Couple of very interesting posts from the aforementioned PPRuNe forum. Have a read. #1201 Clear_Prop 10th Mar 2014, 06:39 Join Date: Nov 2000 Location: Sol, sector ZZ9 plural Z alpha Posts: 69 I did initially promise myself I wasnt going to get involved in this discussion, but I must admit I too am becoming quite perplexed by the lack of any wreckage in the expected area. There was one small fact that I observed at the start and quickly disregarded as meaningless, but as this situation is dragging out, I am beginning to suspect it may be more of a clue. It is to do with the Transponder, or more to the point what we know has been received from it by the FR24 data. Or more to the point what hasnt been received. The very last report in the FR24 data chain lacks any altitude data. For it to have been processed, a recognisable message must have been received by the servers, otherwise the message before would be the last data we would see. What strikes me as noteworthy about this is that the most obvious sequence of events I can think of where this data output would be recorded, would occur when the transponder was deliberately cycled from Mode C (S) through Mode A (no alt) on the way to STBY (Off). I might go one step further and suggest I am struggling to imagine any other set of events where this pattern of signal output would be observed. Your thoughts? ========================== #1208 red_october 10th Mar 2014, 07:00 Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Australia Posts: 5 Im starting to agree with Clear Prop. Either it was deliberately switched off, or there was a serious electrical malfunction / fire in the business end. ========================== #1215 hamster3null 10th Mar 2014, 07:12 Join Date: Nov 2013 Location: California Posts: 14 Quote: So, with 50,000kg on board, you could fly for about 7 hours (and reserves) and go about 2000nm. This mental exercise seems fairly pointless to me. If you want to hide from the radar, you only need to stay low when youre near ATCs. Presumptive hijackers could stay at 600 for 300nm and that would put them on the other side of Malay peninsula, at which point they could regain altitude and theyd have several million square miles of the Indian Ocean at their disposal. (But they probably wouldnt make it to any really interesting places like Afghanistan or Somalia, not without refueling.) ========================== #1231 andrasz 10th Mar 2014, 08:18 Join Date: Sep 2008 Location: BUD Age: 50 Posts: 252 Sixty hours on my post #999 summarizing what we know (Malaysian Airlines MH370 contact lost) has not changed one bit... I would not want to venture out to any speculation based on zero facts, but every passed hour without any wreckage sighting reduces the likelihood of some catastrophic event at/near point of last contact, and increases the chances of the aircraft having continued under some degree of control away from that point. Of course the latter if true eliminates several of proposed scenarios and raises a whole lot of uncomfortable other questions. Im sure a lot of heads are stuck together right now pouring over primary military radar and satellite surveillance data, but Im sure they will not tell us what they see (if anything). However given the location of last contact, after only a little altitude loss even the primary signals would have been lost. Now if one plots the potential area outside the coverage of any primary radar station and within six hours range, that is a sizable patch to comb through... ========================== #1233 uksatcomuk 10th Mar 2014, 08:24 Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: NW UK Posts: 43 12:40 -depart KLIA 1.22 -Fail to chk in with HCM 2:41 -Subang ATC lost contact Time-line is not right Totally agree Codyblade. This is something I commented on immediately the details were released. Our system shows it at 35000 feet around 1710 GMT other trackers continued to see it until around 1720 by which time it was out at sea. Official reports say it was lost around 1840.....but by that time it would have been 4-500 miles north of where they are searching. The search area correlates with a time of around 1720-30 GMT. Of course trackers only track the avionics , not the a/c .... so the a/c may well have continued having suffered a systems loss , but this is an area of intense military interest . DSP satellites watch this region closely for flashes and bursts of radiation relating to missile launches etc....and there may well have been operational ocean bound radar platforms It seems pretty obvious to me that military observers know much more than they are letting on.
Posted on: Mon, 10 Mar 2014 17:36:31 +0000