News French plane lost over Atlantic

[Urwumpe]

Anyway, my doubts grow that we would ever be able to know what happened in detail. The more days go by, the more unlikely it gets to even find anything I think. Not to mention the black box especially if we consider the depth of the ocean. I fear the worst...

Give me a high enough bounty for finding it, and I will do so.

The region in which it could have crashed is just a few hundred square km large, small compared to the regions that had to be searched for years to find some shipwrecks...

 

[Notebook]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/8086860.stm

N.

 

[doggie015]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/8086860.stm

N.

24 error messages. That might explain a lot, I feel sorry for everyone who lost someone in this tragic accident.

Getting off topic here but to lighten things up a bit: Do you think they ran a Pre-SP1 Vista install? :lol:

 

[Urwumpe]

Update: At the current state of the investigation, the Airbus was flying with faulty air data sensors, Air France did not yet exchange the part despite a recommendation by Airbus.

Additionally, the first victims had been found now, together with wreckage. What disturbs the success: The German government had already discovered a large floating part of the wreck by the help of a "satellite of the federal government of germany" 55 hours after the crash and reported it to France and Brazil.

As the federal government currently only owns a single satellite system, and this is also extremely fitting to the weather situation and activity, this must have been the brand-new SAR-Lupe radar satellite system of the German military. It is a special constellation of five radar satellites, designed for quickly getting information about a region, as well as also producing high quality ISAR images by pointing up to three satellites at a target. The official resolution of the SAR Lupe system is already "less than 1m" by a single satellite, assuming typical satellite pointing errors and the constellation used, the SAR-Lupe system should be able to produce radar images with a few cm accuracy when multiple satellites are pointed at a target.

Still... it does not explain why the people had been searching so long in the wrong region...

 

[SiberianTiger]

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americas/06/06/brazil.plane.crash/index.html

The bodies of two men, one of whom was confirmed to be a passenger from the Air France plane that crashed Monday, were found early Saturday, a Brazilian air force spokesman said.

Also found were a backpack and a leather briefcase containing an airplane ticket with a reservation code, which Air France verified belonged to a passenger on the jet, Jorge Amaral said.


The Brazilian navy and air force said the backpack contained a laptop, and an oxygen mask also was discovered, the Brazilian navy and air force said.

 

[Moonwalker]

There are rumors going on across the web, but meanwhile I've also heard it in real life sadly, that Flight 447 possibly got shot down by the US secret service.

I don't know if I should laugh, cry or vomit. Does this never stop? How many drugs do people take? The psychiatries must be crowded obviously...

 

[doggie015]

There are rumors going on across the web, but meanwhile I've also heard it in real life sadly, that Flight 447 possibly got shot down by the US secret service.

I don't know if I should laugh, cry or vomit. Does this never stop? How many drugs do people take? The psychiatries must be crowded obviously...

Think about it: Why would the US bother shooting down a plane from an allied country? And terrorism may not be the cause, if they lost all power then the weather radar would have gone offline as well, making it rather easy to blunder into a Cumulonimbus (Thunderstorm) cloud, those clouds produce VIOLENT upward and downward air currents at once (Many thousands of feet per SECOND), more than enough to tear apart anything, never mind an A330

 

[Moonwalker]

Think about it: Why would the US bother shooting down a plane from an allied country? And terrorism may not be the cause, if they lost all power then the weather radar would have gone offline as well, making it rather easy to blunder into a Cumulonimbus (Thunderstorm) cloud, those clouds produce VIOLENT upward and downward air currents at once (Many thousands of feet per SECOND), more than enough to tear apart anything, never mind an A330

I think it is unlikely that they flew into cb within just a very few minutes after the WXR might have gone offline. The storms across the route also were not unusually strong. At the moment it sadly looks like technical problems basically. There is at least no different evidence yet.

They really need to find the balck box. But I have less and less hope.

 

[movieman]

24 error messages. That might explain a lot, I feel sorry for everyone who lost someone in this tragic accident.

Supposedly these are the messages (I found the link on another forum), but I'm not sure how to decipher them; I know more than any human should need to about how ACARS messages are sent and received by satellite, but have little idea of what's in them .

http://img32.imageshack.us/img32/7547/acarsaf447d.png

 

[Andy44]

There are rumors going on across the web, but meanwhile I've also heard it in real life sadly, that Flight 447 possibly got shot down by the US secret service.

Wat

 

[Notebook]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/8087573.stm

N.

 

[doggie015]

UPDATE:

Debris has been found: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshowpics/4627231.cms

 

[Moonwalker]

Supposedly these are the messages (I found the link on another forum), but I'm not sure how to decipher them; I know more than any human should need to about how ACARS messages are sent and received by satellite, but have little idea of what's in them .

Well, the messages received are related to following systems/problems, almost from bottom to top:

- electronic flight control systems
- auto flight system
- flags on the captains and first officers primary flight displays (which means loss of indicated data)
- navigation air data reference disagree
- integrated standby instrument system (the standby instruments on the center main instrument panel)
- innertial reference 1 and 2 (explains the air data reference disagree I think, there are three innertial reference systems available all in all)
- flight control computer primary and secondary number 1 faults (there are 3 primary and two secondary computers, each number one had faults obviously)
- auto flight system / flight management and guidance computer
- advisory, which is I think related to a TCAS (traffic alert and collision avoidance system) advisory message received/indicated
- vacuum system controller and lavatory configuration message (which is related to the waste water and toilet system)
- the auto pilot was turned off by the crew or which is more likely disconnected automatically due to innertial reference disagree and problems with the electronic flight control systems
- alternate law of the flight control became active
- the auto throttle had been switched off or disconnected automatically
- TCAS fault
- flight control rudder travel limit fault

 

[Quick_Nick]

I kind of guessed most, but not all of those. Any idea which ones came at what times? Some warnings might not be as significant as others if they happened at certain times or in that rush of rapid messages. And... wasn't there some indication of loss of pressure? That doesn't seem to be here anyways.

 

[Moonwalker]

wasn't there some indication of loss of pressure? That doesn't seem to be here anyways.

That's listed as well. I just confused it with a TCAS message. Regarding the A330 maintenance manual, the ADVISORY warning is related to the cabin pressure controller obviously (code 2131).

They obviously flew through a storm system indeed. The pitot tubes got affected badly I think (most likely frozen) causing air data loss/confusion, series malfunctions and all the ACARS warning (WRN) and failure (FLR) messages. I also think that heavy turbulences did the rest. It must have been a real nightmare. I have no doubt the cause was a strong storm system.

 

[movieman]

BTW, there's a very thorough thread here, including comments from Airbus pilots:

http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/376433-af447-24.html

The most likely candidate does seem to be frozen pitot tubes when the aircraft was so close to the limits of its capabilities that even a small error in velocity could either cause a stall (if too slow) or exceed the structural limitations of the airframe (if too fast).

 

[Moonwalker]

BTW, there's a very thorough thread here, including comments from Airbus pilots:

http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/376433-af447-24.html

The most likely candidate does seem to be frozen pitot tubes when the aircraft was so close to the limits of its capabilities that even a small error in velocity could either cause a stall (if too slow) or exceed the structural limitations of the airframe (if too fast).

Frozen tubes is what I expected as well when I first had a look to the ACARS log. I have almost no doubt that a storm system was the cause rather likely.

Clear ice and sleet when flying though cumulonimbus can overcome electric pitot tube heating easily. Concorde was an exception which did not even require electric pitot tube heating anymore during the Mach 2 cruise climb (I guess more than 120°C is enough heating ).

 

[Urwumpe]

Update: The nearly impossible happened, the french nuclear submarine in the region picked up the weak sonar signals of the Black boxes and is now triangulating the position.

As sonar signals are not moving in a straight line in the ocean, this will be a bit more complex as finding the boxes over radio signals, but that they received the weak signals is already a good sign, the submarine must be very close to the target.

 

[tl8]

That is good news. It there still enough time before the batteries run down.

 

[Poscik]

Maybe some interesting information:

Translating from this site: http://www.efakt.pl/Spoznila-sie-na-lot-airbusem-zginela-w-wypadku,artykuly,46491,1.html

Italian woman, who was late to AFR447, have died in car crash in Austria. Info from ANSA agency.

Johanna Ganthaler with her husband, arrived on airport too late to enter AFR447 deck. So they decided to fly to Europe next day. Car, which had been driven by marriage, probably entered opposite direction lane and crashed with lorry. Her husband is in hospital and he is strongly wounded.