For crying out loud! can people stop moaning about the flight path, it was planned and approved and flown by hundreds of flights in the week leading up to this tragedy, although the pilots deviated from the exact route they did nothing outside of SOP.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing but no room for it here.
pretty much disagree as much as it is humanly possible to do.
I come from a military aviation background, so maybe I see things differently, but in my line of business you don't fly over a SAM site which you know is operating below period.
In what universe is this hindsight? It is open air knowledge to anyone with an internet connection that there were SAMs in hands of gung-ho barely trained operators in this area. Likewise, the SAM envelopes were easily obtainable, without recourse to military intelligence.
Why do you think vulnerable civilian airliners with a duty of care to the passengers have some sort of immunity to hostile action and/or cockup/incompetence?
Takes some sort of hand-in-the-sand blinkered stupidity, to front up in hostile airspace with this you-can't touch-me I'm on an airway attitude.
We have have one thing in common though. I too hope the lawyers get stuck in...but its the aviation authorities and airline I want to see sued back to the stone age.
Complacency, driven by economic convenience IMO.
PS
And yeah, the murderous thugs that shot them down are evil beyond belief, but that's war for you...trouble is we've stopped calling it war now...that's an inconvenience as well.