In some way this accident remembers me the one with Austral Flight 2553, which encountered bad weather en route with Cumulonimbus clouds (reportedly topping at 15,000m) an outside air temperature of -59deg.
FYI:
ASN Aircraft accident McDonnell Douglas DC-9-32 LV-WEG Nuevo Berlin
Extracted from
Air France 447 - AFR447 - A detailed meteorological analysis - Satellite and weather data:
Tim Fantastic analisys you performed here. Let me just feed you a couple of thoughts. I'm a A310 pilot, and flown UN873 at night dozens of times, and deviations up to 80 nautical miles off track have been frequent. With tha A310 I donīt fly through any well shaped GREEN radar return at that altitude and in that area. Cb's are too tall in that area, and FL350 is well within the unacceptably active altitude, and will produce EXTREME turbulence (not severe), something aircraft structure can't cope with. The images you posted show an isolated cell right on UN873, between INTOL and the MCS, one that would probably favour a deviation of at least 25nm left of track. This deviation would put the aircraft facing the worse MCS zone, and would require further deviation. The thing that puzzles me is that such deviations would require ATC coordination, and even if unable to contact the control, pilots will broadcast their deviation on interpilot 123.45 frequency. How come in a fairly busy area as that one at that hour, no one heard about AF447 deviating, nor ATC, nor other pilots? This is very strange, you don't fly trough such a storm...