China plane crash: Unexplained 30 seconds of MU5735

Data from the last 150 seconds recorded from of the MU5735 flight has stumped experts, who can’t explain why the plane seemingly dropped out of the sky.

Granular flight data from the tragic China Eastern airlines MU5735 flight has broken down the passenger jet’s turbulent 150 final seconds.

Flying over Wuzhou in China’s south, the incident occured at around 2.20pm, under an hour before theplane was slated to arrive in Guangzhou at 3.05pm, local time.

Analysing the plane’s flight path monitoring, FlightRadar24 has compiled data from MU5735’s computers and shows the aircraft’s sensors at the time of the report. After stabilising during what is known as the stable auto-pilot portion of the flight, the flight path monitoring drops abruptly, before the vertical rate increases again, before dramaticall dropping for the second time.

The plane was travelling on autipilot before it began abruptly falling. Picture: FlightRadar24.

This correlates with the plane’s reported altitude in which the plane dropped from an height of 29,100ft (8869m) to 9075ft (2766m) in two minutes and 15 seconds. The plane briefly stabilised for 10 to 20 seconds, before it dropped again.

No more data was recorded from 2.22pm onwards, when the plane was recorded to be travelling at an altitude of 3225ft (982m).

Analysing this data, the plane’s stark drop and brief correction has stumped experts.

Speaking to 9News, NSW-based aviation expert Neil Hansford struggled to explain the how the act occured.

“It is unlikely, unless it was absolutely catastrophic like the wings falling off, for it to have fallen from the sky in the way that it did,” he said.

“This has gone straight down. It’s likely when you go through the causes it has been hit in flight with military ordinance or there’s been a pilot intervention or a collision.

One item that could solve mystery plane crash

Experts believe one key item could solve the mystery behind why the China Eastern airlines Boeing 737 jet crashed.

Boeing 777 pilot and aviation blogger Juan Browne believes the condition of the MU5735’s elevator trim jackscrew will help investigators understand why the plane was locked into a near-vertical nosedive.

Mr Browne claimed even if a plane was flying into a nosedive, the aircraft’s wings should lift it out of the downwards position as the plane gathered more speed. In this case, flight data from FlightRadar24 shows the plane plummeted in altitude, crashing from 29,100ft (8869m) to 3225ft (982m) in under three minutes.

“There’s really only one thing that can get the aircraft in that vertical of a descent and keep it there, and that is the elevator or the stabiliser trim,” he told the South China Morning Post.

The Boeing pilot believes the plane’s elevator trim jackscrew could explain why the place plummeted with such speed. Picture: Wikipedia.

However, Mr Browne says the “trim” setting of the aircraft’s elevator may have been locked into a specific position which kept it in a nosedive position.

“If you can find where the nut on the jackscrew was located, you can get an idea of what the trim state of the aircraft was on impact,” he added.

The recovery of the plane’s black box, which holds the aircraft’s pilot activity, cockpit recordings and flight information, may also reveal more clues as to what caused the plane’s demise.

Horror three minutes before plane crash

Flight data belonging to MU5735 have detailed the terrifying three minutes the passenger plane plummeted from the sky.

During this time, an aviation expert claims the pilots would have been powerless to rescue the plane, as the huge drop in altitude would have rendered the passengers and crew unconscious.

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Flight commentator Sally Gethin said that while the gravitation force from the 6000m plunge would have knocked the pilots out, flight data may have shown the “10 to 20-second spell where one or more of the pilots regained consciousness and tried to save the plane,” she told The Sun.

Although Ms Gethin said it was “too soon to speculate,” the fact that China Eastern Airlines had grounded their Boeing 737 fleet, could be a sign of more safety issues with the plane.

“The 737-800 has a particularly good safety record,” she said. “There are thousands of them operating around the world, about 1,000 in China alone.

“But the fact that China Eastern Airlines is grounding all of those planes from the fleet as a precaution suggests they’re concerned about the safety of that aircraft.”

The crash caused a fire on the mountains, and the jet involved in the accident was a Boeing 737 aircraft. Picture Twitter

Crash should ‘not have happened’

The initial assessments of the tragic crash appears to have left experts baffled.

This is due to the fact the Boeing 737 was in the cruise phase of the flight, when accidents are least likely to occur.

Speaking to The Sun, Chinese aviation expert Li Xiaojin said the incident should “not have happened” from a “technical point of view“.

“Usually the plane is on autopilot during cruise stage. So it is very hard to fathom what happened,” he said.

China Eastern Airlines flight MU5735 a Boeing 737-800 en route from Kunming to Guangzhou, China has crashed.

Another aviation expert Arthur Rowe ruled out the likelihood of an engine malfunction as well.

“It’s unlikely to be engine related as aircraft can fly perfectly well with no engine power – for a limited time,” Mr Rowe said.

“It looks most likely a loss of control event, possibly following a high altitude stall of the aircraft.

“There are multiple possible causes. Jammed or unresponsive control surfaces, especially on the tail are one.

“An inappropriate combination of autopilot settings is another.”

While he didn’t rule out the likelihood of “sabotage,” although concluded it was “probably unlikely”.

The director of aviation consultancy firm Cirium also called the Boeing 737 jet one of the safest planes ever made and struggled to explain how the incident happened. While rescuers are currently accessing the area, no survivors have been reported

“The 737 NG has been in operation for 25 years and has an excellent safety record,” he told Bloomberg.

“I’m not going to speculate on what happened but if the FlightRadar24 logs are accurate, something seems to have happened abruptly and the plane nose dived from cruising altitude.”

Horror video of Boeing 737 crashing in China

State broadcaster China Central Television reported that the plane crashed in Teng county near Wuzhou.

The report added that rescue teams were dispatched to the scene. One villager told a local news site that the plane involved in the crash had “completely fallen apart” and he had seen nearby forest areas destroyed by a fire caused when the plane crashed onto the mountainside.

Fears for the fate of the jet spread on Monday afternoon as local media reported that it had not arrived as planned in Guangzhou after taking off from Kunming shortly after 1pm (4pm AEDT).

It had been due to land at 3.05pm.

The flight from Kunming city to the southern hub of Guangzhou, 130km north west of Hong Kong, “lost airborne contact over Wuzhou” city in the Guangxi region, the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) said in a statement.

Airlines in China generally have good safety records.

Shocking footage emerging from the site of the crash of flight MU5735 shows fire ripping through a forest on a mountain — sending plumes of smoke into the air — and fragments of the aircraft scattered all around.

Shocking footage shows the plane crashing from the sky.

NASA’s satellite data showed a huge fire in the same area where the plane down went down at the time of the crash.

A villager surnamed Liu told state-run China News Service that he had driven a motorbike to the scene after hearing a loud explosion.

He said he saw debris on the ground, including an aircraft wing and fragments of clothing hanging from trees.

China Eastern grounds fleet

In a statement early on Tuesday, China Eastern confirmed the tragedy.

“The cause of the plane crash is under investigation and the company will co-operate with the relevant investigations.”

There was no word on the number of casualties, any survivors or a possible cause.

It has been reported that China Eastern will ground all 102 of its 737-800 models. These normally fly short haul domestic and international routes.

India has said all 737s in the fleets of its airlines must now be placed under “enhanced surveillance’ following the Chinese disaster.

737-800 in Australian airline fleets

The aircraft, a Boeing 737-800, was delivered to China Eastern direct from Boeing in June 2015 and had been flying for over six years.

The 737-800 is a popular variant of the 737, one of the world’s most widely selling jets. Both Qantas and Virgin Australia have the 800s in their fleets.

The 737-800 is not a 737 Max variant which has been involved in two fatal crashes and was taken out of service for almost two years.

China had enjoyed an enviable air safety record in recent years in a country crisscrossed by newly built airports and serviced by new airlines established to match the country’s breakneck growth over the last few decades.

A Hainan Airlines flight crashed in northeastern Heilongjiang province in 2010, killing at least 42 out of 92 people on board although the final toll was never confirmed.

It was the last Chinese commercial passenger flight crash that caused civilian casualties. The deadliest Chinese commercial flight crash was a China Northwest Airlines crash in 1994 which killed all 160 on-board.

Most of the passengers on-board the Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, which disappeared in March 2014 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, were from China.

A China Eastern 737.

Footage shows a large mountain fire at the site of the crash. Picture: Twitter/@nexta_tv

BREAKING: Reported footage of China's #MU5735 plane crash https://t.co/Lishlp3ejLpic.twitter.com/0UdTZdcYxe

— Insider Paper (@TheInsiderPaper) March 21, 2022

There was no immediate response from China Eastern when contacted by AFP. The airline had changed its website to black and white colours on Monday afternoon.

Serious questions asked about Boeing

The crash comes amid falling trust in Boeing after two crashes involving the planes in recent years.

The iconic company, created in 1916, introduced the commercial jet that made flying affordable for most people and for many years was the most popular supplier of aircraft to airlines around the world.

Most of us who have flown have been on a Boeing plane. At any minute there are around 10,000 Boeing planes in service in more than 150 countries around the globe.

But that trust was shaken when two planes fell out of the sky killing hundreds, within months of each other — Lion Air Flight 610 which crashed in Indonesia in 2018, killing 189 people, and Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 which claimed 157 lives when it crashed in Ethiopia.

A Virgin Australia Boeing 737 commercial passenger jet plane flies out of the Cairns Airport. Picture: Brendan Radke

What was extremely shocking was they were both brand new planes, the 737 Max.

Jon Ostrower, editor in chief of aviation publication The Air Current said: “Two crashes of brand new aeroplanes within five months of each other, that doesn’t happen in modern aviation.”

When the Lion Air plane was downed, initially there was a lot of finger-pointing and the heat was turned on the pilots. Nobody could believe the brand new plane could be the problem.

Xi calls for probe

President Xi Jinping said he was “shocked” by the crash on Monday and ordered an immediate investigation into its cause.

President Xi called for “all efforts” towards the rescue and to find out the “cause of the accident as soon as possible”, according to state broadcaster CCTV.

“We are shocked to learn of the China Eastern MU5735 accident,” he said.