Yet another plane off the radar and lost. With the number that have been lost, shot down etc its time for the industry to make a rapid advance in safety by requiring Flight Recorder data to be transmitted to the ground in real time.
In the event of shoot down or catastrophic failure that would not help as data stops when power stops to the recorders.
In the case of the one over Africa the media have been saying "..aircraft disappears from radar" - I believe this is incorrect. ATC lost communication with the aircraft so not the same thing. If the a/c
had disappeared off radar they would know (roughly) where to start looking.