AF447

[wes_wall]

First glance looks to me like a carbon copy of AA. Not implying the same cause, just that the tail section appears to have failed at the same place.

[rp122]

Nuclear sub operating depth

I note that CNN are reporting seabed depths in the search location as being between 6000m and 8000m.

A quick lookup indicates that modern nuclear submarines have a maximum operating depth (in peacetime) of less than 500m.

[west_yorkshireguy]

No problem. I am no expert, but wanted to share the pictures as not seen them anywhere else and may give a clue of some sort. It does look like a very similar picture to the A.A crash in 2001 when the rudder was found.

Here is the other picture in case people have trouble with the links:-

[cringe]

Sources of purported pilot report of strong turbulence

From Le Figaro (04/06/09):

Refusant à ce stade d'interpréter la cascade de messages d'alerte Acars transmis par l'appareil peu avant le crash, M. Arslanian a simplement précisé mercredi que le pilote du vol AF 447 a évoqué «de fortes turbulences» lors de son ultime contact avec les contrôleurs du ciel brésiliens.

Refusing at this stage to interpret the stream of ACARS message alerts transmitted by the aircraft shortly before the crash, Mr. Arslanian (head of BEA) simply specified Wednesday that the pilot of flight AF 447 evoked “strong turbulence” at the time of his last contact with the Brazilian ATC.

[MartinS]

Nuclear sub operating depth

Yes, subs usually hover around 100m below the surface. However, more importantly, subs have listening capabilities that can detect a whisper at 8000m, which is why one was sent to the crash site.

[Quantz]

Oxygen masks

According to a french website, some passengers may have had donned their oxygen masks.

A silent tought here for these people.

[Flyguy2006]

Tail

Been reading all your posts with interest but have one question.Now the tail section has been recovered, where exactly are the FDR & CVR's located in the tail section?

[DCrefugee]

Flyguy2006

Only the vertical stabilizer has been recovered, according to the posted images, and was separated from the aft fuselage, where the recorders are mounted.

I'd guess the aft fuselage is on the bottom, with the recorders. Question is when the two became separated...

[Fzz]

I am no expert, but wanted to share the pictures as not seen them anywhere else and may give a clue of some sort. It does look like a very similar picture to the A.A crash in 2001 when the rudder was found.

What will matter is where the vertical stabilizer was found. If it is close to other wreckage, I would think it is likely it was still attached for most of the descent. Can't read too much into this without more information.

[mhod]

Does anybody know if a large object travelling at high speed impacting water would be detectable to the seismologists who monitor earth tremors and 'quakes?

[cwatters]

How fast would the pitot have to freeze for all three failures to be reported in just one message? If they had failed at say 5 min intervals there would be three seperate messages as each failed? How far apart would they have to fail to be sent as seperate messages or doesn't it work like that?

[Aerochti]

http://img338.imageshack.us/img338/6310/dfdrcvryz0.jpg

[geneman]

Vertical fin fracture plane.

Looks like it fractured about where I've drawn the green line. Rudder is still attached.

[cwatters]

Does anybody know if a large object travelling at high speed impacting water would be detectable to the seismologists who monitor earth tremors and 'quakes?

I doubt it but when the WTC collapsed the shock was detected about 300 miles away. Some info on that here..

Seismic Detection

The aircraft impacts registered local magnitude (ML) 0.9 and 0.7, indicating minimal earth shaking as a result. The subsequent collapse of the towers, on the contrary, registered magnitudes of 2.1 and 2.3

[Mercenary Pilot]

Looks like it fractured about where I've drawn the green line.

I disagree, I think the photograph you have used/photo-shopped is at an odd angle.

To me, the vertical stabiliser has broken off at the lugs and is almost complete.

[rer47]

Debris locations

lios727 asks about debris locations.

See my posts at:

Crash location

For an analysis of the FAB maps, including one used by the SAR teams.

-rer47

[Dysag]

From Canadian official report on SR111

"Seismographic recorders in Halifax and in Moncton, New Brunswick, recorded a seismic event at 0131:18, which coincides with the time the aircraft struck the water".

[Not_a_pilot]

Further to Mercenary Pilot re: vertical stabilizer break.

You can see the white below the bottom of the stripes in the recovered vertical stabilizer, suggesting that it's the whole thing. That photo of the stabilizer in the water was taken from an angle that changes the perspective of the stripes, I believe.

[Config Full]

AF pilots Union ALTER statement

The Air France Technical crew union ALTER is calling AF crews to refuse to fly the fleet of A330/A340 that do not have at least two modified pitot probes.
source in french: ALTER - Accueil

[Clandestino]

Originally Posted by Bleve

My experience is that some pilots don't fully understand the true significance of a sudden outside air temperature rise

You are not even avare of how thrutfully you have spoken.

Originally Posted by Quantz

Flying from Buenos Aires we overflew Rio de Janeiro and followed the same route that AF474 was flying when the accident happened. Crossing the ITCZ at FL370 with moderate to heavy turbulence in a 1-2 minutes period we experienced a sudden increase in air temperature, from -48ºC to -19ºC.

Using my faithful Felsenthal MB-2A (it gives very good results for troposphere which start diverging above tropopause but not by much), I estimate that your density altitude would jump from appx 37600 to 40100 ft, provided there were actual temperature rise.

Originally Posted by Capt Kremin

I was crossing the ITCZ a few years ago at FL390 and flew into a green radar return. The OAT before entering was -56C. In a few seconds it had risen to -28C. We received a message from out FMC that we were cruising above Max Flight level. The ride however was smooth and the aircraft, a 767, coped well. Flying out of the cloud brought an instantaneous reduction in Temp back to -56C.
Tim Vasquez may be a fine meteorologist, but he doesn't know everything.

And that makes density alt jump from 38900 to 42300 ft. Now ask yourself whether your wings would support at your new density altitude and whether your engines would give you enough trust to serenely cruise along. Tim Vasquez knows enough to state with confidence that thermal bubbles with 20-30 K higher temp than surroundings are thermodynamically severely improbable or, in layman's terms, impossible.

Congratulations fellows, you have witnessed very rare phenomenon. What you've seen was false excessive TAT reading, probably caused by TAT probe blockage, probably caused by ice cristals in cirruses. All we currently have about it is anectodal evidence that suggests that it happens very, very seldom. Being shy an rare beast we know very little about its habits and habitat apart that it occurs in temperatures below -40°C where it's assumed that ice is too dry to stick to anything. We can only guess that under certain circumstances it can thrive on pitot probes too.


Regarding the AF447: we don't know yet if it actually entered the CB or not so asking why did it enter the CB is pointless. Our only hope of finding out what exactly happened is recovering the CVR and FDR in good shape. And very, very, very thin hope it is. Oh, and IR needs TAS input to keep itself upright.

Photos show the composite tailfin with rudder still attached. Obviously it floats so currents have moved away it from the original splashdown point. Also apparent lack of damage on the side and leading edge has some implications but I don't intend to be the first one to write it down on the PPRuNe.