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missing plane
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It looks like it's gone down in the South China Sea. Not good news if true. 
http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-26492748
http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-26492748
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Allegedly two passengers with stolen passports, according to Sky News
A lot of people have instantly zeroed in on that as possible indication of terrorist activity, but it's worth remembering that probably every major international airport will have several instances of false/tampered/stolen document use a week, that said of course it does increase the likelihood unfortunately
My thoughts go to the family's and friends of all those lost as the reality is that the plane has been lost and more than likely all souls on board, the key will be learning why
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Allegedly two passengers with stolen passports, according to Sky News
Bit of a red herring that -Two passengers, a Italian & Australian, were not on the plane because there passports had been stolen
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Austrian not Australian I believe, and as I read it, there were people on the plane in their name, the passports were stolen in 2012 and 2013 we are not talking about people not being on board because they were not able to present their passports, we are talking about people being on board using the stolen passports
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Yes - that's what's currently being reported by Sky News : http://news.sky.com/story/1222674/malaysia-airlines-plane-crashes-near-vietnam
As you said though, it is what it is and not something to read any more into at this stage.
Partly because of the reasons you stated and more telling for me, because of the fact that nobody has come forward to claim responsibility for it if it was an act of terrorism.
While I'd love to be able to hold out hope for a positive outcome, I can't see how that's possible now.
I just hope that they can find a definitive answer soon to give some measure of closure to friends and family still waiting for news.
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Perhaps not a 'normal' terrorism connection ... Thailand/Malaysia/China?
However there are so many people with grudges and 'causes' today, who can say?
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Just re-read the BBC report from earlier and the way it was written led me to misinterpret it
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To be honest I have no idea about the BBC report as I heard about it elsewhere but knowing the quality of BBC reporting I can well believe how that could happen
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The lack of a claim isn't evidence of it not being terrorism. I can think of a fair number where no one has claimed anything.
What's more telling though is the fact that it just disappeared. No radio call, no change of squawk, nothing. That indicates massive disruption of the aircraft, far beyond it's design. There's only 2 causes for that, one's what you don't think it is, the other is design fault. The latter is unlikely as nothing like that has happened to a 777 before. That leaves..............
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Before you speculate too far done that route, the air France flight that deep stalled into the Atlantic a few years ago never issued a mayday. The pilots certainly had time in that case
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If I remember correctly however those were automated rather than sent my the actual pilots
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So if (note the if) that info exists it won't be public yet. The point being no point speculating
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Everyone in the world who ever travels by air, (well maybe not you), will be speculating, whilst eagerly awaiting the final investigation results.
Sorry but I just don't get this idea that nobody should discuss the possibilities in events such as this
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Hugh
What Gramps has said pretty much answers your point.
The system monitoring gizmo 'talks' to the airline, it also talks, depending on contract Engine makers. In AF's case, they continued to do so, albeit, sending what was initially thought was gibberish faults. But later proved to be part of the issue.
Secondly, the weather conditions were one of the route causes of the issue that made the 2 pilots who were not hugely experienced on the AF flight, take the wrong action. In this case conditions were as good as they get, and the crew were very experienced. Lastly, it's not an airbus, so the controls are not routed through a computer that second guesses the crew. The same issue is therefore while not impossible, unlikely.
So what's left? 2 people with fake passports, which is a bit odd. While there is no central database of every nicked passport in the world, I'd say from some experience in this sort of thing, possible for one person with a faked passport on board, but 2?
In any case, what right minded person would want to get into China so much they faked a passport?
So in summary, while I wouldn't discount failure, it really isn't likely. Which as I said only leaves one thing.
What Gramps has said pretty much answers your point.
The system monitoring gizmo 'talks' to the airline, it also talks, depending on contract Engine makers. In AF's case, they continued to do so, albeit, sending what was initially thought was gibberish faults. But later proved to be part of the issue.
Secondly, the weather conditions were one of the route causes of the issue that made the 2 pilots who were not hugely experienced on the AF flight, take the wrong action. In this case conditions were as good as they get, and the crew were very experienced. Lastly, it's not an airbus, so the controls are not routed through a computer that second guesses the crew. The same issue is therefore while not impossible, unlikely.
So what's left? 2 people with fake passports, which is a bit odd. While there is no central database of every nicked passport in the world, I'd say from some experience in this sort of thing, possible for one person with a faked passport on board, but 2?
In any case, what right minded person would want to get into China so much they faked a passport?
So in summary, while I wouldn't discount failure, it really isn't likely. Which as I said only leaves one thing.
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Everyone in the world who ever travels by air, (well maybe not you), will be speculating, whilst eagerly awaiting the final investigation results.
Sorry but I just don't get this idea that nobody should discuss the possibilities in events such as this
Why the need for the personal comment gramps?
Maybe cause you'll get nowhere and achieve nothing
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Sorry I don't get the "personal comment" bit ... you have indicated that you aren't interested in speculating ... is that "personal" or commenting on your stated position on the matter?
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There was no mayday from that flight. Which was my answer to your comment.
You can't possibly know if an automated squawk was sent or not. Nor can I. Neither do you or I know details of weather, crew experience (except the captain) etc. Failures can be caused by any number of things from poor maintenance to a rarely seen failure.
I've no idea why they travelled on nicked documents, there are as you know heaps of reasons, considering the news reported they had onbound flights booked I would think its as likely they were illegal immigrants, but neither I or you know.
So failure seems ATM as likely as anything else
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Interpol operate a central database of stolen passports and all member countries [190 of them] have access to this.
Of course this still relies on people checking this data base
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It's transponder was transmitting every minute, Hugh. It abruptly stopped at 1702 when the aircraft reached 35,000 ft.
http://uk.flightaware.com/live/flight/MAS370/history/20140307/1635Z/WMKK/ZBAA/tracklog
The weather is known to have been good and the sea in that area is heavily populated by fishing boats, none of which reported anything relating to the aircraft. The absence of any wreckage whatsoever is puzzling to say the least.
The two passengers travelling with stolen passports had been issued consecutive tickets which could suggest they were in cahoots about something. Equally so, the "dodgy" passengers could be a complete red herring.
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I wonder if there is some confusion about terms. A mayday is a pilot distress call. There wasn't one. I simply pointed out that this isn't always an indicator of sudden catastrophic issues.
The system gramps talks about is different from a transponder and we can't know if this transmitted info or not. It was over 3 years before the air France investigation revealed the existence of this data. A transponder gives position and id info about a flight.(at least in civil use) it's odd it, the transponder, stopped though
The system gramps talks about is different from a transponder and we can't know if this transmitted info or not. It was over 3 years before the air France investigation revealed the existence of this data. A transponder gives position and id info about a flight.(at least in civil use) it's odd it, the transponder, stopped though
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Days ... the plane took off on 31st May 2009 and crashed on 1st June ... the Air France spokesman made it public on 4th June.
Given that data transmission and storage technology is so advanced these days, I do wonder why the black box still needs to be on the plane.
It should be a trivial matter to transmit the flight information to remote storage. It won't actually be all that much data. Certainly not in the same league as the data transmission involved in, say, in-flight internet or the data we send and receive from our phones every day.
It should be a trivial matter to transmit the flight information to remote storage. It won't actually be all that much data. Certainly not in the same league as the data transmission involved in, say, in-flight internet or the data we send and receive from our phones every day.
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Sorry, my mistake it is still a little early for that yet though. Bearing in mind they've yet to confirm it has actually crashed (although I'm not suggesting anything else)
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Hugh
Transponders don't just stop. This one did. The doors to 777 flightdecks are like ones you find on safes, if something was happening in the cabin, then the crew would not open it, but change the transponder setting and send a mayday.
So, we are left with one thing here. It stopped. For it to stop takes 2 things, switch it off, not very likely. And massive failure of the aircraft.
We do know that it stopped, because it simply disappeared from radar. In the AF incident, it was outside radar range anyway. The weather we do know, it's published. The experience of the crew has also been published.
Now, had we been discussing this 60 odd years ago, then I'd agree with you, ala Comet. But we aren't. 777's are not known for breaking up for no reason, in both accidents with these aircraft they remained largely intact. As I keep saying at the moment, there is evidence of something else going on, the passports issue, and China isn't known for it's illegal immigrants trying to get in.
Ok, that could be entirely unconnected, could be simple coincidence, but that does not change the fact that the aircraft in all likelihood broke up. Given it's strength, and the fact that non other 777 has had any form of structure issue, we are only left with one thing.
Call it speculation if you like, but it's educated speculation, not simply guesswork.
Keith, it reality it relies on 2 things. 1. It being put onto the database, and second it being checkable in practical terms. Given the number of passengers flying, that isn't a practical proposition. Contrary to popular belief very few people who fly are really checked against anything. It used to come as a surprise to people when they rang us (the Police) at Heathrow, and were told we have no access too, and no copies of passenger lists.
Transponders don't just stop. This one did. The doors to 777 flightdecks are like ones you find on safes, if something was happening in the cabin, then the crew would not open it, but change the transponder setting and send a mayday.
So, we are left with one thing here. It stopped. For it to stop takes 2 things, switch it off, not very likely. And massive failure of the aircraft.
We do know that it stopped, because it simply disappeared from radar. In the AF incident, it was outside radar range anyway. The weather we do know, it's published. The experience of the crew has also been published.
Now, had we been discussing this 60 odd years ago, then I'd agree with you, ala Comet. But we aren't. 777's are not known for breaking up for no reason, in both accidents with these aircraft they remained largely intact. As I keep saying at the moment, there is evidence of something else going on, the passports issue, and China isn't known for it's illegal immigrants trying to get in.
Ok, that could be entirely unconnected, could be simple coincidence, but that does not change the fact that the aircraft in all likelihood broke up. Given it's strength, and the fact that non other 777 has had any form of structure issue, we are only left with one thing.
Call it speculation if you like, but it's educated speculation, not simply guesswork.
Keith, it reality it relies on 2 things. 1. It being put onto the database, and second it being checkable in practical terms. Given the number of passengers flying, that isn't a practical proposition. Contrary to popular belief very few people who fly are really checked against anything. It used to come as a surprise to people when they rang us (the Police) at Heathrow, and were told we have no access too, and no copies of passenger lists.
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With the greatest of respect Bernie you don't and can't know this. The link Doug posted above shows data till 17:02, but reports show flight radio contact till 17:30. Transponders aren't used to send maydays.
can you post a link to crew experience. Not the captain 'cause I've seen that, but not seen anything about the flight crew.
I didn't say no reason. But neither did I suggest it had broken up.
its not. You're right. But why would both of the stolen passport carrying passengers be booked onto further flights into Europe if they were doing anything untoward? Real question. I don't know the answer and most of Europe is known for somewhere illegal immigrants try to get in.
Its simple speculation. You're speculating there was some form of catastrophic issue, where there is simply no evidence of that. It may well of broken up, or it may equally of being another cause. It wouldn't be the first time a 777 has just lost power for example.
Checking a well indexed and properly queried database is the work of a few seconds.
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Bernie given you are often telling people not to jump to conclusions in situations where they don't have access to all the information it's probably best not to keep pushing terror angle while absolutely nothing is really known...all the main commercial aircraft manufactures also make exceptionally reliable aircraft
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Hugh wrote :-
With the greatest of respect Bernie you don't and can't know this. The link Doug posted above shows data till 17:02, but reports show flight radio contact till 17:30. Transponders aren't used to send maydays.
Don't think that is quite correct, Hugh.
Transponder codes:-
7700 Mayday
7500 Highjack
With the greatest of respect Bernie you don't and can't know this. The link Doug posted above shows data till 17:02, but reports show flight radio contact till 17:30. Transponders aren't used to send maydays.
Don't think that is quite correct, Hugh.
Transponder codes:-
7700 Mayday
7500 Highjack
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Those who either are not in the industry or don't have an interest will not know about squawk codes, and the reality is that those codes are not specifically for communicating a problem they're more for notification of the wider area that there is an on going issue...a mayday or Pan Pan call would still be the expected route for alerting ATC of issue and will take less time than changing the transponder code, the only real time this is the main notification of an emergency is a Communications failure..
That said do we really need to debate semantics on this, a couple of hundred people have lost their lives, lets think of their family rather than worry about what might have happened, there will be more than enough people from the AAIB, NTSB and Malaysian authorities to investigate what has actually happened
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Dear God!
Flight aware and Flightradar 24 both rely on people with airband radios, it is not reliable nor comprehensive! If it was, finding the bleeding thing would be simple!
Hugh, a plane disappears from secondary radar, that can only happen for 2 reasons, 1. The transponder was switched off, and 2, the aircraft fell apart. Those are the only 2 reasons. So lets deal with number one. The flightdeck door is designed to stop people getting in, so outside interference isn't likely. So that leaves the crew. If they decided to point it nose down, whats the point in turning off the transponder? None. So, you're left with option 2. The aircraft structure failed. Yes, it's possible it's structural, but it's never happened to a 777, it's a strong aircraft, they survived 2 landing accidents in relative terms intact. So, what are you left with?
I haven't claimed it's a definitive cause, if I could I'd make a fortune, but it is at the moment the most likely explanation. Simple as that, if you don't like the idea, sorry, but stop reading.
Flight aware and Flightradar 24 both rely on people with airband radios, it is not reliable nor comprehensive! If it was, finding the bleeding thing would be simple!
Hugh, a plane disappears from secondary radar, that can only happen for 2 reasons, 1. The transponder was switched off, and 2, the aircraft fell apart. Those are the only 2 reasons. So lets deal with number one. The flightdeck door is designed to stop people getting in, so outside interference isn't likely. So that leaves the crew. If they decided to point it nose down, whats the point in turning off the transponder? None. So, you're left with option 2. The aircraft structure failed. Yes, it's possible it's structural, but it's never happened to a 777, it's a strong aircraft, they survived 2 landing accidents in relative terms intact. So, what are you left with?
I haven't claimed it's a definitive cause, if I could I'd make a fortune, but it is at the moment the most likely explanation. Simple as that, if you don't like the idea, sorry, but stop reading.
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The loss of so many souls is a real tragedy. My thoughts go out to their friends, family and loved ones.
The cause of the crash could be attributed to:-
1, Pilot action - accidental, intended or medical,
2, Airframe / engine / system - Mechanical, electrical or structural failure,
3, Criminal - terrorism, hijack or sabotage.
Until further details are known I don't think it's helpful to speculate any further.
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The cause of the crash could be attributed to:-
1, Pilot action - accidental, intended or medical,
2, Airframe / engine / system - Mechanical, electrical or structural failure,
3, Criminal - terrorism, hijack or sabotage.
Until further details are known I don't think it's helpful to speculate any further.
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Exactly, and only goes to show nothing can ever be clear as things might initially look, my only hope is that the wreckage is located sooner rather than later
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You mean it's a possible explanation. It's far from definitive and one of only several solutions. Btw you seem to have missed the question I've asked you several times now, whys that?