Originally Posted by
Lookleft
...
Is there any actual "new" news?
"New" news that is both factual and logical? No.
This latest new news, a dual delinquency of both scholarship and journalism, was comprised of:
a. the mis-identification of a piece of recovered debris as being part of the trunnion door for the left main landing gear (the debris item is most assuredly NOT part of the trunnion door; it is too big, has the wrong profile, has the wrong external finishing, and lacks any of the penetrations required for the strut fasteners);
b. a series of four almost parallel penetrations of the recovered part being incorrectly interpreted as having been caused by engine parts separating from a disintegrating engine due to a forceful impact (fanciful conjecture at best; the penetrations are from the inside to the outside finished surface of the part - essentially impossible if it was the left trunnion door);
c. the two foregoing individually incorrectly interpreted points being conflated and further incorrectly interpreted as indicating that the main landing gear must have been extended at impact;
d. point c. being interpreted as meaning that there must have been an active pilot for the terminal phase of the flight; and
e. the foregoing chain of rank nonsense being given passing credibility by being unquestioningly and uncritically "reported" by Australia's favourite aviation journalist. I use the term "reported" advisedly; the relationship between the originator and the reporter is more akin to something between straight-up
PR and simple dictation.
Next thing we had other media outlets regurgitating this utter pap and all of a sudden it's an entrenched part of the story. Little wonder that poor old Joe and Joanne Six Pack, to the extent that they still have any interest in the disappearance, come away with a completely distorted understanding of the events surrounding it.