[ChadGore]

Re: That makes no sense. How the heck could the airplane take off from Moscow at 10:35 pm and disappear from radar (presumably explode or crash) at 10:59 pm, when the crash site was several hundred miles from Moscow? Either (a) there's some timezone weirdness there between Moscow and Rostov-on-Don--maybe Rostov is an hour behind Moscow and the times are both local--or (b) the plane dropped off radar 24 minutes after takeoff and kept flying for over an hour. There's no way it could've covered more than, what, 120 to 150 miles in the first 24 minutes, on climbout?

Our best guess at this point is that the departure times in the WashPost story were not correct.

[Moose4]

Yeah, I read that after I posted (doh!). That makes more sense...takeoff at 2135, off radar at 2259, so an hour and 24 minutes would put it about in the right place if you assume a normal cruise around 450-500 knots airspeed, and allow for a climb to 10,000+ meters, 33,000+ feet, which I'd assume would be cruise altitude for a jetliner like that.

I do wonder if the FSB will ask for American FBI or NTSB help? They've probably got the resources, but then again, the NTSB is generally considered to be the best in the world at accident investigation.

}:-)4