The mysterious disappearance of Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 has shocked the world and caused untold distress to the families of the 239 people on board.
Till the wreckage of the aircraft is not found, there is no closure for family members and investigators. The slim hope lingers that if the aircraft was hijacked, it might have landed on an airstrip. There is then a remote chance that their family members are alive and might be reunited with them. But as the days pass and there is no trace of the aircraft and no communication from hijackers, if indeed it was hijacked, hopes keep receding.
For eight days, the families have gone through a traumatic wait and no end seems to be in sight. 24-hour news channels are beaming endlessly speculative reports, which are hard to ignore. The plane is at the bottom of the Indian Ocean, no it is on the China-Kazak border, it landed in the jungles of Burma, it fell into the South China Sea, Iranian hijackers, Uyghur terrorists, suicidal pilots: endless speculation because accurate information is coming in a trickle.
Despite criticism, Malaysian authorities have stuck to their decision of following rules of crisis management: stick to facts.
But for families, the process of waiting for information is extremely difficult to cope with. There were several false leads like the one of cell phones ringing of the people on board which was later explained as phantom ring-tones by cell phone operators. Some found instant messaging accounts active.
Kenneth Doka, a professor of counseling at the College of New Rochelle in New York, said on ABC News that families desperate for information "want a story that makes sense." Unfortunately nothing is making sense and every new bit of information seems incredible.
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said on Saturday that the Malaysian Airline aircraft had its communications deliberately disabled and its last signal came about seven and a half hours after takeoff, meaning it could have ended up as far as Kazakhstan or deep in the southern Indian Ocean. There are 13 countries involved in the search and rescue operation (SAR), making coordination a nightmare.
Family members who are desperate for information are caught in this web of national sensitivities regarding overlapping of investigations.
Chinese investigators have lost patience with Malaysian authorities several times during the course of the SAR operations for not sharing information. At Beijing airport where MH370 was supposed to land, one relative of a passenger threw a water bottle at a Malaysian Airline executive.
Families are frustrated over the lack of information from the airline and Malaysian authorities. But they have no choice other than to wait and be at the mercy of the transparency of the investigation and the accountability of the airline.
Add to that the endless speculation on social media, the tasteless jokes, unverified 'sightings', doctored Youtube videos that cause panic and anxiety among concerned relatives. It is a horrific situation that shows little signs of ending. The past eight days have been a tumultuous period of grief and hope.
Psychologists warn that it takes a long time for families to heal from accidents like air crashes. Some cancel travel plans for months on end, some feel claustrophobia on entering aircraft even though it has been proven that air travel is one of the safest modes of transport.
Chance of a fatal accident after boarding an aircraft is one in several million. In comparison, there is one death every five minutes on Indian roads and yet we travel by road almost every day.
Fear is something that is difficult to explain, difficult to rationalise and hard to overcome. Thousands of Americans did not travel by air for a long time after the 9/11 terror strikes.
Many said that even boarding an aircraft would make them feel trapped and they had to take anti-anxiety medication to calm their nerves during the flight. I have not been able to summon up courage to fly to Mangalore, my home town, ever since Air India Express Flight 812 crashed in 2010 killing 158 on board. The aircraft overran the airstrip and fell off the hill, "breaking into two", said a survivor.
In some air crashes, when the bodies of their loved ones were not found, families don't give up hope. Ever.
