If the Air France crash was a terrorist attack, would they tell us?
 

This wouldn't be a good time economically for the airlines to suffer from terrorism fears now would it? Now, I am only speculating that it could be a reason for a plane to go down over the ocean, there could also be a catastrophic mechanical failure, a major electric failure, ice/weather, or a terrorist attack.

I haven't heard or seen any groups claiming responsibility (even if they are lying), but I am wondering how they already know it was weather related, and can rule out a terrorist bomb already. Did they hear any communication from the pilots prior to the crash?

Am I paranoid since I think the truth is what they want it to be?

Nope. Not at all. It makes you intuitive.

Although...in this case, I have no reason to doubt that this is anything other that what it appears to be. A tragic event caused by circumstance and not design.

I've actually heard that they have NOT ruled out a bomb or other kind of attack. As I've read it, weather is just the most likely suspect at the moment, given that they were flying into a pretty massive storm. That makes a missle attack unlikely, which just leaves the bomb theory. Which is the one that really worries me since the Shoe Bomber intended to do something very similar - crash a plane in the deep ocean.

If a storm wasn't a factor, then it would increase the likelihood. Turbulence alone isn't a heck of a lot to bring a plane down. It would have to be a combination of other issues, such as mechanical failure, pilot error, etc., if not terrorism.

I might be stupid, but if it were a terrorist attack wouldnt it be done in such a way that there really wasnt a chance of blaming a storm so they could get the credit? Terrorist rarely doing anything without wanting all the credit for it that they can get

Has anyone taken credit for it? Seems like even when it's accident some whack job groups jump up to claim "we did it!" I think it's a good fund rising move in certain parts of the world.

I know this is off topic but there isnt another thread going about this so I figured I'd just put it here

I was wondering about this on my drive home from work....with today's advanced technology....(and given the fact that flights are now letting passengers have wireless service) would it be that difficult to have the black box and cockpit voice recorders, gps tracking whatevers etc set to where while they are recording data, its simultaneously transmitting wirelessly to "somewhere" on the other end to be recorded as well? At least until the system that controlled it failed? I know it wouldnt replace finding those things, but wouldnt it help in situations like this where they have NO clue what happened?

I think that certainly could be done, technologically, and for a while now.
My guess is that it could become more of a concern for security purposes, people listening in to what they're not supposed to. So interception would probably be really hard to avoid.

If people could intercept a plane's GPS coordinates in real time, that would be very scary.

I know but surely there would be a work around for it. If I can get online and track any flight Dave is on within 10 minutes of real time (and thats pretty darn close for me) there has to be a way for them to securely transmit the data to whatever agency is tracking them at the time

Somebody help me invent this so we can be rich lol

Even if it were a terrorist attack, since the plane apparently experienced an event so catastrophic the pilots didn't have time to put out a mayday we may not know for a long time (if ever) why the plane sank, either way.

But if it is discovered to be terrorism, I don't think the odds of keeping that a secret are very good...someone involved will leak it and then the government would be embarrassed by trying to cover it up. Even if the government were not motivated by the public good, they would release the information in order to avoid the inevitable scandal that would follow a concealment.

The big problem I see with something like that isn't technological, but logistical. The kind of device you're talking about could be assembled by a half-way competent electronics geek using off-the-shelf components from your local Radio Shack. The problem is that there's only so many satellites in the sky, and only so many frequencies they can use to communicate. I don't pretend to know how many commercial aircraft circle the globe on a daily basis, so let's just rough it and say a fucking lot. Each one would need bandwidth allocated for all the data. If we're talking co-ordinates, that's one thing. CVR, that's a big chunk more. Telemetry, things start to get crazy. I'm not doing the numbers here so I could be wrong, but it just doesn't seem terribly likely to me that there's enough bandwidth available to support this for every plane in the sky, which defeats the purpose.

Regarding the Air France crash, though, I think you're right. The whole point of terrorist attacks is to inspire terror; hence the name. A freak storm bringing down a plane might make some people afraid to fly, but it doesn't have the same impact as a deliberate attack. The very fact that nobody's claimed this seems to be evidence that it wasn't a man made disaster.

If this was a terrorist attack, you wouldn't have to wait for the government to release anything. There would be terrorists jumping up and down saying, "That was me! I did that!"

Which would beg the question, why would you blow up a plane in the middle of the Ocean when you could do it over a populated centre for greater impact?

They found the debris this morning so I am sure we will eventually get some sort of answer on this.

If this were a terrorist attack, it would just be more support for the existence of the war on terror. I don't think the government would be reluctant to publicize it.

Charlatan put it in the right words, it just doesn't make sense for a terrorist to do it this way and without gloating about it.

I think the problem with what you're talking about at the moment is there are huge black out spots for sat. coverage in the mid to South Atlantic, Indian Ocean and to a lesser extent the South Pacific. No sat coverage, no GPS.

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I agree. If some terrorist group did this they'd take credit asap.

As for answers I think they may be slow in coming. Most of the reports I've read have the plane going down in waters somewhere between 6500-10,000ft. That's freaking deep water. The Titanic sits at about 12,000ft., so a little deeper. But really anything even close to that depth and you're talking maybe 6-8 (basing this number on conversations on a dive site I use, don't really know for sure) vessels in the world with diving capability like that. The weather on the surface is an issue. The weather there right now sucks and I don't think they'd try a dive to recover anything in it. Could be months before that changes. Then there's the issue of finding the black box. It has a "ping" device attached but they have no idea, as of the last report I read, whether it's working and won't know if it's still attached to the actually box until they retrieve it. The Brazilian Navy has the tech to find the pinging unit but not to recover it.

Long and short is this isn't going to be like TWA 800 that went down in a few hundred feet of water off the coast of Long island NY. Where they were able to literally recover and rebuild the craft. This planes in the middle of no where at a serious depth.

So, what I find strange is, we are a culture enamored with the cell phones. And not a one person on board had a chance to turn on the phone and call a relative or a friend like in the 9/11 hijacking of that plane. Not one person? Not one distress call from any of the three experienced pilots? I realize it was night and several passengers were likely asleep, but the type of turbulence. Loss of cabin pressure wakes me up. I don't get it.

As many people have mentioned, a terrorist organization would have claimed it already. After all, if something is a terrorist attack and no one knows it, it doesnt terrorize anyone.

Furthermore, the two countries involved, Brazil and France, have been fairly critical of the war on terror, so I guess the US and Britain would actually have more of a vested interest to make it known publicly as quickly as possible if this was the case.

---------- Post added at 07:48 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:46 PM ----------

The problem with that is that this airplane was over 700 miles away from any coast. No signal for a cell, etc.

Maybe the terrorists are getting smarter, if planes start dropping out of the sky once a week, and no one knows how or who is behind it, it puts a different twist on things. It would definitely start to terrorize people if you don't know if your plane might be next.

But, what I worry about is that if they do find explosive residue somehow, then they would cover it up since there would be nothing to gain from confirming that terrorists blew up a plane at this stage.

but terrorism is done with a goal in mind. Not to claim authorship or make demands would simply make no sense.

If the terrorists don't take credit for something how can they brag about their accomplishments at the pub during happy hour?

I seriously doubt there's cell coverage where the plane went down.

Pilots may have not had a chance to do a thing. Any number of reasons could have caused the plane to fall apart in mid air. TWA 800 had an explosion that blew the plane into two pieces and sent to the ocean in short order. No distress call, if I remember.

Where's also loss of pressure and complete loss of pressure. You can have a small hole that lead to a whirling sound and you slowly lose pressure or you can have a huge hole that causes sudden and complete loss of pressure. A jet near the Hawaiian Islands lost part of top fuselage. Rip off in mid air, think three of four people flew out of the plane straight out of their seats. That happened in nice weather and near a safe place to land. The Air France plane was in really bad weather and in the middle of no where.

I don't think there anyway to know what happened. This morning they're saying they are not optimistic they'll ever find the black boxes.

Here's an article talking about the difficulties-

Another thing to consider, is that even if they DO find the "black box" (which is actually yellow, go figure!) There is no guarantee that it will be in condition to do anything with. These boxes, while air tight, have just that, air in them. At a depth of 10k feet, the pressures that the ocean waters make at that depth could easily crush it, allowing salt water inside. Most everyone knows that electronic devices and salt water do NOT get along well. Let's just hope that they DO recover it, and find out what happened.

QFT...The people who would be in the position to know are the same ones pushing for more TSA funding, why would they suppress?

Cell phones: *Not* magic communicator boxes. :thumbsup:

Regarding telemetry information: if the FAA is leery of me having an ipod on, I think the amount of testing and cost to add a couple megawatt transmitter would be pretty prohibitive.

The technology for that kind of data linkup isn't even CLOSE to new...what exactly do you think flies the UAV's? And that's TWO way!

Back to the OP, I do think the assorted agencies will suppress wildly bogus claims of responsibility if intelligence classifies them as such.

No sense in fomenting (my $$ word for the day) panic.

has anyone else picked up on this?

More debris found from Air France plane crash - CNN.com

I just found out that a student who attended my wife's school last year was on the flight. He was flying as an unaccompanied minor at the time.

I think you mean they're orange.

Other that that I agree completely with your comments. That deep water, that's a lot pressure. It's completely possible they locate the "pingers' and find them detached from the data recorders. Then the odds of finding the data is near zip.

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Wow that's creepy.

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How sad. Did she know him well? Is she doing alright?

Im so sorry to hear that Charlatan.....give her a hug from us

She's OK, the school is in a bit of shock. I just can't help but think of the kids parents. I've sent my own son on flights as an unaccompanied minor. Just to know that your child would be alone in that sort of situation. Horrible to contemplate.

I knew a lady, Susan Hill, who went down with TWA 800. By knew I mean I'd met her at several meetings and trainings. She was a detective out of Portland. I, as well almost everyone I worked with, followed the investigation. When it turned out to be a freak gas tank thing (likely) it was almost a let down. Like if she gone down in an attack things would have been better? I can't explain why we felt the way we felt. Maybe we would would have been unhappy with any results?

the latest from Brazilian and French authorities is that evidence points to the plane breaking apart in the air, but that given the amount of fuel spread on the water it is unlikely that there was an explosion or fire.

Apparently, there have been known instances of electric malfunction in this type of airbus, and that the plane is designed to automatically do certain maneuvers in certain situations, and the pilot has no ability to override it. In two Qantas incidents, the A330 suddenly pointed its nose down, but the crew reversed it (not before injuring several people). A move like that in the middle of the storm could have sent the airplane out of control.

---------- Post added at 08:26 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:18 PM ----------

Not to derail the thread, but I think people simply have a problem accepting random events. We can't deal with major catastrophe caused by minor events, it's as is the equation is unbalanced.

I just read that some of the debris they found did not come from the Air France flight.

Just random stuff floating in the sea, or perhaps indication of a mid-air collision? Don't know yet.

Yeah I was just sitting here wondering how many parts of different planes could you find in the same area they thought it went down....its kinda in the middle of NO WHERE, but wouldnt we know if there was another plane missing?

CNN was just saying that what they found was stuff like wooden pallets, stuff that planes just wouldn't carry. But there's like there debris fields. I don't think they've recovered stuff from all of them. I still think one's got to be the planes.

This seriously a freaky accident. I can't even imagine how the victims' families must feel at this point, with all these unanswered questions.

Looks like they actual found stuff now, including a few victims.

Story here

More victims and more "stuff."

Story here

I find this quite interesting that they are finally finding things.

I'm reminded of the Bermuda Triangle and it seems very possible that all those mysterious disappearances are more normal than anything else. With all the technology and resources we have we're only getting what we've gotten in this current crisis.

The latest theory is that there was something wrong with the air speed sensors. One of the automated messages that was received indicated that there was an issue with airspeed. The sensors were slated to be replaced.

One article I read suggested that without proper knowledge of airspeed it could be disastrous... if too slow, the plane risks a stall, if too fast the plane risks breaking up as it gets closer to the speed of sound (the skin of the plane is not engineered to withstand that speed).

Yikes.

Vne. Speed a pilot is never to exceed in an aircraft. Every craft has a different set of V speeds.

V Speeds

I know jack shit about flying anything other then single engine prop planes. But I'd hazard a guess there no way that Airbus could get anywhere near Mach 1. Well, maybe vertically headed down.

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Edit: Looks like max airspeed for the Airbus is 615. Mach 1 is 750, I think I'm not looking it up. That's a little closer then I thought. With a throttles full open and a tail wind maybe it could get damn close to the speed of sound.