There are two parts of that which don't make sense given the information presented already. First, communications systems were disabled before the sign off to ATC. So if something was wrong which knocked out or lead the crew to unplug systems to solve problem, something would have happened. Secondly, the assumption of no communication while "aviating" and "navigating" is a bit simplistic. There were mayday calls in similar instances such as the Miracle on the Hudson and other onboard fires. Not to mention the plane went back over Malaysia in this scenario, there would have been cell coverage. Additionally, its still debated, but there is evidence that there were further changes in course, not just the one banking 180 turn and then a straight shot before it "disappeared". Not to mention the writers assumption that any hijacker would be some novice flying the plan on a wacky course. If the pilot wasn't in on it, it doesn't necessarily mean that the plane wasn't taken over by someone who knew what they were doing. Also, this entire article/explanation is rather smug.
Had this shit gone down in US airways we would have been in the pilots homes, and on their PC's within 24 hours. Are we that much more advanced? No. This is getting ridiclous. The people are dead. The plane is hidden somewhere and "they" know where. It was the plan all along. The poor families of the passengers, clinging to a prayer that will not be answered. It's very sad.
There has been so much conflicting information how could anyone possibly know what really transpired? I have been following this from the beginning and I can't tell you what the "official" consensus is at this point. Even the Malaysians are contradicting each other. I must have heard 5 or 6 different versions of what everyone "thinks" happened. Does anyone know what the actual, official, agreed upon data is, or is it really ALL just speculation, even from the people investigating? I'm totally confused. Though, from what I THINK I know, I am inclined to agree with Shemale. I think that plane has indeed been hidden somewhere, the people are dead, and it is being retrofitted with a nuclear device or a hell of a lot of explosives.
We are that much more advanced than Malaysia. More organized too. And we and have access to infinitely more resources. The lives of those three Americans are worth more to US interests than the lives of everyone else who was on that flight to their respective countries combined. As an American you can travel most places in the world knowing that should something happen to you our government will go through great lengths to ensure your return to include violating the sovereignty of another country with a military operation. If something like this happened in America it would be an affront on our countries capability to protect itself, and also bring into question the effectiveness and costliness of the resources we put into preventing, investigating and resolving situations such as these. I think it's best summed up by Tywin Lannister; "If another house can seize one of our own and hold him captive with impunity we are no longer a house to be feared."
I found the same article posted on Business Insider. Communications were disabled before the final ATC sign off? Are you sure you did not misread something? Everything I've read states the aircraft turned west after final transmission and loss of IFF signal. Which would jive with the author's theory. Aviate, navigate, communicate is supposed to be simplistic and it is drummed into every flyer. No matter what happens you must fly the airplane first. The crash of Eastern Airlines Flight 401 is a textbook example why. The crew let the plane fly into the ground because they became fixated on a burnt out gear indicator light. Secondly navigate...if you have a problem you better know where and how soon you can land. I thought the article author explained the turn quite well. During my time in the military as a mission crew member even though I wasn't on the flight deck I always knew where we were and where we could and couldn't go in case of an emergency. I experienced a few fire and potential fire emergencies and communicating our problem to the rest of the world didn't occur until we at least had an idea what the situation was and what our options were. And I was on an aircraft with roughly two dozen crew members who all had access to multiple radio and satellite comms options. We always had the luxury someone could relay our problem and planned course of action to the outside world while everyone else handled the problem. An option the two likely task saturated pilots in a secured from the inside flight deck did not have. Additionally, what would they say? There's little point wasting time trying to contact the outside world if you don't yet know anything other than you have a problem. There are dozens of aviation incidents where the crew did not make a mayday call before they crashed. In the case of the Hudson River flight, communicating was part of effectively aviating. That jet was over a major city in heavily congested airspace. Sullenberger wanted to go to Teterboro Airport after determining he couldn't make it back to LaGuardia. Regardless of airport, not talking to ATC would've quickly made things worse. If they'd made it to either airport, they would've been landing unannounced and quite possibly opposite direction of the runways in use. Plus, Sullenberger knew what his problem was and what caused it. We have no idea whether or not the pilots of the Malaysian Air flight knew what the problem was...only that they likely knew they had a problem serious enough to warrant a turn towards the nearest airfield.
Link to a flight deck ground fire that occurred on a 777-200 several years ago. <a class="postlink" href="http://www.avherald.com/h?article=44078aa7&opt=0" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.avherald.com/h?article=44078aa7&opt=0</a>
The reports I was reading yesterday and today have put the communication disable after. Mostly an aggregation of reports I was seeing on Reddit. As for communications, this is an email from a family friend who I asked his take on the whole situation. He's a former A-10 pilot, lives in Seattle and is still very tied to the aviation community... "Sat in Starbucks with some colleagues, one of whom was a lead on Boeing's ACARS. He says that ACARS is mounted in the forward main mount wheel well which is only accessible through the flight station during flight. What it means is that one of the two pilots had to physically descend into the hull after they went feet wet and accessed ACARS through a panel in the wheel well bulkhead. He physically had to turn it off and there is no legitimate reason for deselecting ACARS. This says at least one pilot wanted the flight to go dark which would have required shutting down ACARS. I assumed ACARS could be accessed on the flight deck but somebody needed to go down into the hull in order to switch it off." That kind of invalidates the idea that it was unplugged while dealing with a fire.
Don't get your news from Reddit, ever. It's just a bunch of retards linking to shit they think sounds good.
[VI climbs up on soapbox] Nobody is getting news from anywhere. Because, wait for it, nobody knows what actually happened yet. This 'story' is the perfect example of what I've been going on about with news. There is no news other than the plane went missing and communication ended at some point. That's the whole story as it stands right now. CNN, FoxNews, MSNBC, Reddit, CollegeHumor, Kim Kardashian, and everyone else (including all of us) knows exactly this about why the plane is missing (other than it is missing): Fuck all. That's what you know. That's what I know. That's what everyone else - except for the people who were on that plane - in this world knows. Therefore, approximately 300 people (and many of them maybe don't) actually have some knowledge as to what happened. No one else does. So how anyone is getting any 'news' right now from anywhere is utterly beyond me. It's all speculation and theories based on one, maybe two, facts. The plane is missing, and communication appears to have ended. [/VI climbs of soapbox to end rant]
Idiot observation from me but wasn't the theory that the fire might have actually started in a wheel well? How fragile is that part? [I could be completely off point here]
I was using it as a story aggregator, not an opinion source. There was just as much linked shit that I disregarded as moronic as stuff that made me go hmm. Reddit is fantastic for aggregating the internet, but from there YMMV. From the same family friend mentioned above... "If indeed there was a fire the last thing a pilot would do would be to leave his command position and go down into the hull to deselect a vital piece of comms gear. A tire fire wouldn't knock that sort of communication out on its own."
I'm not saying you're deriving your opinion based off of reddit comments, my comment still stands. Choosing from a list of sources that anonymous people on the internet think is worth reading is a bad idea. Pretty much every single "news" related subreddit is complete shit.
I'm having flashbacks of the hunt for the Boston Marathon bombers on reddit. Everyone was wrong and so convinced that they were right, hell I believed it then. But I also agree with VI right now, hard to say anyone* is wrong when nobody can prove their story/theory is right. *Except for Courtney Love, Kanye, Bono, etc... really any celebrities who want to open their mouth on the matter.
Shit had me weak. I mean it is kind of fun to get sucked into the threads and debate the pictures but man I could tell then it was all hyper inflated conjecture. Hell the people on the gun message board I frequent for a time thought they had seriously cracked parts of the case because they were passing info on to a CIA employee who frequented there. I had a hardy laugh when NONE of the conjecture was anywhere close to being in the same universe of being correct.
Fixed that for you. Reddit sucks. It is the worst example of internet arrogance and anonymous muscle flexing.
Subreddits where actual user-created content is submitted are generally fine. Any sub that is comment-driven generally sucks and is filled with people who are all trying to be the smartest person in the room and have no idea what they're talking about.
As soon as I was told that my post lacked "good redditude" I ran from that place screaming in horror. "Stick and stones" is not in that faggy-fag board's vocabulary, which is hilarious considering all the sickeningly perverted photos it has.
Satellite images show what everyone thinks is part of the wreckage now. We'll see when they confirm it with a plane or boat, but it looks promising. Personally, my gut tells me this is it, however I am cautiously optimistic they can actually locate what the satellite saw. Never mind trace back it's location to find the actual crash site, never mind recover any of the wreckage in the depths of the ocean in this area. If these images are correct, then officials just located a very small tip of a very large iceberg.