Posted on 11/17/2001 10:58:21 AM PST by MeekOneGOP
Saturday, Nov. 17, 2001 11:39 a.m. EST Flight 587 Video Shows 'Puff of Smoke' in Sky A second-by-second videotape of the final moments of doomed American Airlines Flight 587 shows a puff of smoke in the sky seconds after it crashed outside New York's JFK Airport Monday, lending credence to eyewitnesses who say the jetliner exploded before slamming into a Rockaway, N.Y., neighborhood. Though Flight 587 probers have not released the key videotape, shot from a Metropolitan Transportation Authority highway surveillance camera, reporters from New York's Daily News were allowed to view it Friday. "The tape ... shows a white outline of the jetliner against a clear sky in fairly steep decline," the News reported in Saturday editions. "Seconds later, the outline disappears and the video shows a blurry, white, undefined patch as the plane apparently breaks apart." Visible in one of the final frames of the sequential videotape is "a puff of white smoke in the sky." The images of Flight 587's final moments are said to be "very unclear." FBI and NTSB investigators hope to learn more through video enhancement techniques. On Friday, MTA spokesman Tom Kelly told NewsMax.com that the FBI had turned the videotape over to the NTSB, but apparently both agencies now have copies and continue to analyze them. Enhancement of the Flight 587 video could confirm the accounts of eyewitnesses like Jackie Powers, who, minutes after the crash, told both ABC News and WABC Radio in New York that she saw "an enormous flash" near the wing on the A-300 Airbus before it dropped from the sky. "I don't know if it was fire or an explosion," she said. "It appeared that debris fell from the left side [of the plane]. It just plummeted. It had no momentum whatsoever. It just plummeted." Dozens of other witnesses told various media outlets they saw the jet either explode or catch fire before it crashed. An explosion would be a problem for NTSB officials, who spent the better part of the last few days trying to sell the idea that the plane's vertical stabilizer snapped off, causing the in-flight breakup, because of "wake turbulence" from a Japan Airlines 747 that had taken off from JFK two minutes earlier. Independent aviation experts have generally scoffed at the NTSB theory. "[747 wake turbulence] is not strong enough to be able to break off a tail or to compromise any sort of a normal airplane," said ABC News aviation analyst John Nance on Friday. "They could turn a little airplane upside down. But especially an A-300, which is a jumbo jet - no way in the world should that ever have any potentially disastrous impact on the aircraft or the tail," he explained. On Wednesday, an unnamed aviation expert quoted in New York's Newsday said one likely explanation for Flight 587's breakup was a bomb exploding on board. (See: Aviation Expert: Bomb One Likely Cause of Flight 587 Crash.)
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Yes, I know there is no such force in physics as decceleration ...
Actually there is one of part of the rudder. I'll repeat the Link It's the upper right picture.
There is some truth to being skeptical about eyewitness accounts (not the same things as completely discounting an eyewitness account). I saw a program once, I think on Discovery Channel, about a college class. It was either a criminal justice class or psychology course. Anyway, the professor and only several students (the participants), staged an event during a class hour (I can't recall what the "event" was exactly, let's say threatening and stealing from the professor). During this staged event, several students came into the classroom, yelling and ranting and taking something. They quickly left. Shortly afterward, the test subjects (the ignorant classmates) were questioned, individually and in a group, about the individuals involved, what did they look like, what were they wearing, etc. None of the students who broke into the classrooms were wearing red, but when police investigators asked a leading question (like, wasn't someone wearing a red hat), they were answered positively (yes, actually, I didn't remember that at first, but they were). Or descriptions of the subjects varied. The point of this was to have the class (who were later told about the staging) realize how eyewitness testimony is not 100% accurate and can be persuaded from factual account. With this in mind, I still believe that eyewitness testimony should not be ruled out or disbelieved, especially if the account was not recorded under leading questions. (Sorry for the long comment.)
You people are so predictable. By the way, 41 people say that the shots came from the Book Depository. 2 people on the Grassy Knoll said the shots came from there and Zapruder wasn't one of them.
It would be easier for the government to say that terrorists did it rather than thinking that the next plane you get on, parts are going to fall off.
Your proof is really good. I used a search engine and just pulled up the first of many. Thanks!( I bookmarked that page)
The plane took off and flew normally. The plane encountered and flew through a jet wake. Seconds pass, the plane is pushed left, then left -right. The VS detaches, the engines fall off. The wings do not (in this report) detach. Note that the rudder and VS have no marks indicating damage.
This evidenciary report is consistent with a VS that fails (finally) after encountering normally survivable WT. The VS itself may have deflected (airframe shakes) or it may have been rudder flutter (airfrmae shakes), but I still see this crash as a tragic accident brought on by the failure of a weakened airframe or rudder failure. I'd blame Airbus.
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A friend of a friend sent this... Boeing stock anyone??
(Gary has dedicated his life to aerodynamics. He invented the Wheeler Vortex generator, and the "Gurney" wing on race cars. These are his views on the crashed Airbus.)
Howdy,
Re: the New York 11-12-2001 Airbus crash.
I found this photo of the vertical stabilizer's failed composite attachment blades, or webs. The bolts that attached the composite vertical stabilizer to the fuselage, remain properly attached. Clearly, the failure is a delamination of the composite vertical tail, above the points of attachment to the fuselage.
There are reasons (despite the weight savings) why Douglas Aircraft and Boeing have never used composites this way -- and you're looking at one.
As the delamination of the composite progressed, the entire 37-ft. tall vertical tail would have fluttered briefly & violently. That would explain why both engines were literally shaken off the airplane. (This is particularly remarkable, because unlike Douglas and Boeing, Airbus has bragged of purposely designing their engine mounting pylons to keep the engines in place no matter what!) One wing tip was found several blocks away from the main wreckage.
BTW, you'll be hearing a lot about an encounter with wake turbulence.
That is a red herring. Wake turbulence can make it difficult -- maybe even impossible to control the airplane -- but no amount of wake turbulence can remove the vertical tail at such low flight speeds unless there is a preexisting structural fault.
What is flutter? This morning, I got an email from a friend who is the Director of Structural Engineering of a major American aircraft maker.
He described a chilling picture: "Flutter modes often have an explosively quick onset, rising from nothing to catastrophic in the blink of an eye. Furthermore, the shaking can happen so fast that, despite the large (huge) deflections involved, an observer on the ground might not see it. It's just a blur.
"The people in the back of the airplane would have been shaken senseless and worse as the seats tore loose and everything was homogenized back there; but it was all over a few seconds later."
The design weakness can and will be fixed on other Airbuses. If not, there are plenty of nice Boeing jetliners mothballed in the Mojave Desert, that can trade places with the Airbuses. In the meantime, I'm not riding Airbus.
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And I'm usually the first one on the conspiracy bandwagon.
Besides, if you haven't noticed, we don't have liars in the Whitehouse any more!
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