Johnci,Some may cry "bomb" all the time but I and presumably btacon don't. I have read approximately 90 NTSB accident reports cover to cover and have a good layman's feel for the kinds of things that bring aircraft down. This one feels like a bomb. It's not the only possible cause and he and I have said so, but for the two of us it's the leading contender.About the only way I can think of for a tough airframe to come apart at altitude absent a bomb is if it experienced some kind of upset, went supersonic in a dive and had shock waves over the elevators make it impossible to recover from the dive. With no dive recovery, at some point even the strongest airframe will come apart due to aerodynamic overload.I will even make the case for this kind of event though my instincts still favor the bomb hypothesis. Still, here's how it might happen ...The crew having been aware of the squall line in front of them, they will have been flying at maneuvering speed. This means that any credible vertical gust would cause the wings to stall instead of failing due to G overloads. (That's the definition of maneuvering speed for a given airframe -- the highest airspeed that will still guarantee structural integrity of the wings.)But if they encountered a violent (repeat violent) vertical wind shear then the following could have happened ...1 - They stall at maneuvering speed due to an updraft. (Maneuvering speed can be expected to be on the order of 220-270 knots indicated, or thereabouts. )2 - They put the nose down gently to recover from the stall.3 - While they were nose down they encountered the other side of the shear -- a violent downdraft. By itself this won't have driven the nose down further, but it may have caused an extremely high rate of descent. In principle the overall shear event could also have caused an extreme roll, either because one wing stalled more than the other, or because they flew into a tornado, horizontal or vertical. (I have seen both kinds with my own eyes.)4 - They may then have been coming down at such a rate, perhaps needing to recover from a steep bank that will have put the nose way down, that they tried to pull up sharply, overstressing the airframe. 5 - Alternatively they may have simply gone supersonic in the dive as I mentioned above, with the airframe failing from aerodynamic loads rather than G-loading as such.Something like this kind of event sequence is certainly possible. However, I think that in this situation the disintegration of the airframe would have been sudden, not gradual as is suggested by the maintenance data transmissions. So my guess is a bomb that did not completely destroy the airframe immediately. If I'm right the crew will have been so busy dealing with controlability issues that they will not have had either the time or the desire to transmit a distress call. With the airframe shedding parts it would only be a matter of time till it simply disintegrated.So don't be so quick to dismiss the bomb hypothesis.

* Sudden total catastrophic break-up due to unknown causes. How many times does this happen with an airliner of the Airbus categoryKnown cause--the AA flight in 2001. Do you think that aircraft would have survived intact had it lost the rudder in the flight levels?What about the Aloha Airlines "Pop top"?I am not surprised you'd be partial to the bomb theory Braun, given your history of posts regarding TWA-800. Bomb threats are called in almost daily on aircraft that never crash, including flights I have been on after the first Gulf war. Maybe the press is getting wise regarding not giving every would be terrorist and nut case lip service when a catasrophe like this happens by lending weight to their bomb threats. I do have to wonder how many people are out here with vested interest in the industry (investments, etc) either conciously or unconciously try to divert attention from the fact that aircraft can and do sometimes have catostrophic failure without intervention such as a bomb?One other theory I believe possible, given the weather and exposure to electical storms, is that of cargo being onboard that was highly volatile in such circumstances. Even if such cargo shouldn't be onboard, a lot of merchandise travels back and forth on the globe that is not what's stated on the manifest, people look for a cheap or quick way to ship their goods.It is too early to cite or dismiss anything as the cause, IMHO. Bomb? Maybe. Structural failure? Maybe. Flight crew gone mad? That's a possibility too. But some will declare "bomb" no matter what just as some still believe TWA-800 was part of some evil conspiracy.

John...you are out of line here with your statement about me. I'm not the only individual in this thread who feels that a bomb is a real possibility. Is the ad-hominem attack your choice of rebuttal nowadays?I consider your comments ill thought out, and certainly less valid than me saying a bomb is the most plausible explanation until proven otherwise.Braun

What about the Aloha Airlines "Pop top"?

PS John...the Aloha landed safely. The Airbus did not.bt

....So don't be so quick to dismiss the bomb hypothesis.

I am not quickly dismissing it as a theory, but I don't want to exclude others. My post towards Braun was given his track record on TWA 800, and the fact he seems to appear in the forums whenever there's even a slight suspicion of a bomb or terrorist event or anything unexplained (in the "X-files" zone, so to speak). It gets kind of old for me, that's all. I feel it is still way too early, in the absence of physical evidence, for anyone to dismiss ANY theory or attach to any theory. Until (if) evidence can be obtained, the only thing we know is that whatever happened, it was not instant and probably resulted in a long amount of anxiety and suffering for those aboard. If it is indeed a bomb, I hope a long amount of anxiety and suffering could be extracted against the parties responsible. However if it proves to be a catastrophic failure of the aircraft, or due to mistakes in judgement, or from both, I would hope we don't see conspiracies floating around for years trying to divert attention away from valuable lessons that could be learned to save lives in the future. -John

John...you are out of line here with your statement about me. I'm not the only individual in this thread who feels that a bomb is a real possibility. Is the ad-hominem attack your choice of rebuttal nowadays?I consider your comments ill thought out, and certainly less valid than me saying a bomb is the most plausible explanation until proven otherwise.BraunPS John...the Aloha landed safely. The Airbus did not.bt

Braun, I think if you look at my posts as a whole I do not attack members out of line. Nor did I insult you or claim you are the only person with this "theory" regarding the accident. So please get all your ducks in a row before you accuse me of singling you out, capice?I call 'em as I see 'em, and you have shown a pretty consistent track record of considering aviation incidents in terms of suspecting terrorist events even after investigations have been conducted. The Aloha landed safely, the AA Airbus did not. So I again ask, don't you think at altitude, that type of event could have caused a breakup of an Airbus? I think both a bomb can and that type of event can. So if you are going to cite my posts to debunk me, at least take the entire post into account and not what suits you. 'Nuff said

am not quickly dismissing it as a theory, but I don't want to exclude others. My post towards Braun was given his track record on TWA 800, and the fact he seems to appear in the forums whenever there's even a slight suspicion of a bomb or terrorist event or anything unexplained (in the "X-files" zone, so to speak). It gets kind of old for me, that's all. I feel it is still way too early, in the absence of physical evidence, for anyone to dismiss ANY theory or attach to any theory. -John

John...I am quite surprised at your arrogance and hubris. I've posted hundreds of times since I posted my last word on TWA-800, and never once did it pertain to anything that you ascribe to me. You accuse me of presupposition and conspiracy theory but you are the only one here with a tin-foil hat on this topic.Grow up John and either debate on facts or keep your personal opinion about me out of your comments.Braun

John...I am quite surprised at your arrogance and hubris. I've posted hundreds of times since I posted my last word on TWA-800, and never once did it pertain to anything that you ascribe to me. You accuse me of presupposition and conspiracy theory but you are the only one here with a tin-foil hat on this topic.Grow up John and either debate on facts or keep your personal opinion about me out of your comments.Braun

What facts, that's my question? What facts do you have that the rest of us don't that make you so certain this was a bomb? I did not attack you or question your maturity Braun, only your track record of such posts. If you want to question mine, PM me and I am sure I can conduct an exchange in language that would even make a sailor blush. Hardly grown up, but I do vent when I read such remarks. But I won't rise to such bait in the forums...

What facts, that's my question? What facts do you have that the rest of us don't that make you so certain this was a bomb? I did not attack you or question your maturity Braun, only your track record of such posts. If you want to question mine, PM me and I am sure I can conduct an exchange in language that would even make a sailor blush. Hardly grown up, but I do vent when I read such remarks. But I won't rise to such bait in the forums...

Final comment from me on the topic of "you and me".I did not question your maturity, I told you to "grow up", but if taking it offline and "making a sailor blush" is your reflection of maturity, perhaps I should have.I agree that all possibilities are real. I said that in my original post. I also say, based upon the combined evidence of sudden catastrophic failure without any response from the crew indicates explosive decompression. Add to that the bomb threat days earlier for the same route or one close by, a bomb is the most plausible explanation until disproved.Bomb threats do happen all the time, and many are baseless. In this case we have a bomb threat and evidence of explosion, including witness reports of a fireball and the plane streaming downward. Those ARE the facts as they are known today.Braun

Final comment from me on the topic of "you and me".I did not question your maturity, I told you to "grow up", but if taking it offline and "making a sailor blush" is your reflection of maturity, perhaps I should have.I agree that all possibilities are real. I said that in my original post. I also say, based upon the combined evidence of sudden catastrophic failure without any response from the crew indicates explosive decompression. Add to that the bomb threat days earlier for the same route or one close by, a bomb is the most plausible explanation until disproved.Bomb threats do happen all the time, and many are baseless. In this case we have a bomb threat and evidence of explosion, including witness reports of a fireball and the plane streaming downward. Those ARE the facts as they are known today.Braun

The failure was not sudden from what is being reported in so far. The only thing sudden was lost of comms, but even with my limited experience in the cockpit I was trained to deal with emergencies first, and worry about comms later. And, a fireball is not just the end result of only a bomb--there are many causes. Anything could have caused fuel to ignite if either of the wings had separated from the aircraft, such as might have happened if a control surface was lost due to a structural failure. Forces in those instances are strong enough to tear an aircraft apart when you lose control in one or more axis--even a modern airliner. Also regarding the bomb threat, to my knowledge it was reported against a flight from Argentina to France on or around May 27th. But here we're talking about the media, which as already suggested is not the most reliable source of information. I wonder how many other threats took place that day, and on the day of the crash? So I would ask you to play devil's advocate and add to what causes other than a bomb may bring an aircraft down. Braun, when any tragedy happens you are usually the first to offer condolences in these forums. I suspect you were one of the first to jump in and contribute to Avsim when their servers went down. But I do feel I have a right to disagree or at least disbelieve in such a theory at this time and include your past discussions in coming to that conclusions. If that's a sign of arrogance and my needing to "grow up", so be it.

I think a far more likely explanation than a bomb is something like the following: the pitot tubes and static ports ice up in some CB, that causes erroneous speed indications to various systems, the autothrottles push up to add speed because the icing on those systems is causing them to report that the aircraft is going slow, with that occurring, the combination of turbulence and overspeeding causes some sort of aerodynamic load-induced structural damage, perhaps exacerbated by heavy control inputs when trying to battle with the turbulence.It's a guess, but it would explain the thing sending a series of ACARS failure messages one at a time, of which, among the last ones were the rudder limiter being overridden and the pressure control being effected, perhaps indicating that the tailfin was damaged, which may have then caused damage to the rear pressure bulkhead.Al

Airbus is reporting that the aircraft's computer systems were reporting contradictory airspeed information.Here is a link.

In this case we have a bomb threat and evidence of explosion, including witness reports of a fireball and the plane streaming downward.

No, we don't have any witnesses reporting fireballs, you probably mean midair fireballs, and no, no witnesses reporting aircraft falling down while on fire, we have some potential sightings of spots of fire on water, that is all. Sorry you keep bending the facts to suit your agenda. Assuming for a moment it was a bombing, who? motives? So far all attempted or successful acts of terrorism against aircraft had well understood political motives behind them, no "fuzzy" logic here.

Hello,Hmmmm ...The first ACARS report event is:Disconnection of the autopilot (think about what make disconnect a autopilot in a A330)Cause this and the other ACARS reports and with no more infos available .. I rule out the possibility of a bomb...Regards.

Even though I personally don't think it was a bomb, the lack of a claim of responsibility alone, does not mean it was not. Some bomb attacks are for publicity or other reasons, but, imagine I wanted to kill someone in particular and thought the best way to do it was to blow up a plane they were travelling on. It would be unlikely that I would then claim responsibility for it.Although it is hard to imagine someone being so callous as to not care about all the other people one would kill in perpetrating such an act, we know there are people in the world who wouldn't think twice about such an act.Al

No, we don't have any witnesses reporting fireballs ...

Actually, there was a very early report of an airline crew having observed a descending fireball in the general vicinity of where the accident aircraft is believed to have gone down. The report may not have been true but it existed. I saw it, and btacon probably also saw it.

Hello,Hmmmm ...The first ACARS report event is:Disconnection of the autopilot (think about what make disconnect a autopilot in a A330)Cause this and the other ACAR reports and with no more infos available .. I rule out the possibility of a bomb...Regards.

A small explosion near the main electrical equipment bay probably is quite capable of starting a fire that would take out the autopilot if the explosion itself didn't do it. I'm guessing but I can't imagine a modern autopilot design that didn't self-check for connection integrity and then take itself offline if it saw trouble.Again, I'm not insisting that it was a bomb, but it's the simplest explanation so far and therefore the most likely so far.

Hello,

Actually, there was a very early report of an airline crew having observed a descending fireball in the general vicinity of where the accident aircraft is believed to have gone down. The report may not have been true but it existed. I saw it, and btacon probably also saw it.

This is two reports about fire or fireballs...A very early by a TAM crew who seen fire ON SEA (The TAM was in vicinity of the AF447 route)A other report (some days after) of a Air Comet crew who see fireballs descending in the air.This plane was at time of seeing at 1000 kilometer separated from the flight plan route of the AF447 ....The experts rule out the Air Comet crew report.Regards.

Actually, there was a very early report of an airline crew having observed a descending fireball in the general vicinity of where the accident aircraft is believed to have gone down. The report may not have been true but it existed. I saw it, and btacon probably also saw it.A small explosion near the main electrical equipment bay probably is quite capable of starting a fire that would take out the autopilot if the explosion itself didn't do it. I'm guessing but I can't imagine a modern autopilot design that didn't self-check for connection integrity and then take itself offline if it saw trouble.Again, I'm not insisting that it was a bomb, but it's the simplest explanation so far and therefore the most likely so far.

Another possibility that I don't believe has been mentioned is an onboard fire similar to the one that brought down the MD-11 (Swissair 111) near Canada some years' back. A fire doesn't need a bomb to get started, just some source of ignition. Even Lipo's gone bad can cause a fire and they are finding their way into more and more consumer goods these days. The weather could be a cruel coincidence. I don't discount bomb is a candidate for a cause, but I also don't think it's the simplest explanation. Just a possible one. I certainly don't believe a bomb itself would have been the source of the flash seen by some of the pilots in the area--if it was a bomb, it's something the bomb or subsequent fire (as you suggest) ignited. The big challenge is the unthinkable, because the thought of anything causing a widebody jet to vanish and/or break apart other than a bomb would cause those of us who travel regularly a great deal of anxiety beyond what the threat of terrorism already places on us.I hope they find answers, not only for the general public but especially for the families that don't know what happened to their loved ones or why.-John