Originally posted by BOAC:
3) There have been several (I think unanswered) requests here for positions of the groups of bodies found. Do we have any, and has anyone back-plotted the position of the second recovery vis a vis ocean currents to see where they would have been in relation to the first, and likewise for the first to the POSSIBLE crash site?
Even if this information were available, I think it would be difficult to analyze properly. Most people here are not experts on ocean currents. An earlier post mentioned diverging surface currents in the area, and that the sub-surface currents might differ from the surface. So for bodies, which sink and then (I'm assuming here) surface at varying times, backtracking currents to the crash site sounds at least tricky if not completely unreliable.
The same might apply to wreckage. It may be that as the plane (whether it impacted intact or in pieces) sank, pieces of wreckage broke off or worked loose underwater at various times and floated to the surface at different speeds depending on the boyancy of each piece. So backtracing might not be a simple as (speed of current) * (time since accident).
I'm not saying these analyses can't be done. They will be done and by the trained experts. But I will go out on a limb here and say that most posters here do NOT have the background required. For example without years of mechanical/structures/metallurgical engineering education or experience, someone just is not qualified to say whether impact forces could have broken off the VS from an intact airplane or whether it must have separated in midair.
There are frequent pprune posts arguing that non-pilots should not critique pilot actions, and I support that fully. But let's apply the same standard to accident investigation.