The credible clues from horrific plane crashes in history that could help explain what happened to MH370
The air-crash death of a world famous golfer and at least two other major 'Ghost Flight' accidents are being studied by authorities in Malaysia as they probe the reasons for the plight of flight MH370.
Three crashes in the past 15 years have been attributed to the pilots passing out from hypoxia - lack of oxygen - resulting in their aircraft flying on for hours until they ran out of fuel and crashed.
A vital piece of information that came to light in the days after the Malaysian Airlines jet disappeared, and which subsequently became overlooked, is now being re-examined because it could be the answer to what happened on the Boeing 777 jet.
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What happened? Authorities and aviation experts are still trying to unravel the mystery of Malaysian Airlines flight MH370's disappearance on March 8
A pilot on a similar aircraft flying 30 minutes ahead of the MH370 claims to have made contact with the doomed aircraft to ascertain its position just after 1.30am - but the voice at the other end, believed to be that of co-pilot Fariq Abdul Hamid, was just a mumble and there was a lot of static interference.
The 'mumble' could be the vital clue - for hypoxia starves the brain of its cognitive faculties and the victim becomes like someone heavily intoxicated, unable to think or speak properly, before passing out.
At least one other aircraft - in Australia - has crashed after the pilot's speech was impaired in a contact with air traffic control and he was unable to respond to instructions.
The timing of the mumbled contact from MH370 fits in with the final coherent words spoken by Fariq - 'All right - Good night' - at 1.19am on March 3 as MH370 passed over Malaysia's north east coast and headed out over the Gulf of Thailand.
What caused a loss of oxygen in the aircraft is open to a number of theories, including a slow leaking of air pressure which the pilots weren't aware of until it was too late for them to consciously reach for their oxygen masks.
One theory believed to be under investigation is whether one of the pilots had desperately tried to turn the aircraft back to the nearest airport - Penang, on the west coast - resulting in the sharp 'U-turn' but had passed out after making that manoeuvre and the jet had continued on westwards either on autopilot or with that system switched off.
Stupified fumbling with the controls might have resulted in systems being shut down.
Golf legend Payne Stewart was one of four people killed in a 1999 plane crash that resulted from low-oxygen incapacitation
In October 1999 top-ranked golfer Payne Stewart, three other passengers and the pilots of a chartered Learjet 35, were killed when all on board were incapacitated due to lack of oxygen as it flew across the United States.
The jet flew on over the southern and mid-west for almost four hours and 1,500 miles - the same distance from Australia, by coincidence, that possible debris from MH370 has been spotted in the Indian Ocean - before it ran out of fuel and crashed in a field in South Dakota.
In September 2000 a chartered Beechcraft 200 Super King Air plane set out from Perth, Western Australia, for a mining town in the same State, but later air traffic control was unable to make any sense of the pilot's words and he seemed unable to respond to instructions.
In September 2000 a chartered Beechcraft 200 Super King Air plane set out from Perth, Western Australia. Pilots passed out and it crashed in the desert
Three other aircraft failed to make radio contact with the pilot and the Beechcraft flew on for five hours before running out of fuel and crashing in the desert, resulting in Australian media referring to it as the Ghost Flight.
In 2005 a Greek airliner - a Helios Airways Boeing 737 - crashed into a mountain near Athens, killing all 121 on board after investigators concluded that the jet had lost cabin pressure and it became too late for the pilots to reach for their oxygen masks before they became unconscious.
Disaster: This Greek airliner crashed into a mountain near Athens in 2005, killing everyone on board
The Helios Airways Boeing 737 killed all 121 people on board
In that case, it was found that one of the cabin attendants had come around enough to try to save the aircraft and had struggled with the controls - in vain.
Could such a scenario have occurred on flight MH370? It is a question which might take years to answer, if at all.
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