Hello mm43,
Originally Posted by mm43
The question of leeway for the bodies needs to be addressed, but post 6 June the wind was generally light and from an easterly quarter. Some bodies may have floated initially, and others will have sunk to an equilibrium point, and depending on water temperature at that point will have eventually made their way to the surface. Warm temps mean this happened more quickly than in temperate latitudes.
Opinions of experts about it is that bodies which will sunk will sunk directly to the bottom of the sea while bodies which will float will be almost invisible (99.9% submerged) from the surface during the first few days (which explain why they could have been flown over at close range without being spotted during the initial aerial search and rescue phase). There is no equilibrum point to be reached at any depth (passed 10 meters the pressure is twice the surface).
Originally Posted by mm43
I'm disappointed to read that according to Le Figaro the BEA and the Ministry of Defence are having a spat over the existence or not of pinger records.
I'm very disappointed about that too. Most of this clash is due to hastily communication from MoD (not from Navy) which disrupted BEA's systematic search plan while those data aquired were still too raw to be fully exploited.
The good point is that Emeraude's sensors actually recorded those pingers along 20 positions and that they are actually very real. As it is explained, the uncertaincy about location is still great because distances are very difficult to compute due to the complexity of the relief. It means that the search zone may be far away than first computed. The example given about the localisation of Lebanon pingers +10 nautic miles farther than supposed range of emission is a good clue about all the difficulties encountered to pin point an exact location.
Now, the positive point is that a fourth search will be conducted with certaincy and that only time will permit to fully analyse Navy findings.
S~
Olivier