MH370 - Call for Search & Rescue Help

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#1008215 18-Mar-2014 16:56

Mark: Why are people wondering why no text messages or calls were made by the passengers ?

A Boeing 777 can fly at about 950kph, no way in hell a phone is going to get connected to a cell before being far out of range, add to that the pretty good Faraday cage the plane itself provides, oh and the fact that a good 90% of the passengers will be good little people who turn their phones off when told to.

Although apparently it flew back over malaysia, and possibly at very low speeds at low altitude. But possibly the bigger question is, if it had landed somewhere, wouldn't those phones be pinging off towers. Although probably not if in a very remote location.

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#1008216 18-Mar-2014 16:58

https://plus.google.com/106271056358366282907/posts/GoeVjHJaGBz

A fire on board and the pilot turns towards the nearest airport, but never gets there. It fits the Occam's razor test much better than most of the other speculations. Again, it is still speculation though and doesn't fit with some of the available evidence.

turnin

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#1008220 18-Mar-2014 17:05

Mark: Why are people wondering why no text messages or calls were made by the passengers ?

A Boeing 777 can fly at about 950kph, no way in hell a phone is going to get connected to a cell before being far out of range, add to that the pretty good Faraday cage the plane itself provides, oh and the fact that a good 90% of the passengers will be good little people who turn their phones off when told to.

Because it does not take too long to turn one back on and if you think something serious is about to happen people will try, as they did very successfully and for quite long durations during 9/11. The altitudes may have made that possible, perhaps for txting. Malaysia has really good coverage and many on the flight would have had Malaysian sims which would have allowed txts on their network. But my main point was if you were a hijacker a cellphone jammer would be quite valuable

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#1008224 18-Mar-2014 17:15

jonb: https://plus.google.com/106271056358366282907/posts/GoeVjHJaGBz

A fire on board and the pilot turns towards the nearest airport, but never gets there. It fits the Occam's razor test much better than most of the other speculations. Again, it is still speculation though and doesn't fit with some of the available evidence.

I agree it's quite possible it's an emergency situation that they didn't survive. You would expect a mayday call with a fire and the aircraft wouldn't fly far before it crashed into the sea. they haven't found any wreckage that I'm aware of.

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geocom

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#1008225 18-Mar-2014 17:21

jonb: https://plus.google.com/106271056358366282907/posts/GoeVjHJaGBz

A fire on board and the pilot turns towards the nearest airport, but never gets there. It fits the Occam's razor test much better than most of the other speculations. Again, it is still speculation though and doesn't fit with some of the available evidence.

Fire on board in the communications gear that they managed to under control could explain why the systems failed. With radio gear down they turned back towards an airport but they need to dump fuel to be light enough to land head out to sea to dump but they cannot due to another malfunction. Move further out to sea to fly in clear sky's to avoid traffic seeing as they cannot contact anyone due to failed radio equipment but they end up getting lost after all its dark and with no radio gear they would only have basic flight controls.

But I guess it depends on if all the communication wiring runs through the same place.

Geoff E

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#1008233 18-Mar-2014 17:27

turnin: I still have a bit of trouble believing that a passenger would not attempt to communicate bearing in mind at least some of those passengers would be familiar with the route, the large elevation changes, the turn around and the acars had to be turned off ,to disable the ACARS ( according to media anyway) they have to rip up the carpet in the aisle and if there was entry into the cockpit by hijackers that would alert passengers/flight crew who would then take the risk of trying to communicate.

Passengers wouldn't necessarily know where they were. It was a dark night so no moon to light anything up. The large altitude changes haven't been proven, in fact some of the large excursions that were reported have now been debunked. I bet if I were to put you in an aircraft at night I could manoeuvre that aircraft and you wouldn't know where you were, which way you were pointing, or even if you had been updside down. Tex Johnson rolled a 707 with a whole lot of USAF brass down the back in daylight and they didn't notice. I don't care how familiar some passengers are with the route I'd defy pretty well all of them to be absolutely sure they knew where they were at night just by the occasional glance out the window.

NO no, no, as I posted earlier the floor does not have to be lifted to disable the ACARS.

If there were forced entry into the cockpit I think you could be pretty sure there would have been a distress message.

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#1008246 18-Mar-2014 17:35

geocom:
jonb: https://plus.google.com/106271056358366282907/posts/GoeVjHJaGBz

A fire on board and the pilot turns towards the nearest airport, but never gets there. It fits the Occam's razor test much better than most of the other speculations. Again, it is still speculation though and doesn't fit with some of the available evidence.

Fire on board in the communications gear that they managed to under control could explain why the systems failed. With radio gear down they turned back towards an airport but they need to dump fuel to be light enough to land head out to sea to dump but they cannot due to another malfunction. Move further out to sea to fly in clear sky's to avoid traffic seeing as they cannot contact anyone due to failed radio equipment but they end up getting lost after all its dark and with no radio gear they would only have basic flight controls.

But I guess it depends on if all the communication wiring runs through the same place.

Niceties like dumping fuel go out the window when there is a fire on board an aircraft.

The cargo/belly areas have fire suppression systems, there are certification requirements around this. However the time available to get on the ground with a fire is frighteningly small. It's not the fire that kills it is the smoke inhalation that does the damage. As I said in an earlier post they would get on the ground ASAP in this case probably into the water as this would be the quickest and safest option at night. There again no mayday call and no wreckage.

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#1008249 18-Mar-2014 17:37

As some of the comments in that google+ thread note, pilots are trained to aviate, navigate and communicate, in that order. A smouldering fire could incapacite the crew and the plane continues flying, or there is a decompression and the plane continues flying, or it was a more catastrophic failure and the wreckage hasn't been found yet. The immarsat satelllite pinging is evidence of something, but difficult to establish location from a single point of triangulation. Hopefully that data can give more detail over time, with beam angles or however the experts can analyse it.

geocom

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#1008251 18-Mar-2014 17:40

Technofreak:
geocom:
jonb: https://plus.google.com/106271056358366282907/posts/GoeVjHJaGBz

A fire on board and the pilot turns towards the nearest airport, but never gets there. It fits the Occam's razor test much better than most of the other speculations. Again, it is still speculation though and doesn't fit with some of the available evidence.

Fire on board in the communications gear that they managed to under control could explain why the systems failed. With radio gear down they turned back towards an airport but they need to dump fuel to be light enough to land head out to sea to dump but they cannot due to another malfunction. Move further out to sea to fly in clear sky's to avoid traffic seeing as they cannot contact anyone due to failed radio equipment but they end up getting lost after all its dark and with no radio gear they would only have basic flight controls.

But I guess it depends on if all the communication wiring runs through the same place.

Niceties like dumping fuel go out the window when there is a fire on board an aircraft.

The cargo/belly areas have fire suppression systems, there are certification requirements around this. However the time available to get on the ground with a fire is frighteningly small. It's not the fire that kills it is the smoke inhalation that does the damage. As I said in an earlier post they would get on the ground ASAP in this case probably into the water as this would be the quickest and safest option at night.

I did say that they managed to get under control. Last thing you want to do is take a situation that you have under control and urgently land without comms you could just as easily land on top of an outgoing plane or run off the runway and ditching at night would be a nightmare to do.

Geoff E

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#1008269 18-Mar-2014 17:53

jonb: As some of the comments in that google+ thread note, pilots are trained to aviate, navigate and communicate, in that order. A smouldering fire could incapacite the crew and the plane continues flying, or there is a decompression and the plane continues flying, or it was a more catastrophic failure and the wreckage hasn't been found yet. The immarsat satelllite pinging is evidence of something, but difficult to establish location from a single point of triangulation. Hopefully that data can give more detail over time, with beam angles or however the experts can analyse it.

Haven't the officials already totally rules out any form of plane failure? They have had a long time to assess that, and have far more info on it than anyone else. So if they say that, I think we have to trust what they are saying is correct. If it isn't, then that is a different matter.

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#1008270 18-Mar-2014 17:54

jonb: As some of the comments in that google+ thread note, pilots are trained to aviate, navigate and communicate, in that order. A smouldering fire could incapacite the crew and the plane continues flying, or there is a decompression and the plane continues flying, or it was a more catastrophic failure and the wreckage hasn't been found yet. The immarsat satelllite pinging is evidence of something, but difficult to establish location from a single point of triangulation. Hopefully that data can give more detail over time, with beam angles or however the experts can analyse it.

Correct, Aviate, Navigate, Communicate.

Part of the Aviate is when there's smoke or fire is to put on the O2 mask and smoke goggles, that way the crew don't become overcome with the smoke or fumes. A smouldering fire is highly unlikely to incapacitate the crew.

A fire is highly unlikely to get such a hold that it destroys the communication equipment before some sort of distress message is broadcast. As well as the suppression systems there are fire and smoke detectors in critical places.

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#1008273 18-Mar-2014 17:58

geocom:

I did say that they managed to get under control. Last thing you want to do is take a situation that you have under control and urgently land without comms you could just as easily land on top of an outgoing plane or run off the runway and ditching at night would be a nightmare to do.

Sorry I missed the "under control" bit. Even so they wouldn't be wasting time dumping fuel, they would be making a bee line back to KL.

See my other post re a fire taking out the comms gear before there was time to make a distress call.

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#1008275 18-Mar-2014 18:01

mattwnz:
Haven't the officials already totally rules out any form of plane failure? They have had a long time to assess that, and have far more info on it than anyone else. So if they say that, I think we have to trust what they are saying is correct. If it isn't, then that is a different matter.

I don't know that they have expressly ruled it out, but it would appear from their statements that they don't consider it's the most likely option. Having read all the back flips and contradictions I don't know what to believe anymore.

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Fred99

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#1008289 18-Mar-2014 18:29

Technofreak:
mattwnz:
Haven't the officials already totally rules out any form of plane failure? They have had a long time to assess that, and have far more info on it than anyone else. So if they say that, I think we have to trust what they are saying is correct. If it isn't, then that is a different matter.

I don't know that they have expressly ruled it out, but it would appear from their statements that they don't consider it's the most likely option. Having read all the back flips and contradictions I don't know what to believe anymore.

Exactly. And with each new "revelation", instead of supporting existing theories, every new one seems to throw those out the door - and almost back to square one.
So we've been told that the last radio communication was after the ADS-B transponder was turned off, then a few minutes before. Then we get told that ACARS was turned off early in the flight, then later. We get told that Malaysian radar picked something up, but all sorts of conflicting information about altitude, whether or not it turned NW in the Malacca Strait.
Then expert opinion expressed as if it was a truism "modern airliners don't fall out of the sky" to conclude that it must have been a deliberate act - when it's obvious that sometimes (and fortunately very rarely) in fact they do fall out of the sky.
Could have been a rapid decompression and then on autopilot until it ran out of fuel and crashed into the sea, but personally I don't buy into a theory that something caused that - be it an oxygen bottle as suggested, uncontained engine failure, or other - managed to take out at 3 specific systems (ACARS, ADS-B, and secondary radar/TCAS) but managed to not take out some other systems absolutely critical to keeping the plane airborne (for many hours) presumably without pilot intervention.

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#1008293 18-Mar-2014 18:35

In my mind the new timeline - of last voice transmission from the plane occurring BEFORE its communications systems were disabled, changes everything.
777's had a directive out re cracking under the hull mounted antennas - described as a 'weak spot'in that aircaft.
A failure there would leave passengers and crew unconscious, but should also have completely disabled ACARS, which transmitted the 'ping' they tracked.
What if it not only didn't detach completely and also caused a cascade of further problems?
I wonder if Chris Goodfellow's ideas point in the right direction. Swissair Flight 111 was a lower tech aircraft, but this from the Wikipedia article resonates; with "no light by which to see his controls after the displays failed, the pilot was forced to steer the plane blindly; intentionally or not, the plane swerved off course and headed back out into the Atlantic".

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