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Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

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Re: Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

#401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The phrase "Wikipedia agrees" succinctly encodes the correct degree of confidence, as opposed to "it's true, see Wikipedia".

An argument can be made, I guess, if one leaves out the exclamation... "Wikipedia agrees!"

You're really reaching for nitpicks, there.

Re: Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

#402

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the pilots want to kill you, all they have to do is fly into the ground, and there's absolutely nothing you can do to stop them and nothing short of complete automation could ever remove that risk. I can't think of scenarios where the pilots would particularly want to survive after murdering all their passengers.

With https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethiopian_Airlines_Flight_702 when the co-pilot hijacked the plane to ask for political asylum in Switzerland, I remember news coverage reporting that he had threatened the passengers to cut off the air supply if they didn't remain seated. Must have been quite distressing.

This just reinforces the argument that the pilot is in control, and he can do as he likes. Fly normally, change course, kill everyone... When you step into a plane you put your life in the hands of a pilot.

Re: Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

#403
post #276
post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strikes me as a desperate attempt to save face and explain away the most plausible explanation - that one of their pilots committed an atrocity.

Considering lithium batteries have been known to combust in an impressive firestorm, it definitely seems worth trying to rule out. But the fruit being involved does seem implausible.

> it definitely seems worth trying to rule out. But the fruit being involved does seem implausible.

The other day learned about farmers drying hay before stacking it, because (who would even imagine this?) it turns out stacks of hay can catch fire if there is too much moister in them, due to a biological chemical reaction.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spontaneous_combustion#Hay

Re: Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

#404
post #396
post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From tfa > In the interest of knowing where every plane is at all times, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) began requiring that all airliners manufactured after the 1st of January 2021 include autonomous tracking devices that broadcast their location once per minute.

It's bat shit insane that we're 50 years in to the industry and ~20-25 years in to GPS and this is still only happening in 2021.

It won't save lives and wouldn't have saved lives. It's only to improve the efficiency of recovery operations.

Re: Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

#405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethiopian_Airlines_Flight_702 when the co-pilot hijacked the plane to ask for political asylum in Switzerland, I remember news coverage reporting that he had threatened the passengers to cut off the air supply if they didn't remain seated. Must have been quite distressing.

This just reinforces the argument that the pilot is in control, and he can do as he likes. Fly normally, change course, kill everyone... When you step into a plane you put your life in the hands of a pilot.

It would be pretty easy to remove "kill everyone except me" as one of those options, if we thought it was worth it (which again, it probably isn't). Just mandate that an override switch for the life support systems be accessible in the passenger compartment.

Re: Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

#406

If you haven't seen it, this Google Map of all found debris is quite interesting: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1Kghrk3iwRInii5qBTG...

Crash aside - this is very well-done and cool map. I wish Google made maps like this more easily searchable / discoverable.

Re: Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

#407

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This just reinforces the argument that the pilot is in control, and he can do as he likes. Fly normally, change course, kill everyone... When you step into a plane you put your life in the hands of a pilot.

It would be pretty easy to remove "kill everyone except me" as one of those options, if we thought it was worth it (which again, it probably isn't). Just mandate that an override switch for the life support systems be accessible in the passenger compartment.

> It would be pretty easy to remove "kill everyone except me" as one of those options, if we thought it was worth it (which again, it probably isn't).

The idea is to keep everyone except the pilot alive but unconscious until things improve. I think it's preferable to everyone unconscious and eventually dead.

Re: Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

#408
post #198

> But Sherlock Holmes was right: once we have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. This matter isn't entertainment fiction, and nobody involved is Sherlock Holmes. Hundreds of people died. Amateurs publicly casting blame on one of the presumed dead seems unfair to the individual accused, and insensitive to the families. Especially when it depends on bits like this:…

One does not need to be a professional to deduce possibilities and eliminate them. Given the facts, it can only lead to a few possibilities. Facts don’t care about your feelings.

Re: Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

#409
> Routine automatic satellite communications were made approximately every hour, except for the initial period of the flight between 01:21 and 02:25, when some kind of power interruption to the airplane’s satellite data unit had prevented the satellite from making contact. After that, every hour or so a ground station in Perth sent a query (or “handshake”) to the plane via a geostationary satellite located over the Indian Ocean.

I didn't see any comments referring to this +1hr blackout of the sat unit. This happened right after the 1.19 ATC handoff.

Does anyone know if this signal could have been faked (e.g. by someone sitting in a boat in the ocean)? I assume the tx and rcv end points have some sort of private identifier.

Re: Seven years on, what do we know about the disappearance of flight MH370? (2021)

#410
Interesting bits from the reading:

Communication devices lost contact.

The first turn can only be done by an experienced pilot.

No distress calls. Or passenger attempted cellular communication when they became within range.

Flight path matches similarly to Pilot’s in-home game simulator.

If an explosion occurred wiping out communication devices, it was only a matter of time before they crashed. The plane was on radar and tracked going south for several hours.

Due to the many turns, someone had to be in control of the plane in some capacity after the first turn.

It leaves me to two conclusions.

An alien parasite froze everyone. Made the pilot turn off communications. Made the pilot fly a flight pattern that closely resembles the one at home.

The pilot picked that specific flight as his last. Why he didn’t just nose dived immediately will be answered in the remaining hours he was on that flight. It would be inhumane to keep crew/passengers alive to witness their own demise. Thus I believe he was alive and alone heading south.

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