Beijing-bound MAS plane carrying 239 people missing as of 20 mins ago.

Zaphod58
reply to post by rockflier

 

A highly experienced Egyptian pilot (retired as a general from the Air Force, and was one of the only pilots to shoot down an Israeli plane in air to air combat) stalled a perfectly healthy, almost brand new 737-800 (after a couple years in type) and never even realized what happened. They didn't even know they were descending until just before impact.

I am not familiar with that accident. To clarify, I am a retired airline pilot with over 19,000 hours in the air. I have flown up to and including 757-200, so I can speak with a degree of certainty in these matters. A fighter pilot transitioning to an airliner is actually quite difficult. They are used to power galore with critical wings. We civilian types train quite differently. (I have flown in the military and civilian worlds)

Here is a thread on stalls in large aircraft.
www.airliners.net...

reply to post by tothetenthpower


Very interesting & compelling post.
ThankQ S&F

WordsAreAvenues

DazDaKing
I was simply shocked at the lack of depth in this thread regarding the terrorism allegations. It was all 100% Islam based from start to end

That's just simply not true. There were a number of posters talking about Chinese terrorists.

See how easy it is to be ill-informed?

For a terrorist act carried out by 'Muslims', it is illogical to use an airline of a fellow Muslim country for this attack, as despite the large number of Chinese nationals on the passenger list, it is nevertheless a Malaysian aircraft and the attack will rather be seen as directed towards Malaysia than China. Also, criminals in the past have tended to proudly and quickly claim responsibility for such an attack; as far as I know such word is still not out on this accident. There's no space for ignorant comments here.

reply to post by Zaphod58


and this kind of thing is not detected by the ground and no automatic warning system goes off so they can contact the plane

reply to post by rockflier


I forget when it happened exactly, but he had been flying commercial for sonething like 10 years at the time.

reply to post by Zaphod58


This was on an episode of air disasters too.

Let me see if I can find it for you.

reply to post by rockflier


Rockflier:

I am still perplexed as to why an airplane's computer data is not transmitted to a land-based storage computer in flight. I think black box data is way outdated.

After all, we transmit data in real time all over the world--and have for many years. Scouring the sea for black boxes is archaic.

Would love to hear your thoughts on this.

reply to post by Boeing777


What about the group in the incident I linked earlier? Why can't we speculate Uyghurs like china has told us about on many previous incidents? The knife attacks? Whatever happened with that car blaze in T Square? But how about the attempted hijacking on June 29 2012? Oh and they had explosives on them!
www.ibtimes.com...


en.m.wikipedia.org...

en.m.wikipedia.org...

:explosives part:

MRuss
reply to post by rockflier

 

Rockflier:

I am still perplexed as to why an airplane's computer data is not transmitted to a land-based storage computer in flight. I think black box data is way outdated.

After all, we transmit data in real time all over the world--and have for many years. Scouring the sea for black boxes is archaic.

Would love to hear your thoughts on this.

I honestly cannot answer as to why this is not done. The technology certainly exists to do so. I agree an the outdated "black box". Without foundation I hypothesize that the unions and aircraft manufacturers are resistant to installing this technology. Merely my opinion.

reply to post by Zaphod58


Was this the one you were talking about? Flight 990

P1

P2

P3

P4

P5

Without the on board black box, what happens if the system that sends the data fails? Any events or counter measures plus audio occurring after that are lost. Much information that might be needed to understand the situation would be gone.

EgyptAir Flight 990

The plane dropped 14,600 feet (4,500 m) in 36 seconds. Several subsequent "primary" returns (simple radar reflections without the encoded Mode C altitude information) were received by ATC, the last being at 06:52:05. At 06:54, the ATC controller tried notifying Flight 990 that radar contact had been lost, but received no reply.[1] Two minutes later, the controller contacted ARINC to determine if Flight 990 had switched to an oceanic frequency too early. ARINC attempted to contact Flight 990 on SELCAL, also with no response. The controller then contacted a nearby aircraft, Lufthansa Flight 499, and asked the flight's crew to try to raise Flight 990, but they were unable to make radio contact, although they also reported they were not receiving any Emergency Locator Transmitter signals. Air France Flight 439 was then asked to overfly the last known position of Flight 990, but that crew reported nothing out of the ordinary. Center also provided coordinates of Flight 990's last-known position to Coast Guard rescue aircraft.[1]

en.wikipedia.org...

"Narrowing the possibilities....."

(Reuters) - Officials investigating the disappearance of a Malaysian airliner with 239 people on board are narrowing the focus of their inquiries on the possibility that it disintegrated mid-flight, a senior source said on Sunday.

So, let's expand on that possibility.

Can someone list the events that would lead to mid-air disintegration? (Beyond the obvious...)

ugie1028
reply to post by Zaphod58

 

Was this the one you were talking about? Flight 990

990 was a 767. Suicide was forwarded as causal.

rockflier

ugie1028
reply to post by Zaphod58

 

Was this the one you were talking about? Flight 990

990 was a 767. Suicide was forwarded as causal.

"Forwarded "but not proven. Although some speculated that it could have been deliberate, there were also physical problems with the plane.

Just read the differences between the ECAA report and the NTSB report.

ECAA

The ECAA report concluded as follows:[2]

1. The Relief First Officer (RFO) did not deliberately dive the airplane into the ocean. Nowhere in the 1,665 pages of the NTSB’s docket or in the 18 months of investigative effort is there any evidence to support the so called “deliberate act theory.” In fact, the record contains specific evidence refuting such a theory, including an expert evaluation by Dr. Adel Fouad, a highly experienced psychiatrist.

2. There is evidence pointing to a mechanical defect in the elevator control system of the accident. The best evidence of this is the shearing of certain rivets in two of the right elevator bellcranks and the shearing of an internal pin in a power control actuator (PCA) that was attached to the right elevator. Although this evidence, combined with certain data from the Flight Data Recorder (FDR), points to a mechanical cause for the accident, reaching a definitive conclusion at this point is not possible because of the complexity of the elevator system, the lack of reliable data from Boeing, and the limitations of the simulation and ground tests conducted after the accident. Additional evidence of relevant Boeing 767 elevator malfunctions in incidents involving Aero Mexico (February 2000), Gulf Air, and American Airlines (March, 2001). There were also two incidents on a United Airlines airplane in 1994 and 1996.

3. Investigators cannot rule out the possibility that the RFO may have taken emergency action to avoid a collision with an unknown object. Although plausible, this theory cannot be tested because the United States has refused to release certain radar calibration and test data that are necessary to evaluate various unidentified radar returns in the vicinity of Flight 990.


NTSB

The NTSB's final report was issued on 21 March 2002, after a two-year investigation, and concluded as follows:[1] The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of the EgyptAir flight 990 accident is the airplane's departure from normal cruise flight and subsequent impact with the Atlantic Ocean as a result of the relief first officer's flight control inputs. The reason for the relief first officer's actions was not determined.

en.wikipedia.org...

JRCrowley

rockflier

ugie1028
reply to post by Zaphod58

 

Was this the one you were talking about? Flight 990

990 was a 767. Suicide was forwarded as causal.

"Forwarded "but not proven. Although some speculated that it could have been deliberate, there were also physical problems with the plane.

Just read the differences between the ECAA report and the NTSB report.

en.wikipedia.org...

But, also included in the same document you quote was the following "The cockpit voice recorder (CVR) recorded the Captain excusing himself to go to the lavatory, followed thirty seconds later by the First Officer saying in Egyptian Arabic "Tawkalt ala Allah", which translates to "I rely on God." A minute later, the autopilot was disengaged, immediately followed by the First Officer again saying, "I rely on God." Three seconds later, the throttles for both engines were reduced to idle, and both elevators were moved three degrees nose down. The First Officer repeated "I rely on God" seven more times before the Captain suddenly asked repeatedly, "What's happening, what's happening?" The flight data recorder reflected that the elevators then moved into a split condition, with the left elevator up and the right elevator down, a condition which is expected to result when the two control columns are subjected to at least 50 pounds (23 kg) of opposing force.[1] At this point, both engines were shut down by moving the start levers from run to cutoff. The Captain asked, "What is this? What is this? Did you shut the engines?" The First Officer did not respond. The Captain repeatedly stated, "Pull with me" but the FDR data indicated that the elevator surfaces remained in a split condition (with the left surface commanding nose up and the right surface commanding nose down) until the FDR and CVR stopped recording. There were no other aircraft in the area. There was no indication that an explosion occurred on board. The engines operated normally for the entire flight until they were shut down. From the presence of a western debris field about 1,200 feet (370 m) from the eastern debris field, the NTSB concluded that the left engine and some small pieces of wreckage separated from the airplane at some point before water impact.[1]"

reply to post by reject


There are warning devices in the cockpit, and on the radar screen but there are still people involved.

reply to post by ugie1028


It was a 737 that impacted the Red Sea.

rockflier

JRCrowley

rockflier

ugie1028
reply to post by Zaphod58

 

Was this the one you were talking about? Flight 990

990 was a 767. Suicide was forwarded as causal.

"Forwarded "but not proven. Although some speculated that it could have been deliberate, there were also physical problems with the plane.

Just read the differences between the ECAA report and the NTSB report.

en.wikipedia.org...

But, also included in the same document you quote was the following "The cockpit voice recorder (CVR) recorded the Captain excusing himself to go to the lavatory, followed thirty seconds later by the First Officer saying in Egyptian Arabic "Tawkalt ala Allah", which translates to "I rely on God." A minute later, the autopilot was disengaged, immediately followed by the First Officer again saying, "I rely on God." Three seconds later, the throttles for both engines were reduced to idle, and both elevators were moved three degrees nose down. The First Officer repeated "I rely on God" seven more times before the Captain suddenly asked repeatedly, "What's happening, what's happening?" The flight data recorder reflected that the elevators then moved into a split condition, with the left elevator up and the right elevator down, a condition which is expected to result when the two control columns are subjected to at least 50 pounds (23 kg) of opposing force.[1] At this point, both engines were shut down by moving the start levers from run to cutoff. The Captain asked, "What is this? What is this? Did you shut the engines?" The First Officer did not respond. The Captain repeatedly stated, "Pull with me" but the FDR data indicated that the elevator surfaces remained in a split condition (with the left surface commanding nose up and the right surface commanding nose down) until the FDR and CVR stopped recording. There were no other aircraft in the area. There was no indication that an explosion occurred on board. The engines operated normally for the entire flight until they were shut down. From the presence of a western debris field about 1,200 feet (370 m) from the eastern debris field, the NTSB concluded that the left engine and some small pieces of wreckage separated from the airplane at some point before water impact.[1]"

Once again, it was not proven that Al-Batouti was saying those things because he was intending on crashing the plane. It's just as plausible that he was saying those words because the plane had already lost control and he was fighting with it and knew it was a lost cause.

Sorry, posted wrong quote here.