Missing Malaysia jet: The curious disappearance of the name 'Boeing' from news

Each time we read or hear of a car accident, the first thing that catches our attention is the brand name of the car, almost always with the model detail as well. Now think about all the news you have read about the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, and dwell on how many times you have come across the brand name ‘Boeing’. After all, the missing aircraft is a Boeing 777. Take a look at a few stories from earlier today. Check CNN’s article titled ‘ Australian leader cites ‘credible leads’ as Flight 370 search resumes’ and the first paragraph says,“With more planes searching than ever before, Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott on Sunday expressed optimism the mystery of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 will be solved.” In a 1700-word article, ‘Boeing’ has been mentioned twice. [caption id=“attachment_1446489” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  The missing aircraft is a Boeing, but that has somehow rarely been mentioned: AP[/caption] The Guardian’s ‘ Flight MH370: China sends ships to verify debris’ goes without mentioning the Boeing even once. The Telegraph’s Live Blog for today has mentioned the ‘B’ word only twice so far. Same for the March 22, 2014 live blog. However, there are more than a handful of articles validating the Boeing’s safety. The Guardian has a piece dated March 8, 2014, immediately after the flight disappeared on the same day, quoting aviation experts who are ‘ surprised at disappearance of ‘very safe’ Boeing 777’. Funnily enough, a news article on Yahoo! News UK has a glowing piece on the Boeing P-8A Poseidon, a hi-tech anti-submarine aircraft that is helping search operations of the MH370. However, not once has ‘Boeing’ been mentioned in connection to the disappearance of the Malaysian flight. What strikes one as odd is how ‘Boeing’ is so conspicuously low-key in this entire incident. Try this exercise – Type ‘Boeing’ in the search box on TheGuardian.com, and the ‘search results by relevance’ displays no news articles on the Flight MH370 disappearance! Try this too. Key in ‘Malaysia Airlines’ as a search term on Google and then ‘find’ ‘Boeing’ using Ctrl+F. You won’t find Boeing anywhere in the results. For the last time, search for ‘Boeing 777’ on Google and you see that CNN, BBC, The Telegraph and The Guardian conspicuously go missing from the results. What is abundantly clear is that Boeing’s PR team is making sure the company is as distant from the incident as possible. In what is perhaps the biggest aviation mystery of our time, Boeing’s exclusion from almost every news piece does not seem natural. Well, well. Boeing, Boeing, gone!