Originally Posted by
Silver Spur
Hi All,
At this early stage, by looking at the wreckage floating on the water, is it possible to determine whether the AF A330-200 experienced an inflight Break Up or It breaks up on impact with the water?
No, you'd need to get the bits into a lab, and probably need a reasonably number of the metal bits into a lab. That would take some time, since most of those don't float.
If, it was an inflight Break Up, would that be possible to predict whether it is an excessive aerodynamic force induced Break Up, or if the Break Up was caused by - i.e. Bomb?
I think you meant "e.g.", but I'm just being picky. Yes, the tear marks on the fracture surface look quite different from a fuel explosion, overstress, or high explosive. Also, there's a good chance of some residues that can indicate whether an explosive was present and if so which one.
Specific to the A330 200 operated by Air France, does anyone knows if the ACARS also transmit excessive G force experienced by the aircraft?
No idea.
I haven't flown any Airbus FBW nor have I got any appreciable knowledge of the flight control logic, according to what I gather from the media and some posts on the AF330 Thread, there have been discussion about the ACARS sending "electrical fault" message, in this case, would the fault degrade the flight control system so much as to the crew lost the flight envelope protection?
We'd need a lot more information than has been released by Air France to answer that.
G