The Twin Tragedies of Malaysia Airlines

A deeper look at Flights MH370 and MH17

On 8 March 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 (MH370) completely disappeared. This international passenger flight was flying from Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia to Beijing International Airport in China. It is assumed that the 227 passengers and 12 crew members on board all died.

According to the Aviation Safety Network, the fatal accident rate for airlines is approximately one in 3,000,000. Most airlines will never experience a crash that kills everybody on board.

Malaysia airlines, a company which was in severe financial trouble in 2014, has a fleet of 81 planes which means if each one flies every single day, the airline will make approximately 30,000 flights per year. Therefore, statistically, it may encounter an unfortunate tragedy every 100 years.

So, it is highly unusual that the next fatal crash came less than 6 months later, after 131 days.

This second Malaysia Airlines plane was another Boeing 777, travelling from Amsterdam Airport Schiphol in the Netherlands to Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia. This time, the plane didn’t just vanish, it was blown up over Eastern Ukraine. Sadly, all 282 passengers and 15 crew members were killed.

How rare are deaths on Boeing 777s? Since its maiden flight in 1994, there have been 8 ‘hull loss’ aircraft incidents. Five of these were in-flight whilst three were on the ground. In total, 541 people have lost their lives in Boeing 777 incidents - 536 of them were on the two Malaysia Airlines flights above - and all within 131 days.

What happened to these two flights, were there any people of interest on board and could there be a connection?