AJIRA 316

The island hosted a second significant plane crash, Flight 316.

Flight 316 was piloted by Frank Lapidus, who based upon his background and mental state after Flight 815 crashed, would not have resumed being a commercial pilot. He was one of the few people to escape the island after being rescued by Penny's boat.

Flight 316 was a Boeing 737 from LA to Guam. Eloise Hawking told the O6 that this flight was their only way to return to the island. The plane crash landed on the Hydra Island in 2007, but not before Jack, Kate, Hurley and Sayid were teleported by a white light to the Island in 1977. Now, the four that went to 1977 were all contacted by Locke off-island in his quest to get everyone to go back to the island. The other person on board who had contact with Locke off-island was Ben, who did not time flash to 1977 (possibly because his child self was on the island at that time). Ben wound up facing the ghost of Locke (MIB as Flocke) with the survivors of the Ajira flight.

Fourteen days after this crash, Frank miraculously pilots the damaged plane off the island. Kate, Claire, Alpert, Sawyer and Miles were on board. We do not know what happened to them after take off, or whether they actually made it to land.

The significance of the number, 316, was not lost on fans.

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." John 3:16, which some scholars call "the Bible in a nutshell."

The theme of eternal life is central to many unified theories of LOST.

Who was the son?
Who were the believers?
How were the 815ers granted eternal life?

None of the characters expressed any devotion to Christianity. Clearly, none of them practiced devout religious beliefs while on the island.

The fact that the Ajira plane went through some sort of island barrier is a key. This barrier had to have some intelligence as it separated four passengers from the rest of the people on board. However, three people previously on the island, Sun, Frank and Ben were not transported to 1977. No one knows why (except for the writer's attempt to jack up the drama of Sun still being cut off from Jin.) The rest of the Ajira passengers would find their own demise as red shirts.

Besides returning the O6 to the island, what was the purpose of the plane? It was the last means of escape for a few lucky people. It some ways it was a dream vindication for Frank (and his pilot skills). And a vessel for Flocke to round up the remaining candidates so he could blow them up (the submarine became the best means of accomplishing that task).

There is still no clear explanation of why there was a time duality on the island when Ajira passed through one spacial location. Unless the island itself was not real in the conventional planetary sense of being a Pacific island mass. A distortion in the time axis would also suggest a distortion in the spacial axis in the space time continuum. The island was in another dimension. How it intersects with the Earth is still unclear, but if it was a spiritual world (as the whispers claimed), then it is like an onion skin that surrounds the planet with limited jumps between the worlds of the living and the worlds of the dead. 

So what did this flight represent? It was symbolic of the grief that the O6 had from leaving their fellow passengers behind on the island. It was the means to return. It was also a carrier of death, as the other passengers were killed on the Hydra island. It also was the means of escape, as it took off from the Hydra Island with several people on board.  Was their fate merely delayed? Or did they actually cheat death?

Many may believe that Ajira 316 was just another prop to build tension and drama in the last desperate hours of the show. That may be its only purpose. But one would hope for more.