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Flight MH370

Yet Air France continue to blame the makers of the pitot tubes (speed sensors) for the crash rather than the inexperienced co-pilot who was left by his captains to fly the plane and fly it he did straight into a storm that 6 other planes flew around..

Typical Air France, its never ever their fault, they are the Sol Campbell of the airline industry

Marky, every now and then - especially on Aircrash Investigation - you hear about the Pitot tubes icing up. Are they not heated or something to keep them clear??
 
Accept it, that plane landed on some remote island and is now lost

I dont think its crashed, that seems to be the general consensus as well, but where the **** is it? Cant be in some country as someone I mean SOMEONE would have seen it. An Island as you say Naja? then why couldnt the pilot just land it in a country anyways? How did the hijackers (assumingly so) get into the ****pit - arent they secure now?

I find it fascinating.
 
I'm getting a bit distraught with the way this is being reported on

the bottom line is 200 people have probably died, families ripped apart, relatives in limbo not knowing whether to grieve or not

and the press are treating it like a tintin comic
 
Right from the start, the Malaysian authorities (government, military, airline) have all contradicted each other and themselves. Then they backtrack when new information comes to light, like signals being sent from the engines after contact was lost. Way too sketchy, no way they're trying to buy time for whoever hijacked the plane?
 
I agree, there's more going on behind-the-scenes than is being letting on. They def no more than they're drip feeding the media. Which in turn doesn't help, as the media then has to fill in the blanks, fuelling all the crackpot conspiracy theories
 
How risky is it to land a plane on water? If they got it right they could have rendezvoused with the boats expecting them, got what they wanted off the plane and left it to sink intact?

Or land it on a remote Island, but surely those are being checked now. How do you hide a 777?
 
Very, the Hudson river landing was a one-off. The engines act like giant buckets, and scoop the water, 9 times out of 10, flipping the plane over and breaking it into many pieces.

Most water landings involve total disintegration of the aircraft.
 
Very, the Hudson river landing was a one-off. The engines act like giant buckets, and scoop the water, 9 times out of 10, flipping the plane over and breaking it into many pieces.

Most water landings involve total disintegration of the aircraft.

This.

Even a very controlled descent would mean coming in pretty 'hot' - likely well over 150mph, you could probably add 10-20mph for a full complement of passengers. The chances of the plane not completely disintegrating are very, very small. The entire situation is made worse by the fact that the sea is not a flat surface - the Hudson River in comparison is like a runway.
 
I'm getting a bit distraught with the way this is being reported on

the bottom line is 200 people have probably died, families ripped apart, relatives in limbo not knowing whether to grieve or not

and the press are treating it like a tintin comic

Was thinking that the other day. Sky (I think) were running a program called 'Lost plane - Live' or something like that, had various 'experts' on in the studio speculating on the cause of death of over 200 people who's families can very easily turn on the TV and watch. In-sensitive to say the least.
 
I find it utterly incredible that this transponder less plane has flown through several military radars after the events of 9/11 and has not, so we are led to believe, been challenged in any way at all.
 
I find it utterly incredible that this transponder less plane has flown through several military radars after the events of 9/11 and has not, so we are led to believe, been challenged in any way at all.

It probably didn't. There was a piece in the Independent (I think) that mapped out the possible destinations based on range and then took into account places that had military radar covering their borders (fewer than you think). There were still a lot of places the plane could have flown to.
 
It probably didn't. There was a piece in the Independent (I think) that mapped out the possible destinations based on range and then took into account places that had military radar covering their borders (fewer than you think). There were still a lot of places the plane could have flown to.

Quite a surprise that then really, would have thought past events would have made most countries make changes if they could afford etc.

Still strange the Malaysian air force did not react to it given the Petronas Towers being an easy target, but then this whole event is very strange in the first place so I guess we should not be surprised by anything related to it.
 
Quite a surprise that then really, would have thought past events would have made most countries make changes if they could afford etc.

Still strange the Malaysian air force did not react to it given the Petronas Towers being an easy target, but then this whole event is very strange in the first place so I guess we should not be surprised by anything related to it.

I think it's safe to say that politics is masking a whole slew of information. I'm not saying the plane isn't gone, I'm just speculating that the information itself is being hoarded and used as some form of political 'currency'...
 
A pilot's view

MH370 A different point of view. Pulau Langkawi 13,000 runway.

A lot of speculation about MH370. Terrorism, hijack, meteors. I cannot believe the analysis on CNN - almost disturbing. I tend to look for a more simple explanation of this event.

Loaded 777 departs midnight from Kuala to Beijing. Hot night. Heavy aircraft. About an hour out across the gulf towards Vietnam the plane goes dark meaning the transponder goes off and secondary radar tracking goes off.

Two days later we hear of reports that Malaysian military radar (which is a primary radar meaning the plane is being tracked by reflection rather than by transponder interrogation response) has tracked the plane on a southwesterly course back across the Malay Peninsula into the straits of Malacca.

When I heard this I immediately brought up Google Earth and I searched for airports in proximity to the track towards southwest.

The left turn is the key here. This was a very experienced senior Captain with 18,000 hours. Maybe some of the younger pilots interviewed on CNN didn't pick up on this left turn. We old pilots were always drilled to always know the closest airport of safe harbor while in cruise. Airports behind us, airports abeam us and airports ahead of us. Always in our head. Always. Because if something happens you don't want to be thinking what are you going to do - you already know what you are going to do. Instinctively when I saw that left turn with a direct heading I knew he was heading for an airport. Actually he was taking a direct route to Palau Langkawi a 13,000 foot strip with an approach over water at night with no obstacles. He did not turn back to Kuala Lampur because he knew he had 8,000 foot ridges to cross. He knew the terrain was friendlier towards Langkawi and also a shorter distance.

Take a look on Google Earth at this airport. This pilot did all the right things. He was confronted by some major event onboard that made him make that immediate turn back to the closest safe airport.
For me the loss of transponders and communications makes perfect sense if a fire. There was most likely a fire or electrical fire. In the case of fire the first response if to pull all the main busses and restore circuits one by one until you have isolated the bad one.


If they pulled the busses the plane indeed would go silent. It was probably a serious event and they simply were occupied with controlling the plane and trying to fight the fire. Aviate, Navigate and lastly communicate. There are two types of fires. Electrical might not be as fast and furious and there might or might not be incapacitating smoke. However there is the possibility given the timeline that perhaps there was an overheat on one of the front landing gear tires and it blew on takeoff and started slowly burning. Yes this happens with underinflated tires. Remember heavy plane, hot night, sea level, long run takeoff. There was a well known accident in Nigeria of a DC8 that had a landing gear fire on takeoff. A tire fire once going would produce horrific incapacitating smoke. Yes, pilots have access to oxygen masks but this is a no no with fire. Most have access to a smoke hood with a filter but this will only last for a few minutes depending on the smoke level. (I used to carry one of my own in a flight bag and I still carry one in my briefcase today when I fly).

What I think happened is that they were overcome by smoke and the plane just continued on the heading probably on George (autopilot) until either fuel exhaustion or fire destroyed the control surfaces and it crashed. I said four days ago you will find it along that route - looking elsewhere was pointless.

This pilot, as I say, was a hero struggling with an impossible situation trying to get that plane to Langkawi. No doubt in my mind. That's the reason for the turn and direct route. A hijack would not have made that deliberate left turn with a direct heading for Langkawi. It would probably have weaved around a bit until the hijackers decided on where they were taking it.

Surprisingly none of the reporters , officials, other pilots interviewed have looked at this from the pilot's viewpoint. If something went wrong where would he go? Thanks to Google earth I spotted Langkawi in about 30 seconds, zoomed in and saw how long the runway was and I just instinctively knew this pilot knew this airport. He had probably flown there many times. I guess we will eventually find out when you help me spread this theory on the net and some reporters finally take a look on Google earth and put 2 and 2 together. Also a look at the age and number of cycles on those nose tires might give us a good clue too.

Fire in an aircraft demands one thing - you get the machine on the ground as soon as possible. There are two well remembered experiences in my memory. The AirCanada DC9 which landed I believe in Columbus Ohio in the eighties. That pilot delayed descent and bypassed several airports. He didn't instinctively know the closest airports. He got it on the ground eventually but lost 30 odd souls. In the 1998 crash of Swissair DC-10 off Nova Scotia was another example of heroic pilots. They were 15 minutes out of Halifax but the fire simply overcame them and they had to ditch in the ocean. Just ran out of time. That fire incidentally started when the aircraft was about an hour out of Kennedy. Guess what the transponders and communications were shut off as they pulled the busses.


Get on Google Earth and type in Pulau Langkawi and then look at it in relation to the radar track heading. 2+2=4 That for me is the simple explanation why it turned and headed in that direction.

Smart pilot. Just didn't have the time.
 
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