Are Out:

A question that is as pertinent, if not more so: How can you safely fly over a war zone where the airspace is indeed closed below FL 320? What about an engine failure or a loss of pressurization?

e.g Iraq. Let's face it some factions in the Middle East would love to shoot down a western airliner.

What reason for close airspace over Ukraine?

I beg to differ.. The said statement is a position of a civil-case lawyer, it would appear, rather than that of a state (as the movie title implies).

Please help identify this MH17 part
 

I am working on research on the MH17 shot down. Can you please identify the part of the aircraft shown on this photo with three arrows? Is this the backrest of one of the pilots seats?
http://aviaforum.ru/attachment.php?a...7&d=1406975116

@ Aterpster
How can you safely fly over a war zone where the airspace is indeed closed below FL 320? What about an engine failure or a loss of pressurization?

A closed airspace is not automatically the same as an airspace where you are shot down automatically if you enter it. It could simply be closed to prevent interference between military and commercial planes in this zone - these are controlled by different ATCs. In case a plane had to go down below 32k for emergency reasons a call from civil to military ATC might be enough.

Apparently the airspace between 15k and 32k was closed after an AN-26 was shot down flying at 21k. The reasoning behind closing up to 32k and not closing completely for ComAir is very interesting and maybe this court case might shed some light on this. Or maybe the DSB final report. The fact that the airspace was closed up to 32k on itself is no proof that Ukraine was aware of the risks MH-17 was running.

In principle I agree with the german reasoning, because it is Ukraine who decides wether the airspace is safe or not and is responsible for this. To keep flying safe, pilots are trained to avoid even small risks with slim chances for accidents. One should expect that countries threat their airspace with equal care.

An-26 altitude is disputed - rebels claim that it was flying within the range of their weapons when it was shot down. Ukrainians insisted on 6500m so that they could accuse Russians and pin it on them. It was a political tussle.


Rebels captured the pilot and even put his interrogation video up on youtube, there was no talk about missiles at all. He probably has long been released in POW exchange. Ukraine just stopped talking about it even though after MH17 it would be very advantageous for them to prove Russian involvement beyond any doubt.


Debris were also photographed by locals and I guess anybody can still go there and take more pictures, especially Russians.

Backrest
 

Indeed, should be a pilot seat. You can see the nodge in the seat cushion to allow the control column to be pulled toward the pilot. Therefore, yes, must be the backrest.

The seat from another site
https://www.flickr.com/photos/337057...57646326477044

The different parts of the co pilot's seat.


https://www.flickr.com/photos/128147...9675/lightbox/

Another video footage

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rt-QIsgjQkg#t=2816

It not the correct arrangement of a fragment of a frame of a window!

https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-0...Windowpane.jpg

It is necessary to change an arrangement of this fragment of a window,
in the top part of a fragment we see black paint a covering,
it has to be below:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BtJZ75iIIAA6Ry-.jpg:large

Here we see that the covering is located black paint below, this fragment has to be on the left side of MH17:

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-g...Windowpane.jpg

A sobering development?
 

Multiple news agencies are reporting that one of the passengers was found to be wearing an oxygen mask, according to the Dutch Foreign Minister.

Malaysia Airlines MH17 passenger had oxygen mask on ? Dutch Foreign Minister

Can someone advise how rapidly the passenger O2 masks deploy after cabin depressurisation?

Grim stuff....

Dean

immediately

Perhaps I could have phrased my question more precisely.

Does passenger cabin mask deployment happen within 0.1, 0.5, 1.0, 2.0, 5.0 etc. seconds after cabin pressurisation reaches a specific setting (and what is that apparent-altitude value)?

Dean

People had about two minutes between the missile hit and the crash.



That Australian article states as a matter of fact that Boeing was shot down by rebels, clearly getting ahead of the investigation itself.

deanm

The cabin altitude during the cruise would have been about 6000 feet. The masks will deploy when the cabin altitude reaches 14000 feet. Within a few seconds of the missile strike the cabin altitude would have increased to the aircraft altitude of 33000 feet and the masks would drop. So within 5 seconds of the cabin being pierced the masks would have dropped, probably more like a couple of seconds.

Rapid depressurisation is extremely painful on the ears and a shock. The noise from airflow and engines and the force of the airflow itself would be a massive shock and the deceleration very debilitating, possible broken necks etc. Negative panic would probably ensure that most people did nothing and just froze. They would be unconscious in about 30 seconds. If someone did have the presence of mind to grab a whirling mask and put it over their mouth and nose it might keep them conscious. However if the aircraft had broken up there is a good chance the ring main would have been severed from the passenger oxygen bottle which is towards the rear of the aircraft so they would not get any oxygen anyway and would become unconscious within 30 seconds or so. So to me if someone had put a mask on it does not necessarily mean they were conscious all the way down, it just means they had the presence of mind to put a mask on within 30 seconds of the depressurisation.

Without invoking any conspiracy theories, finding one body that was wearing an oxygen mask doesn't necessarily mean much. We know the wreckage was "messed with" in the days before any independent investigating personnel made it there. Finding a body with an oxygen mask on does not prove unequivocally that this person actually put it on himself shortly after the plane was hit.

no clarification on O2 mask, was it an overhead mask or did the passenger have an inflight problem , so using portable O2 already ?

@BB69,

In 1988/89 I spent some time area cleaning parts of SW Scotland and NE England of the wreckage of PA103, which was spread over hundreds of miles.

The crater at Sherwood Crescent in Lockerbie was caused by the explosion of the fuel in the relatively intact wings and not by the kinetic impact. The second thing to realise is that shrapnel from an exploded projectile is very hot.

So to your summary points I would say that, by comparison with PA103, the wreckage came down in a very tight pattern. The lack of a substantial crater means that most of the fuel was burnt before impact. In my mind this is corroborated by the heavy sooting on the fan blades, which I do not recollect on the PA103 engines that broke off the wing before impact.

So in my view:

Hot shrapnel penetrated the port wing fuel tanks igniting the fuel and starting at least one engine fire.

The plane lost forward movement very quickly, but broke up at a lower altitude than PA103 (which was around 19,000 ft for the major break up IIRC - but, admittedly, the stormy weather on 21 Dec 1988 will have been a factor in the wider spread of PA103 wreckage)

EG