Chris Scott
The aircraft's Last Known Position appears to have been generated following a LOC incident which occurred with the onset of the various ACARS messages time-stamped initially at 0210z. The AOC position has priority and was injected into the stream at 02:10:30. No comment has been made by the BEA as to the actual timing of the AOC message, but it could be presumed that the ACARS time-stamp was not to the integer of the minute, but was rounded to the nearest minute - or the position was at 02:10:30z.
I assume the BEA have good reason to believe that, unsurprisingly, the aircraft continued to deviate further to the left of the airway centreline?
It is assumed that this deviation to the NNW had happened prior to the AOC position. The radius of the search area is a result of the difficulties presented when trying to backtrack debris drift allowing for current and leeway in a very fickle part of the ocean and at what was the effective center of the doldrums at the time of the accident.
The last satellite contact with the a/c was at 02:14:28 and the flight may have ended at that time or up to 45 secs later, as the BEA have determined that at least one ACARS FLT message remained to be transmitted.
mm43