The missing Malaysia Airlines flight has had us all hooked for weeks. You’ve probably spent hours pouring over the internet for more details, clicked on any aircraft-related link on your Facebook feed and have discussed theories over beers in the pub. Let’s be honest, we all love a mystery.
But it’s not the first plane to go missing in suspicious circumstances. In fact, far from it. OK, so in the past 50 years we’ve got way better at locating wreckages (we’re guessing due to technological advances), so it’s not every day we wake up to huge jumbo jets full of holiday makers disappearing.
But since planes first took to the skies in 1903, there have been a handful that have rivalled MH370 in the weird stakes….
1. Flying Tiger Line Flight 739
The chartered military flight from California to Vietnam in 1962 was carrying 107 passengers, including 93 U.S. soldiers when it disappeared.
After refuelling at Guam (a teeny tiny island in the western Pacific Ocean) the flight headed towards the Philippines before disappearing totally from radar without any distress calls to radio operators, prompting investigators to suspect the aircraft had exploded in flight. No wreckage was ever found, despite 200,000 square miles being searched over eight days.
The really weird part? Another military plane, carrying secret cargo rather than soldiers, also departed from the same Californian airport at a similar time to flight 739. It too crashed. Eerie, right?
2. Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 2501
It’s the evening of June 23 1950 and flight 2501 has set out from New York to Seattle with 55 passengers and three crew members. Its last known location was 3,500 feet over Lake Michigan when it suddenly disappeared from radar, only moments after requesting clearance to drop to 2,500 feet.
Despite the lake being dredged and search teams investigating, no wreckage was ever located. Although in 2008, a researcher believed that she had found an unmarked grave containing the bodies of the victims, that had been buried by locals without the authorities or families’ knowledge after they had washed up on shore… spooky.
3. Glenn Miller’s plane
In case you didn’t know (we didn’t) Glenn Miller was a big name in the Forties. He was a big band musician from the swing era and was travelling to entertain U.S. troops in France during WW2 when the plane he was travelling on went missing over the English Channel.
There’s several theories about what happened to him, including that his plane was accidentally bombed by friendly fire when military planes flying back from Germany offloaded their remaining artillery into a designated space that then clashed with Miller’s flight route.
Although, we much prefer the theory that he did make it to France but his death was covered up the next day after he suffered a heart attack during a liaison with a prostitute.
4. Frederick Valentich and his plane
The 20-year-old Australian UFO enthusiast was taking a routine 150-mile training flight in a light aircraft when he mentioned to radio controllers that there was another plane following him.
Seconds later he declared ‘it’s not an aircraft’ and his transmission was interrupted by scraping, metallic noises.
He was never seen again (this was in 1978, BTW). Officials speculated that Valentich had become disorientated and had seen his own reflection in water, seeing as there was no known air traffic near him, but fellow UFO fans believe he was abducted. Others believed he staged his own disappearance. Good.
5. Atlantic C-124 disappearance
In 1951 a military flight, from New Mexico to Suffolk, England, had to stage an emergency landing in the sea following an in-flight fire. Despite the landing going well and a successful evacuation taking place, when rescuers arrived on scene there was no sign of any of the 53 passengers of the aircraft.
The rafts and flares had, however, been spotted earlier when another plane had flown over the area. So where had they gone? Some speculate that Soviet submarines operating in the area at the time (about 500 miles west of Shannon, Ireland) snatched them. Ooh.
6. Canadian Pacific Air Lines Douglas DC-4
A routine flight from Vancouver, Canada to Japan in 151 turned sour when it failed to turn up to its scheduled stopover in Anchorage, Alaska.
Visibility at the time of the flight was 500m, with heavy rain and ice reported.
The aircraft and its 37 passengers were declared missing but no wreckage has even been found. In fact, there’s not even a recorded probably cause. No one has any idea what happened. Kind of tempting to go out and explore Alaska for it, isn’t it? Or is that just us?
7. BSAA Star Ariel
The pilot of the BSAA Star Ariel, flying from Bermuda to Kingston, Jamaica, reported that he had ‘excellent visibility’ as he flew the 13 passengers over the Atlantic Ocean in 1951.
His last check-in with air traffic controllers was to let them know he was descending to a lower flying level, but at no point showed any sign of distress.
In the search that ensued, no debris, oil slicks or wreckage were found. The fact that there was no May Day call, bad weather or plane defects caused many to believe that it had been lost to the legendary Bermuda Triangle.
