ELTs do, ULBs don't. No idea about ELBs. :rolleyes:

We don't know that; MH370's actual flight path has yet to be established as a known fact and everything is based on theory at this time.

What we do know is that 370 deviated from it's original planned route early in it's flight. This was apparently not seen as sufficiently unusual to start alarm bells ringing immediately and I would suggest that the delay in raising the alarm meant that MH370 was effectively allowed to disappear, for reasons which are as yet unknown...

I haven't yet seen anyone in the media ask the question: "When it "disappeared" and was apparently then "seen" on Air defence radar an hour later, why was no action taken to intercept and identify it?"

This is the first thing that happens in Europe, the US and most areas when an airliner "disappears" or even loses radio contact. Malaysia is said to have a very advanced Air Defence System and yet it took no action....why?

Somebody needs to discover the wonders of Google.

Yes the media asked, and yes an answer was given. Back in March according to some newspaper articles I've found... so no doubt already discussed a million times on this thread, suggest you go back a few pages and have a read. :cool:

- that is of great concern to residents in that part of the world. How can an unidentified non-transponding a/c flying over your territory be 'no threat'? Let's face it, they were asleep at the wheel and found it on the tapes.

Define 'threat'.

As far as the theatre tensions are concerned I imagine that the military threat was assessed as low. The Comair threat negligible. A higher military posture unnecessarily expensive.

As far as the tax payer is concerned, if there are tax payers, tucked up in bed, the State apparatus is protecting them. They are probably unaware of how that is done.

Take UK, how many people know what air defence reactive forces we have and at what readiness? Do they know where they are? Do they know what the RoE are?

I imagine the answer is either a lemon or largely wrong. I am still not too far out but cannot pretend to know what our systems are.

Malaysia hasn't had a terrorist attack on their soil since the 1977 MAS653 hijacking.

Al Qaeda has no beef with the Malaysians.

It appears to me someone went to a lot of trouble to make the final resting place difficult to find. If that is the case, what are the odds the final act was doing something to induce an in-flight breakup, thus spreading wreckage over a vast area both on the surface and on the seabed..??

Breakup
 

If wreckage was spread over a large area of water, it's likely some of it would have been found by now.

Either it entered the water largely intact and didn't generate much (if any) flotsam, or it isn't where they're looking.

Pura

If that was the case, then I would suggest they would have found something.

look at the 747 that exploded just out from NY and the spread of wreckage.

I would have thought that the more break up mid air, the more floating debris on the surface that would have stayed floating and therefore been noticed at some point.

In flight break up would not spread parts over a very large area, parts would land probably well within a mile.

There's little doubt that the engines would be torn from the wings in any controlled ditching attempt as in US1549. They would be on the bottom near the coordinates of the point of impact even if the fuselage remained reasonably intact.

Reading Teddy Robinsons post (10167 as I write) I am still of the feeling that

A - The "Authorities" are totally clueless, or B - They are totally clued up & doing everything to appear to be clueless.

For quite some time now, I am unable to decide which version is the reality.

We are forgetting that there may well have been debris to begin with, but we were all looking in the wrong place, and a large amount of it will probably have sunk by now.


So perhaps it doesn't have to have been an entirely controlled ditching.


And what was left could well already be on a beach somewhere remote.


Let's not give up hope that we will soon have an answer.

I didn't say that. But terrorists apparently don't target Malaysia. If they wanted to they surely would have done so in the past.

Bali attacks were directed primarily at Australian and European tourists and most Balinese are not Muslims. Marriott targets were officially Americans and Australians.

Airspace and Radar
 

The Malaysian narrative supports a number of different scenarios. A steady state flight across Malaysia is one way to "evade" radar (by blending in) and evasive fighter pilot tactics are one way to cause someone watching radar to notice. Per MH370 first turn (Igari), Malaysia military radar might have noticed a offshore inbound unidentified target, but apparently it didn't. The next soonest time for a military alert would have been if ATC had notified Malaysian Air Dispatch and an alarm raised because of no contact . As soon as MH370 left Malaysian airspace, it was somebody else's business. The aircraft might have been seen paralleling borders by Thai or even Indonesian radar, but the aircraft might not have been 'noticed' unless it was headed to or over each's respective airspace. In effect, after 30 minutes this aircraft would have been off radar(and not a 'potential threat'), until and unless, it crossed another country's airspace.

The old generation ELTs prior to the introduction of 406Mhz ELTs were, I agree, notoriously unreliable.

However all those that are 406Mhz conform to new specs that were introduced, RTCA DO204 and Eurocae ED62, and spurious signals etc tend to be down to maintenance issues etc.

The type of ELT installed on the Malaysian aircraft is that used on many other Boeing and Airbus aircraft. It is a top of the range model known for the quality of it's construction. Yes, a ditching would certainly provide the de-acceleration forces required to trigger the "g" switch.

Serveral references have been made in the past to the 1992 Air Inter A320 Mont St Odile crash, and the fact that the ELT did not go off in this event. There is an extremely simple explanation as to why no ELT went off, since surprising as it may seem, no Automatic Fixed ELT was installed on that aircraft. Most likely because at the time it was not a mandatory requirement

Most debris was found well within 1.5-2 miles.

Actually, it was more of a tautology ;)

My original point was that the Malaysian perceived threat of a terrorist attack of any sort was low. And an airborne attack on the Petronas Towers, a potent symbol of Malaysian national pride, would make no sense at all for any terrorist organization, especially on a Friday night when it was virtually empty.