Missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 disappeared without a trace because it nosedived at a perfect 90-degree angle into the Indian Ocean and stayed intact, according to a maths professor.
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The latest theory on the ill-fated flight, which vanished in March 2014, has been put forward by Goong Chen and his team of mathematicians from the Texas A&M University in Qatar.
The mathematicians ran a series of computer simulations, which Dr Chen says show that the Boeing 777 plunged into the Indian Ocean at a 90-degree angle.
According to Dr Chen, this explains why no debris or oil slick has ever been found.
"The true final moments of MH370 are likely to remain a mystery until someday when its black box is finally recovered and decoded," Dr Chen said.
"But forensics strongly supports that MH370 plunged into the ocean in a nosedive."
According to Dr Chen's fluid dynamics simulations, a "vertical water entry" would have caused the least resistance to the plane.
He said the wings of the plane would have broken off almost immediately, while the rest of the fuselage remained intact. Dr Chen said the wings, along with other heavy debris, would have sunk to the bottom of the ocean, leaving little or no trace behind. It may be on the ocean floor, belly-up.
His research was first published in the April 2015 issue of Notices of the American Mathematical Society.
Meanwhile, the Australian government is allegedly preparing to call off the search for the plane, according to Emirates president Sir Tim Clark.
Sir Tim, who has likened the effort to a "goose chase", told Fairfax Media funding for the search would be exhausted later this year.
He said the disappearance would thereafter go into the annals of the history of aviation.
"I think it is only a question of time before the search is abandoned," he said on the sidelines of the International Air Transport Association annual meeting in Miami on Tuesday.
"Do we have solutions? Do we have explanations? Cause? Reasons? No. It has sent us down a goose chase. It will be an Amelia Earhart repetition."
Earhart was the first female aviator to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean in the late 1920s. A few months later, after another attempt, she disappeared.
At the request of the Malaysian government, Australia has taken responsibility for the search, with the Australian Transport Safety Bureau leading the mission.
The search for the aircraft, thought to be in the Southern Ocean off the coast of Western Australia, is ongoing but has been hampered by bad weather.
In the latest operational update on June 3, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau said all three search vessels in the area were forced to temporary halt the effort on May 30 as a result of poor weather.
In April, the search area was doubled to 120,000 square kilometres, but the Australian, Malaysian and Chinese governments have agreed that in the absence of further information that leads to the identification of the aircraft, there will be no further expansion of the search area.
MH370 disappeared on 8 March 2014 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 passengers and crew on board.
Six Australians, including Brisbane couple Rod and Mary Burrows and their friends Robert and Catherine Lawton, and Sydney couple Gu Naijun and Li Yuan were on board.
Perth-based New Zealand man Paul Weeks was also on the flight.
- with Jamie Freed
