A man looks at messages of support left for family members and passengers onboard the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 at The Curve, Petaling Jaya March 18, 2014. — Picture by Yusof Mat Isa

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 26 — A US aviation safety expert has dismissed the latest conspiracy theory that the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 was hijacked from the plane’s electronics bay and flown to a Kazakhstan airfield.

John Goglia, a former board member of the US’ National Transportation Safety Board, wrote on Forbes that there was no way for the flight controls of a plane to be taken over from the electronics bay mid-flight as the system is designed to be disabled in flight.

“This conspiracy theory would be just one more ridiculous theory except for the possibility that it raises the false hope for the families of the victims of Flight 370 that the plane could have landed safely in a remote airfield,” Goglia wrote.

His article titled “Hijacking Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 from electronics bay? Not possible” was published on the US business website yesterday.

Pilot Jeff Wise wrote in New York magazine last Monday that hijackers had likely entered the Malaysia Airlines jet’s electronics bay, which can be accessed from the passenger cabin, and said they could have taken over flight controls and even changed the aircraft’s satellite transmissions.

He claimed that the plane carrying 239 people on board, which vanished en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur last March 8, flew north and was landed on an airstrip in Kazakhstan.

Goglia said in response that changing satellite transmission data could not be done simply by pulling circuit breakers in the electronics bay.

He said it would require sophisticated equipment and specialised tools that were unlikely to get through security unnoticed, as well as specialised technical knowledge, besides noting the time required to perform the task.

“There is no way that hijackers could be doing all this without the crew noticing abnormalities with their avionics and reporting them to air traffic control,” said Goglia.

Other conspiracy theories have sprung up recently in the weeks leading to the first anniversary of the disappearance of Flight MH370.

A National Geographic documentary, which will be aired on March 8, reportedly claims that the commercial plane may have been flown deliberately off-course towards the Antarctica.

A new book titled Someone Is Hiding Something: What Happened to Malaysia Airlines Flight 370? by George Noory, Richard Belzer and David Wayne claims that Flight MH370 was cyberjacked.

Flight MH370 had seemingly disappeared without a trace, with a massive international search focused in the southern Indian Ocean off Australia yet to recover any wreckage or bodies.