondary, 10-second intervals, early flight, ends 01:21 MYT with the transponder) and BE144 (primary, 10-second intervals, westbound after the turn, ends 18:02:59 UTC). The 2018 reconstruction then shows a last military return at 18:22:12 UTC after a gap. Those later points exist in the official track. Their raw source is not public.

Last primary radar contact

18:22:12 UTC

The final military primary-radar return is recorded northwest of Malaysia, over the Andaman Sea approaches. After this, only the satellite terminal speaks.

MH370 Daily Research — working papers

18 September 2026

Working ISR report, source ledger and master chronology gathered the same day, with a cited-URL set pointing at contemporary MAGIC, Orion and Gorgon Stare reporting.

Andaman Sea / last primary radar

18:22:12 UTC

Final military primary return, northwest of Malaysia. After this, only SATCOM.

What were the 20 Freescale passengers working on?

Presence on the flight is confirmed. Defence/avionics/inertial/radar assignment is unresolved. FXAS21000 gyro timing is an adjacent product fact, not a link.

The radar story and the 9 March cyberattack

Working chart · tracks, delays, and a spear-phish of the investigation

Two panels. Left: civilian secondary, Malaysian military primary, Thai paint disclosed ten days later, and the 12-hour lag before the civilian rescue centre was told. Right: one day after the loss, officials on the investigation were hit with a spear-phish that CyberSecurity Malaysia later said stole classified material toward an IP in China. Presence of a hack is confirmed as that agency’s public account. What was in the take — and whether it included radar — is still open.

HASC Report 113-102 — Gorgon Stare to recapitalise Blue Devil

House Armed Services Committee · 7 June 2013 · USD(I)/USAF report due 14 Feb 2014

Primary Congressional source: Gorgon Stare is the USAF’s only operational persistent day/night WAMI capability and the logical programme to recapitalise Blue Devil technologies, capabilities and lessons learned. Directed evolution into WAMI + near-vertical direction-finding SIGINT, leveraging Blue Devil PED. Report due 14 February 2014 — 22 days before MH370.

Forensic evidence board — facts, capabilities, missing dossiers

Working chart of intersections · ten target records still outstanding

Cork-board reconstruction: Malaysian military radar and MH370 data on one side; QF-16 2013, UAV/UAS patents, JORN, Kadena P-8A/P-3C, Inmarsat SATCOM and Boeing range models on the other. The bottom row is the live request list — Boeing’s 4 March statement of work, sortie logs, Global Hawk, Pinckney/Kidd tracks, JORN tasking, SBIRS, Five Eyes correspondence, 9M-MRO avionics configuration.

Thinking About the U.S. Military’s Next-Generation UAS Force

OSD Office of Net Assessment · September 2013 · 112 pp. · HQ0034-09-D-3007-0013

Pre-MH370 OSD-commissioned report. Gorgon Stare / ARGUS-IS / ARGUS-IR: multi-lens arrays, lower frame rate and resolution than HD FMV, areas up to ~40 km². Comparison figure labels conventional FMV 30 fps and Gorgon Stare 2 fps.

Inmarsat signalling-unit log for 9M-MRO

Perth Ground Earth Station · 7–8 March 2014

The table of channel, BTO, BFO and message type that underpins every arc on every search map. Released by Malaysia with Inmarsat notes.

Inmarsat signalling-unit logs for 9M-MRO

Perth Ground Earth Station · 7–8 March 2014

The raw-ish tables of channel, BTO, BFO and message type that underpin every arc on every search map. Released by Malaysia with Inmarsat explanatory notes.

Malaysian summary of possible MH370 debris

ICAO Annex 13 Team · updated 2017

Itemised list of wreckage recovered on western Indian Ocean coasts, with confirmation classes: confirmed, almost certain, highly likely, likely.

Penang

Westbound primary-radar track · FO phone register

Aircraft crossed the peninsula in this area. F/O handset registered at 17:52:27 UTC.

What was actually taken on 9 March — and did it include radar?

CSM said minutes of crisis meetings and classified documents, some related to MH370. The working chart asks whether radar information or discussions of the turn-back were in that set. No public loot list answers it. A negative would also be a finding.

Deep Dive: MH370 Episode Three — The Turn Back

Deep Dive Podcast Network · 28 September 2023 · 31:12

Podcast reconstruction of the air turn-back after IGARI: military primary radar, heading 273°, altitude and speed blips the 2018 report itself flags as noisy.

DODIG-2013-128 — Blue Devil Block 2

DoD Inspector General · 19 September 2013 · 54 pages · Drive source copy

Primary. FA8620-11-C-4024, ~$149m spent, payload stop 4 Jan 2012, residual components absorbed into other Air Force programmes.

Gorgon Stare documented at 2 fps, not 6 fps

OSD September 2013 comparison figure

Primary pre-MH370 report labels Gorgon Stare 2 fps versus 30 fps FMV. A claimed ~6 fps match to Increment 2 is not established, pending an Increment-2 specification.

Secondary radar lost

17:21:13 UTC

Mode S transponder returns cease. Primary (military) radar continues to paint an unidentified westbound track consistent with MH370.

Turn back across the Malay Peninsula

17:21–17:52 UTC

Primary radar shows a left turn off the Beijing airway, a crossing of Malaysia, and a track toward the Andaman Sea. The official report calls this diversion likely the result of manual inputs.

Two waves of MH370-themed cyberattacks

9 March official-network intrusion · March–April public malware lures

Working chart of two separate campaigns. Attack one: 9 March spear-phish of officials at the Department of Civil Aviation, National Security Council and Malaysia Airlines — CyberSecurity Malaysia’s public account, disclosed in August. Attack two: MyCERT alerts on 24 March and 18 April about MH370-themed backdoors and a fake investigation-transcript phish aimed more widely. Destination IP in China is not the same as a finding that Beijing ran the operation.

US military presence in theatre, 7–9 March 2014

Public-source board · confirmed search assets vs records still needed

Working chart of publicly documented US assets around MH370: USS Pinckney already in the South China Sea and diverted to search on 8 March; a Kadena P-3C announced the same day; USS Kidd joined. Guam RQ-4, Diego Garcia sensors, EP-3E, RC-135 and exact 7–9 March sortie lists remain open. Presence is not the same as tracking 9M-MRO.

Wikipedia — Malaysia Airlines Flight 370

en.wikipedia.org · living page · read 18 September 2026

Crowd-maintained digest of the public case: 239 dead, 9M-MRO, 8 March 2014, KUL–PEK, cause undetermined. Useful as a citation map into ATSB, MOT, Inmarsat and Ocean Infinity. Not a primary source.

Can the Motorola and mangosteen cargo be rebuilt at carton level?

Working-log Q28–Q35: airway bill 232-10677085, Motorola SKUs, whether radios/transmitters were present, CG effects, and why the Motorola consignment was not X-rayed.

Fariq Abdul Hamid

First officer · MH370

Not heard on the last ATC handover. His mobile registered with a Penang tower at 17:52:27 UTC, corroborating the westbound primary-radar track. About 2,763 hours; this was a 777 training sector.

Remote-control claims versus evidence gaps

Patent, QF-16, Teso FMS proof-of-concept · installation on 9M-MRO still open

Working chart: unmanned flight of a fighter-class jet was demonstrated in 2013; Boeing’s uninterruptible-autopilot patent exists; Hugo Teso showed an FMS proof-of-concept the same year. Boeing told Malaysian investigators there was no commercial implementation on the 2002 delivery. Radar proves a turn at IGARI, not who commanded it. Ten data requests remain.

Surat Thani military radar

Thai Air Force · paint ~01:28 MYT 8 March

Documented late-disclosed primary-radar source on the westbound track.

The Operational Search for MH370

ATSB AE-2014-054 · final search report 2017

Australia’s account of how the southern Indian Ocean search box was drawn, refined, and exhausted over 120,000 km². Primary technical home of the 7th-arc argument used in the field.

Why did SAR start in the wrong ocean for days?

Military primary radar and live SATCOM existed while the public search flew the South China Sea. Minister ~10:30 MYT; KL ARCC 22:30; Thai Surat Thani 18–19 March. GADSS is the policy answer; the night-of organisational failure is still a research subject.

A China IP is not a finding that Beijing ran the 9 March hack

Routing fact · operator unknown

CSM said exfiltrated mail went to an IP address in China. Headlines called it a Chinese hack. The agency did not publish a named operator. Compromised machines, third-party infrastructure and a false flag remain live. Not established, not ruled out.

Blue Devil, MAGIC, Orion, BIG SAFARI — 2014 window

Briefing collages, 18 September 2026

Nic Moneypenny published investigation collages placing Blue Devil (including an egg-shaped airship), MAGIC, Aurora Orion, BIG SAFARI, Lockheed and DARPA in the same 2013–14 spending window as MH370, with Freescale’s last gyro presentation among the plates.

Boeing files uninterruptible-autopilot priority

19 February 2003 · later US7142971B2

Patent architecture: remote or automatic engagement; onboard controls may be disconnected; dedicated communications; inaccessible power path. Precedent, not an MH370 installation.

Boeing US7142971B2 — uninterruptible automatic control

Remote engagement · disconnected onboard controls

Confirmed patent disclosure. Claims include remote initiation, dedicated comms distinct from other aircraft communications, disabled onboard override, and automatic landing at a predetermined (including military) site.

Cargo, including lithium-ion batteries

Manifest reviewed; fire hypothesis not supported

The aircraft carried cargo including lithium-ion batteries. The investigation found they were packed to regulation and did not support a cargo-fire cause.

CTBTO HA08 North at Diego Garcia went dark in March 2014

Cable break ~189 km offshore · South array kept listening

Confirmed by CTBTO. The northern hydroacoustic segment of HA08, off Diego Garcia, suffered a trunk-cable fault in March 2014 about 189–190 km from shore, more than a kilometre and a half down. HA08 South continued. North stayed silent for twelve years. A conventional splash in the southern Indian Ocean is not thereby erased — Cape Leeuwin (HA01) and HA08 South remained in the network.

CyberSecurity Malaysia

National cyber agency · publicly described the 9 March intrusion in August 2014

Confirmed. Agency under the then Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation. CEO Amirudin Abdul Wahab is the named source for the 9 March spear-phish of investigation officials. Digital forensics support to the affected departments; work with police and Interpol.

Did 9M-MRO have any path for external flight-control commands?

Patents prove the concept. The test is hardware/software, SATCOM/data-link, power architecture, and maintenance/modification records on this tail.

External / uninterruptible autopilot on 9M-MRO

Engineering precedent exists. Installation on this airframe is not established.

Boeing US7142971B2 and Cubic US6641087B1 describe remote engagement, disconnected cockpit controls, dedicated links. No maintenance/mod/certification record currently in this archive places that architecture on 9M-MRO.

First officer’s phone registers at Penang

17:52:27 UTC

A cell-site handshake from F/O Fariq Abdul Hamid’s mobile is recorded by a Penang tower as the aircraft passes nearby. No call is connected.

Flight MH370 — 17 Fascinating Facts

J. Jericho / The Free School · March 2019 · Drive backup PDF

Independent compilation of official-file facts with annexes (simulator pages, passenger list, cargo docs, Boeing patent, ACARS log). Not an official report. Several numbered “facts” still need MOT/ATSB cross-check.

Freescale as a causal thread

Twenty employees confirmed; assignment unreconstructed

Presence is a fact. A defence, inertial, or communications assignment that would matter to MH370 is an open question, not a finding.

Fuel exhaustion, then uncontrolled descent at the 7th arc

Prevailing official end-of-flight model

After a long southern cruise the aircraft flames out near 00:19 UTC, the SDU logs on from APU/emergency power, and the aeroplane leaves controlled flight. Wreckage should lie on or near the 7th arc.

FY2013 Endurance UAV budget jumped via Congressional adds, not a hidden presidential request

PE 0305205F: previous PB $21m → $74.126m. MAGIC $50m add; Endurance UAV Base $9.893m. Documented. Who sponsored the add remains open.

Inmarsat

Classic Aero I-3 · Perth Ground Earth Station

The communications company that became the principal witness to MH370’s last six hours.

Investigation networks spear-phished the day after MH370 vanished

CyberSecurity Malaysia · ~30 PCs · disclosed 20 August 2014

Confirmed as CSM’s public account. On 9 March, officials at the Department of Civil Aviation, the National Security Council and Malaysia Airlines were sent malware disguised as a news article that the aircraft had been found. About thirty computers were infected. Outbound mail carrying confidential files, including meeting minutes and classified documents, some related to MH370, was traced to an IP in China. CSM shut the machines down and asked Chinese providers to block the traffic. Police and Interpol were involved. What exactly was stolen is still unpublished.

Is Flight 370 still sending signals?

CNN · 13 March 2014 · 2:09

Week-one report, before the 15 March Inmarsat southern-arc briefing. Captures the live confusion over whether the aircraft was still electrically alive.

Lockheed awarded ISIS Phase 3

27 April 2009 · just under $400m

Lockheed integrator, Raytheon radar, one-third-scale autonomous airship. Same later PE as MAGIC.

Malaysia extends the search contract to June 2027

29 June 2026

Cabinet extends the Ocean Infinity agreement from 1 July 2026 to 30 June 2027 to finish a remaining 7,428.54 km². No-find-no-fee terms continue.

MH370 Disappearance: Minute by Minute

Licensed 53-minute feature · 2025–26 reprints

The same ~53:13 timeline film appears under DocuReal, Spark, Wonder, Real Stories and Progress with new title cards. Content is the public night: 00:41 takeoff, 01:19 sign-off, Malacca radar, Inmarsat, African debris.

MH370: The Forensic Evidence

Capt. John Cox · Sit Down With Sid · 13 June 2026 · 37:10

US accident investigator. Reads the transponder drop at the FIR boundary, the southwest run to MEKAR, the northwest turn, and the 300-mile ocean leg as too many coincidences for a random failure. Preponderance, in his view: a deliberate act, high likelihood the captain.

MH370: The Untold Story / The Cover-Up

Peter Stefanovic · Sky News 2020 · later Amazon two-part

Interviews with Tony Abbott, Warren Truss and Sir Angus Houston on the first hours, plus Capt. Byron Bailey’s claim that the aircraft was hidden on purpose. Radar-sharing delay is documented; “hidden” is Bailey’s inference.

MyCERT: MH370-themed backdoor and fake-transcript spear-phish

MA-381 · 24 March 2014 · MA-386 · 18 April 2014

Confirmed public advisories, a different campaign from the 9 March official-network intrusion. 24 March: a Facebook-app lure dropping a backdoor with remote-control (C2) capability. 18 April: emails posing as an investigation team / ICAO portal item, password-protected archive, fake MH370 transcript, command-and-control. Aimed at organisations and the public, not shown to be the DCA/NSC/MAS breach.

Quiet Exodus: HA08 was blinded on purpose — not established

Outage confirmed · deliberate cut not shown · depths argue against UCT-2

The thesis treats the March 2014 HA08 North cable fault plus UCT-2’s presence as an acoustic blackout for MH370. The outage is real. The published UCT-2 task is near-shore anode work. HA08 South and HA01 kept listening. Deliberate blinding remains a hypothesis.

Right outboard flap — Pemba Island

Item 20 · ~4.57 × 1.83 m · confirmed

Large right outboard flap found in Tanzania and confirmed as 9M-MRO. Third serial-confirmed trailing-edge surface.

Right outboard flap confirmed in Tanzania

20 June 2016

A 4.6 m right outboard flap section is found on Pemba Island, Tanzania, and confirmed as 9M-MRO.

The MH370 Mystery — Parts 1 and 2

Easy Documentary · June 2025

Two-part compilation: Part 1 the public crash/disappearance narrative; Part 2 “inside the investigation’s biggest failures.” Secondary retelling of already-filed records.

Waypoint IGARI

17:20:31 UTC

MH370 passes IGARI, the FIR boundary between Kuala Lumpur and Ho Chi Minh, seconds before disappearing from secondary radar.

What were the two MAGIC JUON numbers and the FY2012/13 add sponsors?

USAF says two Joint Urgent Operational Needs for long dwell / persistent ISR. Exact numbers, submitting commands, and the $19m / $50m Congressional language are unresolved.