maybe i should have explained some of the reasons why i like the robbery-and-parachute/d.b. cooper scenario for flight 370 (still do). well they turned the plane intentionally, and i think they cut communications right at the intersection between malaysian and vietnamese airspace. maybe the pilot was simulating extremely precise routing back over the peninsula in order to make a jump, though obviously such a thing can't be non-life-threatening. surely if it was terrorism we'd have heard something from a perpetrating group or even a posthumous message from the terrorist: if that's the point, you want people to know who did it. a hijacking is a super-theatrical event; this wan't that. so we're down to mechanical failure and this robbery notion, and i think the latter does better with the bizarre flight plan, weird communication darkness, etc. admittedly they all seem unlikely. so then i'd wonder if there was some valuable item that was regularly transported on this flight, so that the pilot might know it in advance, or suspect that the thing was sponsored by someone who knew well in advance that this item would be on board. right so why am i writing this? dunno really.