Randy Marsh Posted June 2, 2009 Posted June 2, 2009 Speculation doesn’t help any one you might as well say it was aliens or the Bermuda triangle, best wait for the facts. Or they crashed on a mysterious island that no one knows how to find...
MR BENN Posted June 2, 2009 Posted June 2, 2009 At the moment, the most plausible explanation is that the plane was struck by lightning, causing a catastrophic systems failure. Now I know enough about aeroplanes to know that they can be brought down safely on the sea, but I don't know enough to know if that would be possible after total electronics failure. I'm half-hoping that there is still the chance of finding the plane bobbing on the ocean, communications and all electrics down but otherwise intact. However ... it's considerably less than half a hope, at this point. a former pilot on sky news tonight said that the chances of lightening bringing a plane down were very slim ,as an airliner will absord the static and devices on the wing tips (forgot what he said they are called) disperse the static energy back into the clouds.
dazzler4 Posted June 2, 2009 Posted June 2, 2009 *Waits for somebody to blame the "Muslims", for the disapperance of this plane....* why is it that someone has to jump in with that line? reading through the post no one has mentioned them, someone did mention terrorism but not muslims.
HeadingNorth Posted June 2, 2009 Posted June 2, 2009 a former pilot on sky news tonight said that the chances of lightening bringing a plane down were very slim ,as an airliner will absord the static and devices on the wing tips (forgot what he said they are called) disperse the static energy back into the clouds. A former pilot certainly knows more about aeroplane design than I do (it would be hard to know less!), though I should point out that it wasn't simply my opinion that "lightning was the most likely cause" .. that's what I read in the reports, as having been said by the Air France authorities. I don't know whether strong turbulence (which was also reported by the pilot) could affect the functioning of such anti-lightning-strike devices, or whether there's simply a limit to how well they can work? ...someone explained to me once how many volts there are in a lightning bolt, and I lost count of the zeros. It's an absolutely insane amount of power they strike with. A more up-to-date report now says "believe it may have been disabled by a storm" ... without specifically mentioning lightning. Could a plane be so violently tossed around by turbulence that it would break up under the stress? Surely not. I imagine the stress tests on an aeroplane must be fairly humongous.
MR BENN Posted June 2, 2009 Posted June 2, 2009 ive flown and suffered bad turbalance ,but i wouldnt have thought that could cause a plane to come down . usually the pilot either climbs above it or desends beneath it . im no expert and like everyone else can only go on what experts tell us . these devices are called `wicks` http://www.physlink.com/Education/AskExperts/ae568.cfm
olorin Posted June 2, 2009 Author Posted June 2, 2009 Security expert on Sky just stated he couldn't rule out terrorism. The french are denying this, they would wouldn't they. At the moment you would have a hard time proving that it wasnt due to the Loch Ness Monster.... Everything is *possible* just that some things are not very likley. It reported an electrical fault long after the last radio contact and then a depressurisation - could be anything really.
olorin Posted June 2, 2009 Author Posted June 2, 2009 A more up-to-date report now says "believe it may have been disabled by a storm" ... without specifically mentioning lightning. Could a plane be so violently tossed around by turbulence that it would break up under the stress? Surely not. I imagine the stress tests on an aeroplane must be fairly humongous. I once flew into DC in a violent storm and we took a lightning hit on the port wing. Punched a hole the size of a gold ball through the skin into the wing root. It can and does a lot of damage...no idea what the damage inside was like of course.
HeadingNorth Posted June 2, 2009 Posted June 2, 2009 More details become clear ... "Pierre-Henri Gourgeon, the airline’s chief executive, said that the jet’s automated link had sent out a “succession of a dozen technical messages . . . indicating that several systems had broken down . . . indicating a completely unheard-of situation”. The Airbus is equipped with locator beacons that should transmit over a narrow range from under water. The pilots made their last position report after leaving the coast of Brazil at 1.30am. The aircraft was flying normally at 35,000ft (10,600m). Since there is no radar cover over the ocean, the crew, which included a senior captain with 11,000 flying hours, had been due to check in with the next oceanic control at 2am. Air France said that it entered “a thunderous zone with strong turbulence” at that time. The last communication was the data link message at 2.15am reporting a failure of electrical power, pressurisation and other systems. This suggested that the aircraft was already out of control and possibly breaking up.“Something catastrophic happened on board,” ” Chris Yates, an analyst for Jane’s Aviation, said. “Potentially it went down so quickly that the pilot didn’t have a chance to make that emergency call.” Airline pilots speculated that the airliner could have flown into one of the powerful, towering storm cells that are strong enough to turn a big aircraft on its back and that are usually avoided." I can think of only two possibilities: collision with a large object (I mentioned a meteorite strike earlier, but the odds are so enormously huge it's not even worth considering) ... or a lightning bolt. Your average run-of-the-mill lightning bolt could not bring down a plane, but .. nature is far more powerful than we can cope with, sometimes.
Agent Orange Posted June 2, 2009 Posted June 2, 2009 ive flown and suffered bad turbalance ,but i wouldnt have thought that could cause a plane to come down . usually the pilot either climbs above it or desends beneath it . im no expert and like everyone else can only go on what experts tell us . these devices are called `wicks` http://www.physlink.com/Education/AskExperts/ae568.cfm I have flown through the same area where the Air France plane disappeared and the turbulance there is beyond anything that I have experienced anywhere else. Obviously, not enough to bring down an aircraft, but maybe enough to cause a chain of failures which in turn brought down the aircraft.
shane39 Posted June 2, 2009 Posted June 2, 2009 It's seems this catastrophe was almost instantaneous as no mayday call was recieved.
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