Originally Posted by
DaveReidUK
I think the distinction that's being made is the difference between, on one hand, simple speculation along the lines of "do you think xxx might have been a factor in the accident?"
and, on the other hand, bald assertions that the accident was caused by (for example) an inflight breakup, based on dodgy data analysis that doesn't stand up to scrutiny.
Yes, this. I have no issue with intelligent people, speculating intelligently about possible scenarios based on known facts and personal experience. OZbusdrivers's post is a good example of such. I have little patience for the sanctimonious twits who inevitably pop up on a discussion of an accident and insist loudly and obnoxiously that nobody may discuss possible causes, that we must only read the official report when it is issued.
That said, what
SCPL_1988 was posting was not intelligent, reasoned, fact based speculation. Quite the contrary, it was accusatory ranting that disregarded the very facts he claims as support. For whatever reason, he jumped to the conclusion, without any supporting evidence at all , that this accident was due to structural failure involving wing separation, then he went on for pages, insisting that the flight tracking data demonstrated wing separation, even claiming that you could tell from the data when the wing separated. In fact the tracking data shows pretty clearly that the wing did not separate, as he claimed. In my previous post responding to him, you can see the kind of ridiculous claims he was making. (clicking the little arrow icon after my name in the quote box will take you to that post)
Originally Posted by
A Squared
So, according to your wing failure theory, the wing came off at that point, but the plane continued to remain airborne for another 1 minute, 45 seconds after losing a wing, and during that time, only descending 1200 feet, at no more than 960 feet per minute. That, to you, seems like the trajectory of an airplane which has lost a wing?
That post of mine quotes his more ridiculous assertions and will link you back to the actual posts of his in which he made them, if you're interested in understanding why he's receiving criticism. The bottom line is that the flight tracking data in no way supports an inflight breakup. There in no flight parameter in the available data set, neither groundspeed, nor rate of descent, nor any other parameter which wouldn't be recorded from that same airplane flying an instrument approach. The recorded groundspeeds are all well within the flight envelope of a C-130 with flaps extended, and at no point within the last 20 minutes of flight did the rate of descent exceed 1000 ft per minute. One would have to be a complete idiot to keep insisting that this is characteristic of an inflight breakup. Unfortunately,
SCPL_1988 is that person. There is no inconsistency between believing that there is nothing wrong with intelligent, reasonable speculation on the possible causes of an accident, and being strongly critical of the kind of stupidity which
SCPL_1988 was posting.