MH370 - Missing

[Nigel C]

Now the Chinese believe they've spotted possible debris from their Il-76, just over 2100kms from Perth.
http://www.news.com.au/world/chinese...-1226862829830

[Philip Argy]

I know the Chinese are here to help but I'm a bit sceptical that on their first day out they happen to spot what their satellite claimed to have photographed.

I suppose tomorrow their ship will pick up what they claim to have spotted too ...

[Nigel C]

If it helps appease your scepticism, the Australian search crews have also found possible debris in the search area.......

http://www.news.com.au/travel/travel...-1226863596129

[Stuart Trevena]

Hi All,

Was MRO in the old Livery or the new one?

If it was the old one, then according to the Herald Sun tonight, they have found some debris.

Here is the Quote

"PRIME Minister Tony Abbott says two “objects” have been located by a RAAF P3 Orion in the search for Flight MH370.

Mr Abbott told Parliament the first object was grey or green and circular and the second was orange and rectangular.

HMAS Success is in the vicinity, about 2500km south-west of Perth, and hopes to be there within hours to recover the objects.

This could be the Grey under body colour of the livery and green, being the raw Protective coat.

Stuart

[Paul F]

Originally Posted by Stuart Trevena

Hi All,

Was MRO in the old Livery or the new one?

All MH 777,s are in the old livery.

[Philip Argy]

From what I can gather they refined their Doppler analysis by comparing the ping signal timings from recent flights on the MH370 route and other routes that traversed the so-called northern corridor option. As the successive-ping time delay was greater than the recent samples for planes travelling north, they concluded that the aircraft must have been further south and travelling sothwards, hence resolving the question of which corridor should be searched and where in that corridor the 'last ping' most likely emanated from.

Combined with the known fuel range and the last ping emitted from the B772, and the reported physical and satellite imagery of debris in the Southern Indian Ocean, the current search area firmed up as a highly plausible location for the a/c to have hit the ocean after fuel exhaustion. It also increases the likelihood of wings breaking off on impact remaining afloat due to empty fuel tanks.

With 17 days having elapsed, and wind and ocean currents that have moved tracking buoys up to 120 km in one day, it's not hard to see why widely dispersed sightings of debris remain consistent with the latest impact site theory.

The FDR will be of immense value but the CVR, with only two hours of recording, probably conclusive in establishing whether all aboard were hypoxic (ie two hours of voice silence) or whether there were words spoken which would signify a deliberate human act. Hopefully it will be sooner rather than later that these vital questions get answered, and meanwhile the vigilance with which a/c are tracked around the globe is likely to be ramped up almost immediately, with departures from planned routes and transponder failures likely to become subject to immediate investigation rather than ignored.

[Scott L.]

Is it the Malaysian vigilance SoP that needs to be reviewed or the situation globally with respect to loss of radar, acars, ads-b, etc? In other words, if this happened to Qantas overseas or an aircraft here in Australia - would the response be different?

[Montague S]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-03-2...-mh370/5343988

interesting piece by ABC journalist that joined the US Poseidon crew.

[Rich W]

I have a personal view that this incident may well have been some kind of depressurization and that at some stage the pilots became unconscious, thus the plane simply flew on until it ran out of fuel. However can someone with more knowledge try answer these things to help me out...

1. It makes sense that if it was depressurization that they would turn back to the nearest mainland (which it appears to have done) but why did it then fly past the mainland and go south? Assuming the pilots were unconscious, would the autopilot in anyway do this by itself? Or would this needed to be programmed or manually made?

2. Could depressurization somehow make the transponder turn off? In what way could the transponder turn off if it was not done intentionally? We have to rule out fire or some other catastrophic explosion because I would assume the plane would have gone down quicker?

3. The autopilot must have still been active. Otherwise how would it have flown for so long if the pilots were unconscious? If they were conscious, it appears no really attempt was made to contact ground or try get close to mainland after it turned south.

4. Is it possible for the cabin crew to contact head office/ground from their airline-phones if they knew something was wrong? Also, was MH370 equip with passenger phones from their seat?

[Grahame Hutchison]

Air safety experts question MH370’s impact on data connectivity

Full Text

Aviation safety experts are dubious that the MH370 tragedy will spark urgent action to improve the data connectivity of airliners.

At the annual Flightglobal Safety in Aviation conference held in Singapore, a group of safety experts addressing airline safety heads agreed that the issue is not the amount of data aircraft produce, but the cost and challenge of getting it off the aircraft in a timely manner, and converting it into useful information for improving safety and conducting safety investigations.