As the search for the vanished Flight MH370 continues, the likely outcome becomes grimmer and grimmer with each passing minute. Already the surviving family members of those on board have been told to prepare for the worst.

Even though it remains uncertain exactly what went wrong or even where the plane may have crashed, investigators are already considering various scenarios.

According to military radar, the Boeing 777 may have turned back around prior to disappearing from the radar. Despite the revelation, Vietnamese Air force chief Rodzali Daud says that they cannot say for certain what direction the plane may have been headed in its last few minutes.

Daud said in a press conference, “We are trying to make sense of this.The military radar indicated that the aircraft may have made a turn back and in some parts, this was corroborated by civilian radar.”

It is standard procedure for pilots to inform traffic control officials if they intend to do a U-turn said Malaysia Airlines Chief Executive Ahmad Jauhari Yahya.

This had not been done. There was also no distress signal or indication of any kind that the plane may have been in trouble, which officials find especially odd given the circumstances.

The bizarre nature of the airplane’s last few documented minutes and its sudden disappearance both suggest to authorities that something of a criminal nature may have occurred.

Officials revealed on Saturday that at least two passengers whose names were listed on the flight’s manifest were not their own. The identities used by two individuals matched the names on two passports that were reported stolen in Thailand.

Malaysian Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said that authorities were looking into the identities of four suspicious passengers and that the relevant information had been passed on to intelligence agencies in the international community. The FBI is also said to be looking into the matter.

The sudden vanishing of the plane is said by experts to be consistent with a possible explosion.

Was the plane’s disappearance due to an attempted hijacking gone wrong or act of terrorism? Each new clue seems suggest something nefarious to be at the root of the disappearance of Flight MH370.

I'm hoping that #MH370 is hijacked. At least there's hope that the passengers are still alive rather than crash into the ocean #prayforMH370

— Said (@SaidOsem) March 9, 2014

The #MH370 case seems mysterious. On the other hand, it took nearly 2 years to locate Air France 447 plane after it had crashed. God bless!

— Jojo Wittaya (@jowittaya) March 9, 2014

Image via Wikimedia Commons