Malaysian Airlines MH370 contact lost

[ManaAdaSystem]

and a pilot would also know that turning on extra oxygen in the event of a fire may just lead to a bigger fire!

I agree with Romeo ET

Goodie, so your first action if the cockpit filled with smoke would be to???

[INTEL101]

Fire on board?

Would correspond with what the oil rig worker saw.

[YouNeverStopLearning]

Question for B777 pilots. Sorry if this has already been discussed but there are too many pages to read:
I don't know this particular airspace.
If this aircraft suffered a total or substantial electrical failure, this being at night, would any of the actions documented or released so far be reasonable?
This is a substantially electrical aircraft and the "10 to the power of whatever" event that is a total electrical failure at night can occur.
Turn back is is understandable, but they didn't quite make it round to anywhere near to 180 degrees...
I wonder how well light up the Southern Thailand peninsula is?
Was it a moonlight night?
What was the cloud situation that night?
Is it easy to read the wet compass on a B777?
How long can the batteries sustain the Standby Instruments if the electrical failure removes any charging to the batteries or power to the emergency bus? 30 minutes? I.E. having a RAT did not help...
Is there a scenario where a forced landing on the sea might not create sufficient G-force to automatically trigger the ELT, yet still power the "ping" to the satellite the press are going on and on and on and on about?
If the forced landing was at the limit of the fuel endurance range to the South or SW, would anyone detect the 30 day DFDR transmission, from the deap sea? and if the ELT was not triggered, is there any other kit that floats that could be used by crew manually from either floating in the sea in lifejackets or in liferafts/slides?

[Mesoman]

Pings, SAR and probability

Per the recent discussion on what additional satellite ping data (about which we have not been given info) could provide...

It is unlikely that the additional pings would tell us exactly where the aircraft was. But... it would change the probabilities regarding possible flight paths and thus possible end points. In other words, it almost certainly would allow additional refinement of probabilities along the final ping path.

Expert SAR techniques (such as by the US Civil Air Patrol) use probability to allocate assets to search areas. Higher probability sectors get more assets, sooner. As a sector is searched, the probability of not seeing the target if it is really there is used to assign a new probability to that sector, ultimately altering overall probabilities and subsequent assignments. Certainly some agencies are using these techniques in this search. *Any* information may be used to adjust probabilities.

Finally, I have yet to see a definitive source for the accuracy of the ping arcs. If timing is used, one mile of slant range (from satellite to aircraft) corresponds to about 10 microseconds of round trip latency. Uncertainties in this are introduced by any variation in the latency within the aircraft's satellite system, the precision of measurement at the satellite, and the resolution of the logged time. If signal strength is used, uncertainties are likely higher.

That the estimated last ping is located exactly on the 40 degree antenna tilt angle (a circle of constant range from the bird) suggests that the accuracy is not high. Otherwise, we'd more likely see something like 38.52 degrees, or whatever.

Hopefully, someone will find a definitive answer to this question, to satisfy the curiosity of some of us, if nothing else.

[SLFplatine]

Quote:
Then PF locks the cockpit door and does whatever he wants...

Okay, so why enter the course change in the first place before disabling ACARS if ACARS will report the wp change?
Only possible reason if this were the meticulously planned event by said PF (or persons unknown), and underline if, would be to leave a false trail. Thus the world has been searching in the wrong place for 10 days?

[MPN11]

@ overthewing ....greenhouses?

Remember some early imagery of "debris" that turned out to be dozens of illuminated greenhouses? "Fruit in season" doesn't happen much any more, especially when customers are prepared to have it air-freighted.

[D.S.]

LASJayhawk said

Once again. If the waypoint change was reported via ACARS at 1:07

WHY DID IT TAKE 10 DAYS to realize this information.

It's a text message TEN DAYS.

Either they are oblivious to everything, or this report is untrue like most reports have been.

There are reports that US officials are still attempting, yet being denied, access to the Flight Simulator.

It is possible the people Malaysia had interpreting the message either missed or concealed the fact (neither would be the first time in this investigation, sadly) until other officials were eventually given access to the hard data

It is also possible they all knew all along but were holding back the information until other information was leaked/released (similar to a few key pieces of confirmed "turning around" evidence that seemingly hit after it was leaked the plane was in the air much longer than first revealed)

I agree it is questionable, but it is possibly only that because we are not part of the investigation - we only know what the investigators tell us, when they decide to tell us stuff

[rampstriker]

INMARSAT ping received, as apparently Boeing's AHM report attempted to automatically transmit (thru Satellite)

The Boeing AHM system did not generate the pings as it was not activated. The hourly pings were generated by Inmarsat (initial ping from satellite and subsequent pings from the plane) for satcom service channel access (in case data was transmitted).

Here's a superbly informative post from yesterday with details. Many missed it apparently due to moderator approval time lag.

[DaveReidUK]

to fly equidistant from the satellite would require a non-great circle along the red arc

Why so? You can construct a GC between any two points on the globe, including any pair of points on that arc.

We only know that the aircraft was equidistant from the satellite at two specific points in time.

[EPPO]

@awblain

Even then… the Maldives are across the red track from starting point. It would have to have doubled back.

Right... Maldives fall roughly at the 75º circle from the sat footprint. Definitely, the plane [reportedly] seen there is not the same as the one that was pinged within the 40º arch a couple of hours later.

[jugofpropwash]

Quote:
Then PF locks the cockpit door and does whatever he wants...

Okay, but why enter the wp in the first place before shutting down ACARS which will report a wp change?

Because that's not the final direction, and is meant as a red herring? Or because the timeline is tight, and he needs to turn at that point so as to keep to the route he's already laid out?

[albatross]

ATC tapes?

Just a thought but should there not be a tape of all comms from ATC to the aircraft including Ground, clearance delivery, tower, departure or centre?
Should these tapes not provide an opportunity for voice recognition software to confirm who was talking when and what was said.
I am sure everybody would like to see a complete transcript of the last contact both from ATC and the aircraft.

Sorry if I was unclear in the original post. What I meant to ask was why have the authorities not referred to them. It would clear up, at least, the actual terminology used in the last contact.

[D.S.]

bsieker said

D.S.,

sorry, I may have missed it, but where does it say that Boeing initiated or received, or tried to receive/transmit anything to/from this airplane?
...
My understanding is that the pings are only between that satcom installation on the aircraft and INMARSAT. If someone else initiated these pings I must have missed something.

I have read in numerous reports the pings are from an attempted Boeing AHM connection, and that it doesn't include data because MAH is not signed up for that report.

That does not mean Boeing initiated contact, just what would regularly be a scheduled contact was attempted regarding a Boeing report that would normally be transmitted to MAH if the contract had been purchased.

I would have to assume Boeing has a contract with INMARSAT in which each of their planes automatically attempts this contact, making future purchase/cessation of the airlines contract to receive said data easy to accomplish with a simple update.

[Ornis]

DS, doesn't make a lot of sense to set up a "link" unless you use it. I repeat:

Does Acars send data routinely for Boeing's and Rolls Royce's use, even if the airline is not paying for a maintenance programme?

[GarageYears]

SATCOM for voice also?

I keep seeing questions related to why the SATCOM system was sent pings, etc, and discussion related to ACARS use, MAS subscription to the ACARS reporting service to Boeing (or not), but isn't it also the case that the SATCOM transceivers at ALSO available for voice comms?

[cairnshouse]

@overthewing

And it doesn't seem like the mangosteen crop is early this year.

(from a Malaysian newspaper on Monday)

Dry spell causes drop in fruit production | theSundaily

[oldoberon]

Originally Posted by Pontius Navigator

I may misunderstand this but if there was constant spacing (between rings?) then it would indicate flight along a radial from the nadir.

Any other angle would eventually result in flight on the tangent or for a short time effectively along the ring.

have to be on the radial to get the maximum space between rings, any other angle will reduce the ring spacing. after ring 2 look at the distance to ring two, if less than that for a radial note how much less.

npw treat ring 2 as your start again you know the max to ring three on a radial, if at ring 3 ping that distance is less than the radial spacing distance, note the difference.

compare the two noted differences if they are the same the plane is on a constant heading, that si the only info I could get from the previous ping rings.

Now I don't believe the 60, 55, 50 45 etc rings are the only fixed points he could come up at 38, 33 etc

[Shadoko]

Accuracy of data on sites like flightradar24, planefinder, ...

FR24 : if you look at a "rewind" of what was ("legally" I suppose...) in the sky near between Kabul and Mazari Sharif (Aghanistan) on the 3/08 at 00:00 UTC (that is 8am Malaysian Time, 11 minutes before "last ping" of MH370), you find 4 a/c (direct link below in the post):
- THA960 (TG960 / THA960), B777 (HS-TKQ)
- KLM872 (KL872 / KLM872), A330 (PH-AKD)
- BAW142 (BA142 / BAW142), B747 (G-CIVC)
- TSO9184 (UN9184 / TSO9184), B767 (EI-DBG)
On planefinder.net, the three first are found with routes consistent with where they show on FR24 (on the right day):
THA960 : BKK to ARN
KL872 : DEL to AMS,
BAW142 : DEL to LHR
But for the TSO9184, planefinder doesn't find it on a search by UN9184 nor TSO9184, but finds it by EI-DBG and tells it was (on 2014-03-07) on the route CUN to DME as flight UN9184 (so the one near Mazari Sharif on the same day). And tells also it is a B763 (vs B767 on FR24). It is also found by direct typing of the searched address (see below).

On FR24, the flihgt TSO9184 disappears at 00:12 or 00:13
Flight disappearing for some minutes on FR24 is not uncommon, and KL872 disappears also at the same time and at 00:19 just the BA142 is remaining, and after 00:28 nothing in the sky near Mazari Sharif ! Probable problems with air data.
But what about the same a/c (EI-DBG) flying NE in Afghanistan and between Cancun and Moscow the same day? Some mispelling anywhere?

"Replay" from 03-08 00:01 between Kabul and Mazari Sharif : Flightradar24.com - Live flight tracker!
UN9184 flight info - Plane Finder

Is it "business as usual"? And so, not very more useful than newspapers?

Sorry if all this is some more trash

[brika]

Originally Posted by EPPO

Right... Maldives fall roughly at the 75º circle from the sat footprint. Definitely, the plane [reportedly] seen there is not the same as the one that was pinged within the 40º arch a couple of hours later.

Roger that....and how would they have escaped the Diego Garcia sphere of surveillance?

[sycamore]

Ref the Maldives sighting;a `Mega Maldives 767 `landed about 0600-30, lots of other local traffic,also upper transit stuff.