Posted on 12/30/2014 12:29:43 AM PST by tcrlaf
Indonesian rescue teams said Tuesday that they had found bodies and what appeared to be debris from the AirAsia plane that vanished shortly after taking off from the airport here on Sunday.
Members of search teams told the Indonesian news media that they had spotted what appeared to be suitcases, life vests and aircraft debris. Indonesian television showed a rescuer descending from a helicopter toward a bloated corpse floating in the sea.
The debris was found in the Karimata Strait off the coast of Borneo. Search teams also spotted what appeared to be a larger piece of the fuselage of the plane, which was operated by the Indonesian affiliate of AirAsia.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Per CNN, Indonesian local TV is showing bodies in the water.
Per CNN, Indonesian officials saying the area the aircraft went down in is 120-150 ft deep.
-PJ
http://avherald.com/h?article=47d74074&opt=0
http://ad.easa.europa.eu/ad/2014-0266-E
Folks are beginning to wonder if this AOA probe freezing problem may be related.
An AD was recently issued for all Airbus variants with instructions on how to handle frozen AOA probes.
High altitude in a thunderstorm is definitely a freezing possibility.
How long would it take to get the procedures through the training cycle, especially in a place like Indonesia?
The “alpha protection” reference in the first article reminds me of that old joke, referencing the Paris airshow Airbus A320 demo crash:
Q: “What’s the difference between an Airbus and a chain saw?”
A: “About 3,000 trees per minute”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kHa3WNerjU
MH370 went winging off into a vast unoccupied ocean area, this one went down in one of the busiest and most densely inhabited areas on the planet - more to the point, it didn’t have the fuel to go cruise off for hours and hours. It had just enough to get where it was destined as a short hop flight plus a reasonable reserve.
I guess that will be part of the investigation, even if it is not a contributing factor to the incident.
Given that it looks like a breakup in flight, it may be that the AOA probes had nothing to do with it.
Heavy vessel traffic in QZ8501search area, from US warships to fishing boats MarineTraffic
Airbus is NOT a safe plane and they ought to be sued out of existence.
over 60 bodies now recovered....and counting...mny ships and boats in the area now to help...this will go quickly now.
I think he's right, it might be the AOA vanes freezing in position that caused this accident. That emergency AWD was dated 9 Dec 2014. We certainly can't rule it out yet, before the forensic investigation. Even a temporary loss of control could have caused the crew to fly into a thunderstorm they were otherwise avoiding, leading to a catastrophic breakup of the airplane.
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An occurrence was reported where an Airbus A321 aeroplane encountered a blockage of two Angle Of Attack (AOA) probes during climb, leading to activation of the Alpha Protection (Alpha Prot) while the Mach number increased. The flight crew managed to regain full control and the flight landed uneventfully. When Alpha Prot is activated due to blocked AOA probes, the flight control laws order a continuous nose down pitch rate that, in a worst case scenario, cannot be stopped with backward sidestick inputs, even in the full backward position. If the Mach number increases during a nose down order, the AOA value of the Alpha Prot will continue to decrease. As a result, the flight control laws will continue to order a nose down pitch rate, even if the speed is above minimum selectable speed, known as VLS. This condition, if not corrected, could result in loss of control of the aeroplane.
If it is yet another repeat of the vanes incident, and the pane not knowing what to do next, the discussion about cockpit reliance on technology is going to be endless.
“Airbus is NOT a safe plane and they ought to be sued out of existence.”
Airbus is heavy into Java. Imagine using Java to control airplanes.
Yes, well maybe it should be. Not just AOA vanes, but pitot systems freezing, and engines flaming out from high-altitude icing near storms. They're still not taking the issue of high-altitude upsets (with autopilot off) seriously. It's not a big topic in anyone's simulator program -- yet. But it can be caused by a number of different scenarios, and not just in an Airbus.
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Airline Regulators Grapple With Engine-Shutdown Peril
http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB120753185285993925
Damn!
All I can say is my prayers go out.
And as hard as it is to say it, at least this amounts to closure for the families and those involved.
I mentioned this in a post yesterday and got some pretty cranky responses. If it turns out to be the case I think Airbus has a real problem.
It’s just past sunset now at the recovery site so news may slow up until the morning. But additional resources and equipment will be headed to the site overnight.
ABC news is still saying wreckage “may have been spotted...”...
Not sure exactly what is going on... thank you abc news!
:-(
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