sound asleep,
My post was about misperceptions and the media echo chamber, and my alternate-theory story was a speculation on the sort of patched-together alternate narrative that might be believed by those who do not trust the NTSB, and believe there is bias against the pilots and a cover-up rather than a real investigation.
I was saying that things like the snafus with the first responders and the pilot-name story, both of which did, factually happen, can feed into mistrust and can undermine belief in an objective investigation.
For example, the "30-second" tidbit -- that is from an actual question fielded by the NTSB chair after a briefing. A reporter said, "The Korean media is reporting that the air traffic controllers changed shifts 30 seconds before the accident."
NTSB chair neither confirmed nor denied, but reiterated that the exchanges with the crew were uneventful and clearance was given. It seems, reading between the lines, that the Korean media was implying ATC dropped the ball because they did not reply promptly enough to one of the aircraft's transmissions.
But just from that question, as well as the translated news article someone posted above, you can see how different countries emphasize different things, which means that readers end up being *absolutely sure* that stories like the yarn I spun are the "real truth."
Just to be clear: it's not what I believe, nor is it a prediction of what the eventual conspiracy theory will actually be. But surely there will be one.
And, speaking now for myself, I do have a level of mistrust of the veracity of the fire department's statements. I will trust the NTSB's findings on the rescue operation far more than the interim statements coming from the SF department.
Why? Because the day of the accident, it was the SF Fire Chief who made statement after statement that was premature and wrong. She said everyone was alive. Then she said 60 people were unaccounted for (letting everyone believe they might still be on the burning plane.) Then she said that weird thing about some passengers coming up from the water line, sort of hinting that they had gone down for a dip in the water. I am betting very strongly that those people near the water line were the critically injured flight attendants and passenger, and the other passengers who had found them and were calling for help. It just has not inspired confidence.
And, given that the pushback for findings of pilot error can be nationalist in tone, all of these details could be twisted and presented as deliberate, malicious, inept, etc on the part of Americans, who messed up but want to blame the pilots.