Hikers Make A Discovery In The Mountains That Forces The Government To Act

Two friends from Boston were going to South America on a bold mission. They were going to hike the border of Bolivia and Paraguay to solve a decades-old mystery. It wouldn't be easy. The treacherous terrain had stopped plenty of people from providing closure to a painful and puzzling tragedy. And the hikers soon discovered that there was a reason why the area was considered so deadly.

Setting out

As Dan Futrell and Isaac Stoner packed their bags for what would be a trying expedition, they tried to maintain their calm. They hoped to uncover the truth behind an "accident" that had claimed so many lives and left so many questions unanswered. Previous explanations from investigators just didn't quite add up.

A new year's flight

The mystery the guys were trying to solve started like this. Years earlier, 29 people on board Eastern Air Lines Flight 980 were all prepared to have a safe and timely trip out of Paraguay. The pilot and crew had traveled this route plenty of times, and everything should've gone smoothly.

Miami bound

The plane was leaving the gorgeous city of Asunción on New Year's Day, 1985, and heading to Miami, Florida. Because of the long distance involved, the plan was to make a few stops before the flight reached its final destination.

A seasoned crew

The captain's name was Larry Campbell, and he was joined by a trusted crew: his co-pilot, a flight engineer, and a team of Chilean flight attendants who were prepared for any sort of trouble. Well, so they thought...

Fuel stop

An airport in La Paz, Bolivia, was the first of two stops before reaching Asunción. Naturally, the captain radioed to the control tower to let them know the plane was arriving to refuel. And at the time, everything on board was fine.

High landing

The flight attendants may have been serving the final round of drinks before the plane reached the tarmac. El Alto International Airport is the highest in the world, and the mountains surrounding La Paz were covered with snow and ice. But ten minutes before the plane touched down, disaster struck.

Mountain collision

Without warning, the plane careened directly into the side of Mount Illimani, striking jagged rocks and sharp ice before exploding. There were no survivors. The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board sent people out to scan the area.

A difficult search

Even with the specialized training the searchers had, many of them suffered awful altitude sickness. Visibility was almost non-existent, too, and after a few days of the search, the whole thing was called off. Still, the authorities knew the answers were out there.

No black box

The black box on board the plane could've told the investigators what they wanted to know. But over the years that followed, only small pieces of debris were found scattered around the mountain. All of this fascinated Dan and Isaac. Could they do what the authorities had failed to?

Independent adventurers

Dan and Isaac hadn't been commissioned by the government. They had been reading a Wikipedia page dedicated to unrecovered black boxes, and they had taken on the investigation themselves after they learned of the flight that had hit Mount Illimani. Recovering the black box would answer what caused the plane to crash — and potentially save other travelers in the future.

Operation Thonapa

Having almost no experience traversing the rugged mountainous terrain, the men named their black box-hunting mission "Operation Thonapa" after the Incan god of knowledge. And to up their odds of finding the box, they tried something other search teams hadn't.

An uncovered area

Most expeditions, naturally, searched the immediate area around the crash site. It was assumed that anything worth finding would be close to the wreckage. Dan and Isaac, however? They explored the section 3,000 feet from the top of the mountain. And they quickly realized how important that choice was.

Scattered for miles

As the Boeing 727 had slammed into the mountainside at a speed of over 500 miles per hour, the wreckage had been scattered for miles around, making the search incredibly difficult. But the two men managed to discover debris the authorities hadn't.

Precious fragments

The guys even found the remains of the coveted black box! Thirty-one years of exposure to brutal weather conditions had left it in shambles, however. But as important a discovery as this was, it didn't hold a candle to what Dan and Isaac found next.

Suitcase surprises

There were two sealed suitcases lodged between some ice-covered boulders. And when the men opened the first of these, they saw piles of poached crocodile skins worth millions of dollars. Yet they still weren't prepared for the surprise inside suitcase number two.

Stacks of cash

Dan and Isaac's jaws dropped as they stared in awe at stacks upon stacks of crisp bills. They had no idea at the time, but they were looking at $20 million. Who would be carrying that kind of cash on a flight?

Mob money

Dan and Isaac later learned that the money had belonged to a well-known mob boss and drug dealer named Enrique Matalón Sr., who had been traveling with his family. That meant the crash could very well have been orchestrated by a rival mob boss.

Officials step in

Then the National Transportation Safety Board anxiously went through the wreckage the men found, hoping the black box had answers to the decades-old mystery. But the box was not the crucial in-flight recorder. Instead, it was something quite bizarre.

I Spy

The box contained an 18-minute recording of an episode of the show I Spy dubbed in Spanish. This reveal was, quite disappointingly, not the breaking development authorities hoped for. And in the end, questions remained.

A new lead

Dan and Isaac made a discovery that shed a little light on the mysterious history of Eastern Air Lines Flight 980. But they're not the only ones to go digging for answers after a plane crash. When Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 (MH370) seemingly disappeared without a trace in 2014, the world waited for news of the whereabouts of the missing plane. Then, on the ocean floor, investigators looking for answers made a truly incredible find. And it was all to do with what they uncovered beneath the waves of the Indian Ocean.

The fateful flight

On that fateful final flight, MH370 left Kuala Lumpur International Airport at 12.41 a.m. on March 8, 2014. The plane was en route to Beijing Capital International Airport, where it was expected to touch down at 6:30 a.m. after a journey of around 2,700 miles. And as the weather at take-off was fine, it may have seemed likely at first that the trip would be a smooth one.

The passengers

On MH370 that day were a total of 227 passengers and 12 crew members. People from 13 different countries were represented, although more than 50 percent of those on board were either Chinese or Taiwanese. A further 38 passengers were Malaysian, five were Indian, and three were from the United States.

Youngest on board

Of the American citizens traveling on MH370, two were children: toddler Yan Zhang and four-year-old Nicole Meng. And there were three other passengers aged below five on the flight, the youngest of them being 23-month-old Wang Moheng. He was traveling home to Beijing with his parents after a vacation in Malaysia.

Strange goings-on

Sadly, though, none of the passengers or the crew on the ill-fated flight would make it home again. And soon after MH370’s departure, the plane started to behave strangely. While the craft was able to rise to its intended altitude of 35,000 feet, its Aircraft Communication Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS) was unexpectedly deactivated shortly after 1:07 a.m.

Couldn’t be traced

The purpose of the ACARS is to give information on the aircraft’s performance – data needed during a journey. But the deactivation of the system wasn’t the only strange development. Around three-quarters of an hour after the flight had departed from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysian air traffic monitors were no longer able to trace the plane. And, tragically, it was never to be heard from again.

Last message

At the time the authorities became unable to contact MH370, the craft was traveling over the South China Sea that separates Malaysia from Vietnam. Controllers had spoken to the crew just a few minutes earlier, in fact, to inform them that they were about to cross over into Vietnamese airspace. Acknowledging the information, MH370 had then responded, “Good night. Malaysian three seven zero.” This was the final time that anyone heard from the flight. Searchers would ultimately look for the plane, of course, and make their awe-inspiring discovery in the process.

Changing route

But while MH370 had dropped off the Malaysian authorities’ radar, it was still being observed by military equipment. Consequently, it was noted that, bizarrely, the flight had turned away from its scheduled route towards China and was instead moving westward over Malaysia. The plane subsequently traveled out of range of the monitoring equipment when it was somewhere above the Andaman Sea.

Satellite finds it

Then, while MH370 ultimately dropped off the Malaysian military radar at 2:22 a.m., an Inmarsat satellite situated above the Indian Ocean continued to log regular signals from the plane until 8:11 a.m. An Inmarsat transmission sent at 09:15 a.m. wasn’t acknowledged by the craft, which had been due to arrive in Beijing at 6.30 a.m.

Families worry

In the hours that followed, the relatives of those on board MH370 then began to arrive at Beijing Capital International Airport, awaiting news about the missing plane. And on March 9, 2014, it seemed that there was finally a clue to MH370’s whereabouts when a low-altitude airplane saw a rectangular object on the surface of the sea.

Search efforts start

Seven ships and six planes departed from Vietnam to try to find the reported object, although unfortunately they were unable to do so. And while subsequent search efforts focused at first on the South China Sea, these later switched to the Andaman Sea and the Strait of Malacca after the last known movements of MH370 became clearer.

A new approach

Then, seven days after MH370 had vanished, the search area changed yet again. Data from Inmarsat determined, you see, that the aircraft could have been anywhere on one of two paths. One of these routes arced to the south of the Indian Ocean towards Australia; the other went north towards the Asian nations of Vietnam and Turkmenistan. It was on the floor of the Indian Ocean, remember, that a search team uncovered something incredible.

Dealing a big blow

Ultimately, then, the quest to find MH370 came to span the waters off Australia and large sections of the Asian mainland. But a blow was dealt when Najib Razak – the Malaysian Prime Minister – later declared that the plane had come down far from land in the Indian Ocean. It was thought, too, that all the passengers and crew members were presumed dead.

Mystery remains

The investigation into MH370’s whereabouts would go on to become the most expensive of its kind, with the plane’s disappearance remaining a mystery even six years later. And with no definitive official explanation as to what became of the aircraft or those on board, a number of conspiracy theories have emerged.

Was the pilot responsible?

It’s been said, for example, that MH370’s pilot had embarked on a convoluted murder/suicide plot. Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah – who had been at the helm at the time – had been an extremely experienced pilot, having amassed more than 18,000 flight hours during his career. Shah had also worked for Malaysia Airlines since the early 1980s.

No unusual behavior

Still, there had apparently been nothing unusual about Shah’s conduct in the lead-up to the flight – casting the theory of pilot suicide into doubt. The actions of the first officer, Fariq Ab Hamid, and the plane’s cabin attendants were also all in line with normal practices, making it unlikely that any of the crew members were responsible for the aircraft’s disappearance.

Hijacking not likely

A potential hijacking was similarly put forward as an explanation for MH370 vanishing, yet no person or entity ever came forward to claim that they’d caused the aircraft to go missing. It also appeared implausible that hijackers would have directed the jet out over the Indian Ocean.

Abducted by aliens?

Others, meanwhile, have suggested that MH370 met its demise following a mechanical failure or a fire on board. And there have been even more bizarre theories put forward to explain the plane’s disappearance. Some of the particularly out-there opinions include the notion that the aircraft had been abducted by aliens; alternatively, it’s been posited that MH370 may have somehow flown into a black hole.

Remote crash site

While conspiracy theorists were busy putting their spin on MH370’s disappearance, however, the real search for answers was underway. And, unfortunately, the investigators’ efforts were made more difficult by the remote nature of the crash site in the Indian Ocean – 1,500 miles off the coast of Australia.

Glimmer of hope

Yet there was a glimmer of hope for search teams on April 6, 2014, when an Australian ship detected signals that could have emanated from MH370’s flight recorder. Promisingly, the position of the possible black box also matched the location of the last satellite signal received from the plane. As a result, the race was on to locate the recorder before its battery went flat. And the hunt for the signal would result in the discovery of extraordinary details about landscapes on the ocean floor, which were created millions of years ago.

A dead end

But when an unmanned submarine was deployed to seek out the MH370 black box, it could find no traces of the aircraft. Tests also determined that a malfunctioning cable in the Australian ship’s monitoring equipment could have been responsible for the signals that had been picked up. For months, then, the fate of MH370 remained a mystery.

Debris washes up

In fact, it wasn’t until July 29, 2015, that the first debris from MH370 was finally located. A piece from one of the aircraft’s wings had washed up on the shores of Réunion – a French island that lies more than 2,000 miles from the original search area in the Indian Ocean. Then, over the course of the following 18 months, more plane parts were found on beaches in Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, South Africa and Tanzania.

Definitely part of the plane

Of these 27 fragments of washed-up debris, three were definitively confirmed as belonging to MH370; a further 17 were deemed to have probably been part of the aircraft. And owing to the locations at which the parts were found, investigators were then able to limit the search to regions of the Indian Ocean – specifically, those areas from which it would be conceivable for wreckage to have washed up on the shores of Africa.

No more luck

Nonetheless, following investigation operations that spanned three years and in excess of 40,000 square miles, the search for MH370 was called off in January 2017. And although a U.S. firm named Ocean Infinity continued to look for the missing aircraft until May 2017, its investigations also proved inconclusive.

End of the search

In 2017 the MH370 Tripartite Joint Communiqué therefore released a statement announcing the end of the search for the missing plane. This message read, “Despite every effort using the best science available [and] cutting-edge technology as well as modeling and advice from highly skilled professionals who are the best in their field, unfortunately, the search has not been able to locate the aircraft. Accordingly, the underwater search for MH370 has been suspended.”

Discoveries continue

Still, the hunt for the missing aircraft hasn’t been completely fruitless. Indeed, while the investigation tragically failed to provide answers for the families with loved ones on board the doomed flight, it did provide some insight into what lurks beneath the Indian Ocean. And some of the discoveries made as a result have proved quite amazing.

Maps of the ocean

As part of the search for MH370, you see, a team of Australian investigators made a series of intricate maps of the bottom of the Indian Ocean. And while the detailed graphs didn’t lead to the successful discovery of the missing aircraft, they have allowed us to view the depths of the vast body of water.

Incredible landscapes

Yes, these maps were made public in July 2017 – six months after the official search for MH370 was called off. And they have revealed the breathtaking landscapes hidden beneath the waves in a remote region of the Indian Ocean – an area where the aircraft is believed to have vanished.

Unusual features

The Australian team’s search was conducted in two phases. Initially, the depths of the waters were measured in order to produce a comprehensive picture of the seabed, with researchers even able to use sonar technology to distinguish the varieties of sediment down there. During the process, the group also pinpointed unusual features below the surface that would need further investigation.

Sophisticated tech was used

The initial phase of the Australian search was then used to inform the second stage: a submarine search of the seafloor. For this, investigators used sophisticated sonar technology that was attached to underwater robots in order to create high-resolution maps of the subaquatic landscape.

Underwater geography

So, while the Australian team didn’t locate MH370, they did discover sunken vessels, ocean valleys and underwater mountains. And their detailed maps have documented the sub-aquatic world with extraordinary precision, making the data produced potentially invaluable in our future understanding of the depths of the Indian Ocean.

Mountains taller than Everest

Among the discoveries that investigators made were a vast volcano-lined rift valley; there were also sub-aquatic mountains that are taller than Mount Everest. And the resulting maps cover close to 50,000 square miles off the west coast of Australia, meaning the project is one of the most extensive investigations of its kind in human history.

Much more to map

Currently, the planet’s deepest oceans remain largely unmapped, with less than one-fifth of their waters having been charted in the manner done by teams looking for the missing MH370. Prior to those investigations taking place, our knowledge of the search area in the Indian Ocean was derived from satellite data, which could only provide low-resolution maps of the seafloor.

Why they’re special

The remote location of the MH370 search area also made the new maps special, as the area they document lies well over 1,000 miles from the Western Australian city of Perth. And as it can take close to a week for ships to travel to the remote region, charting the ocean there may have proved too labor-intensive an endeavor under less urgent circumstances.

Could help fishers

Furthermore, as the new maps of the Indian Ocean provide an in-depth look at a little-explored section of water, they may supply both scientists and fishermen with invaluable information about the area. The documents could also help researchers in studying tsunamis in the region, as undersea mountains help to absorb the destructive energy of these phenomena.

Trawlers will come

In 2017 Charitha Pattiaratchi, a coastal oceanography professor from the University of Western Australia, explained to Reuters why the maps may be useful to ocean trawlers. He said, “There are the locations of seamounts which will attract a lot of international deep-sea fishermen to the area.”

Investigating Broken Ridge

Among the locations explored in detail for the first time during the hunt for MH370 was Broken Ridge – a 750-mile-long oceanic plateau. This was created, it’s thought, when Australia broke away from Antarctica back in the Jurassic period. And at more than 40 million years old, the ocean floor at Broken Ridge is therefore considered to be the earliest of its kind to have formed within the boundaries of the MH370 search area.

Complex search

By contrast, the youngest seabed was found at the Diamantina Escarpment. This was deemed to have been created as the result of “seafloor spreading” – a consequence of shifts in tectonic plates. But these differences in the ocean floor weren’t just down to age, but also to topography. And this makes the MH370 search area highly complex.

Among the most mapped

Stuart Minchin is the chief of Geoscience Australia’s environmental division. And while commenting on the significance of the new data, he told the Daily Mail, “It is estimated that only ten to 15 percent of the world’s oceans have been surveyed with the kind of technology used in the search for MH370, making this remote part of the Indian Ocean among the most thoroughly mapped regions of the deep ocean on the planet.”

Hopeful the plane will be found

So while the fate of MH370 remains one of the greatest and most tragic aviation mysteries that the world has ever seen, the search for the aircraft did lead to some valuable discoveries. And investigations may yet continue in the future if new evidence arises. In 2017 the MH370 Tripartite Joint Communiqué suggested as much, saying, “We remain hopeful that new information will come to light and that at some point in the future the aircraft will be located.”