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I think I speak for everyone that loves flight as we simmers do when I say what a tragedy it is regarding MH370.

 

You can only imagine what the family of those on board must be feeling with so much uncertainty and seemingly contradictory information coming out at every turn.

 

I, like us all, pray and hope for a positive outcome, but it seems so unlikely with each passing hour and day.

 

Let's hope that sooner or later we find some sign of what happened and those families can find some peace.

My mum used to fly with the captain when he was still a F/O back in her cabin crew days. 

I also feel very sorry for the families of the passengers and crew. This whole story leaves me with a big "something is just not right here", feeling.

 

Mel

Time will tell what happend that night!

 

My thoughts are with all the families and friends who have their loved ones on the flight!

This is the one incident that got me most curious...

Another way to do it, but would be quite expensive as it would require changes to ATC Radar, as well as the aircraft, but would be relatively foolproof. Is to have a secondary transponder on the aircraft, that activates whenever power either from Battery, standby power, APU, engines, or ram turbine., and can not be turned off by the pilots. It would squawk a default transponder code (Like 1200 is the default for VFR) that ATC radar would normally ignore (but be recorded) but can switch on if needed. Only when the primary transponder is squawking would it be overridden. If the primary trans is switched off the plane would continue transmitting with the default code. Data transmitted would be the same as the primary (Alt, speed, etc) except it would identify by registration number instead of flight number. This way the planes location and telemetry can be tracked, as long as there is any source of electrical power, that no one in the cockpit could defeat. Like I say it would be expensive to implement, and would need international buy in to do, but it would prevent disappearances like this in the future. Of course planes may still go down, but at least you would always know where!

The mechanics of what you are proposing would still cause confusion for ATC for various reasons. Even if there was a transponder that cannot be deactivated aboard that aircraft, it can still disappear because it is not the lack of aircraft transmissions that allows them to disappear over the ocean, but rather the lack of ATC receivers. When you are over the middle of the ocean, there are no radar sites to receive your always-on transponder signal.

I see it this way....The cable company has a fleet of vehicles that are GPS tracked. And when the Cable Guy van has been found to be parked at a local strip club he loses his job because his employer can see that one of their vans has been parked out front on GPS tracking.

 

My iPhone can be found when I lost it with a simple 'Find iPhone' app. But we can't find a $300 million dollar airliner?

 

I agree these planes should be broadcasting more flight information back to the airlines that own them constantly.

How well does that app work if the iphone was in the middle of the ocean? Not that the technology doesn't exist, but to track aircraft no matter where they are is going to require investment in satcom equipment.

Latest development is USA navy is steaming the US KIDD towards a position in the Indian Ocean after receiving strong information. Seems they have by passed the Malaysian control center on this one.

 

The families need some closure. I really for them

Latest development is USA navy is steaming the US KIDD towards a position in the Indian Ocean after receiving strong information. Seems they have by passed the Malaysian control center on this one.

 

The families need some closure. I really for them

 

Just seen this, very interesting development. I just pray that the details are known soon so that at least the families can get that closure one way or another. Of course you will be preparing for the worst of news by now, but the uncertainty must be awful nonetheless.

I have had this idea bouncing aroumd my head for the last few days because of the Malaysian flight disappearance.

 

Albeit a costly indeavor, it would be possible with 21st century technology to have a constant data/audio/video feed of every commercial airplane in the sky. Each plane would continuously uplink data/audio that is present in the black boxes in real time to geosynchronous satellites. It is then downlinked and saved in vast server farms for later scrutiny. The data can also be monitored in realtime by the proper authorities/NTSB if need be. A video portion from within the cockpit and cabin could also be added. The black boxes would become a secondary data source for redundancy purposes only.

 

If we had a system like this in place, it would be great tool for flight safety.

I was reading yesterday, that the FAA had issued a notice that came into effect right after or before this incident(don't quote me on the after or before), about a crack in the fuselage in the area of the satcom. The article made reference to the Payne Stewart accident years ago, as what can happen in the event of failure of the fuselage in that area. I could be quoting it wrong but it was along those lines. IMHO if it was something had to do with the bogus passports, I think the authorities would have said something or a world wide travel alert would be issued, which hasn't to my knowledge. So to me it's just coincidance. I wish, well to say I hope that this plane is somewhere safe and just unable to make contact due to unforseen reason.

 

 

Latest development is USA navy is steaming the US KIDD towards a position in the Indian Ocean after receiving strong information

 

The way the information was released, not indicating what that "strong information" was, makes me think it was some classified sensor that picked it up.

 

Actually, it seems like "the authorities" from all the countries are reluctant to release information.  In addition, the generic reporters from the news media don't seem to have the technical expertise to ask intelligent questions.

Consider the possibility that MH370 is actually somewhere in western China (or Myanmar) and NOT in the ocean.

Remember Entebbe for a parallel..

january

I was reading yesterday, that the FAA had issued a notice that came into effect right after or before this incident(don't quote me on the after or before), about a crack in the fuselage in the area of the satcom.

 

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/12/us-malaysia-airplane-faa-idUSBREA2B1YN20140312

 

The article above describes this inspection order.  However, MH370 did not have that particular satcom antenna installed, and was not included in the inspection order.

This flight is as scary as Air France flight 447.

 

I hope everyone is okay somewhere, but it's not looking too good.  :(