JD-EE,
Yes! Many eyes looking at miles and miles of traverses. What anomalies might they find? Start with some of the contributors to this thread: engineers, scientists, pilots, masters. Bright, interested, trainable, and likely capable of the meticulous effort required. Possibly with available time.
Two problems: First, training volunteers to be able to recognize substance from noise then providing them with appropriate software and administrative infrastructure. Second, willingness of "owner" authorities to release the raw data and manage/filter the input from a Many Eyes collaborative approach...
The first problem can be solved. The second is not so easy, though eventually I hope the bathymetric data gained during the extensive search in this portion of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge will be released to the world's geophysics and oceanographic communities and be stored in the open-access international libraries for such data.
It could be that the authorities are already talking to the academic community and to those with experience with side-scanning sonar to provide more eyes.
What worries me, though, is that there may be blank spots in the already-acquired data (too deep, too fuzzy, out-of-range, dark blue, etc.) and that the search misses the hull by an unfortunate circumstance of probability. 95% of the sea floor is not 100% of the sea floor. Like pingers, not there if you don't hear it.
In any case,
Dear Mr. Bea,
We have organised an ad-hoc team of 34 highly-qualified volunteers willing to visually review your AF447 search data meter by meter, in case an anomaly or find has been overlooked during your initial traverses. Eleven are active or retired air transport pilots, seven are electrical and structural engineers, six are naval or merchant marine officers, four are computer scientists, and the remainder are just plain smart people. If you would post your raw data to an accessible FTP site, we will take a look at it in great time-consuming detail and let you know if we find anything remarkable.
Sincerely yours,
Great Bear
(or JD-EE, but I don't want to put words in your mouth.)
Now if I can just find the right address...
JD-EE, it's theoretically do-able but perhaps culturally impossible. The world-wide culture of such investigations is more accustomed to locked hangars, yellow do-not-cross tape, tightly controlled evidence, very expert input, and very careful deliberation. Not a bad culture, mind you, just one unused to the public eye or, what would be perhaps more disconcerting, to public participation.
GB