The baffling disappearance of Flight 370 and its 239 passengers is like something out of that old TV series, The Twilight Zone.
In some episodes of that series, people or objects would vanish into another dimension.
Flight 370 is just as perplexing, maddening and mysterious as anything in the realm of science fiction.
For weeks, questions – questions seemingly without answers – have abounded, leaving mostly nothing but guesses and wild speculations.
It was a massive in-flight mechanical failure.
The plane suddenly depressurized, causing everyone in it to lose consciousness as the plane kept flying on auto-pilot to its doom.
The plane was commandeered by terrorists.
One of the pilots was in a plot to hijack the plane.
Hijackers landed the plane on a remote air strip so it can be used as a weapon in a future attack somewhere.
No one, not even aviation experts, has any good answers. There is something very disturbing, sinister and downright spooky about the disappearance. And the final explanation, we must suspect, will not be a good outcome. It is sadly and tragically likely all people on that plane are dead. The suffering they must have endured is unimaginable.
If a catastrophic malfunction had downed that jet, there would be evidence by now, on land or sea, under its designated flight path from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. At this point, it’s almost certain something sinister occurred. But what? We may never know.
When the Titanic went down on its maiden voyage, the entire world was shocked because that ship was supposed to be “unsinkable.” Its sinking was a terrible reminder even the best and most up-to-date technology can, indeed, be catastrophically fallible. The Challenger shuttle disaster was another reminder of the limits of so-called “foolproof” technology, as was the explosion near re-entry of another space shuttle years later.
The disappearance of Flight 370 is a reminder, once again, of how just one or two terrorists, hijackers or extortionists – in other words, obsessive and vicious criminals – are more than willing to risk the lives of so many people or to purposely bring those people to their deaths. That conclusion, of course, depends on whether someone purposely caused the tragedy.
It’s such a depressing thought.
Flight 370, in any case, is a chilling reminder of just how dangerous this world can be and how fleeting and vulnerable is human life. It’s so ironic, in this wondrous Age of Marvels, we can be hounded and plagued by murderous zealots. All it takes is a few to wreak such destruction and death.
Probably the only lesson we can learn from such horror is to enjoy every minute of life, to stop worrying about petty things and to develop more love, respect and kindness for our fellow human beings.
