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It's interesting that for once, the immediate rumor take within an hour of the event (e.g. in the HN thread about the video) was simply correct.
by cjbprime 7y ago
It's interesting that for once, the immediate rumor take within an hour of the event (e.g. in the HN thread about the video) was simply correct.
- avocado4 7y agoIt was glaringly obvious from the first report considering the ongoing missile strike.
- eloff 7y agoYes, it was. Planes are very reliable. What's the odds there's a crash in Iran hours after they attach the US and are on high alert for a counter attack? It's a safe bet.
- c0nducktr 7y agoI'd assume the odds of a country shooting down an aircraft that took off from their own airport ought to be pretty low as well.
- bigiain 7y agoSure. Sydney Airport on a pleasant summer afternoon? Odds so close to zero that it doesn't matter. Tehran Airport at what could be the start of a war with the US? If I were an insurer I'd be pricing that risk _way_ differently.
- idiocratic 7y agoMost major airlines suspended flights to and from Teheran on that day, so the odds were a bit higher than normal.
- gumby 7y agoNot a “safe bet.” Reasonable assumption yes but no more. An American Airlines planet crashed only a few weeks after the September 01 attacks, but it was just an actual accident.
- eloff 7y agoNo, this is not chance of a crash anywhere, it's that a crash happens in Iran where there just aren't that many flights. Even more on this day when many airlines suspended flights. The math here is probability of air crash times number of flights in Iran, it's such a low number that one would be silly to think it's a coincidence.
- ekianjo 7y agoThe video was the smoking gun
- bouncycastle 7y agoAlso images of the larger parts from the wreckage show shrapnel damage https://twitter.com/ATSVasaCroe/status/1214914521023811584?s=19 https://twitter.com/ATSVasaCroe/status/1214914521023811584?s...
- chrononaut 7y agoContext for other readers: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21989165 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21989165
- burfog 7y agoThe "engine failure" claim was simply unreasonable. Considering the altitude and the weather, there were a few ways that the aircraft could just suddenly go down without warning: 1. bomb on the aircraft 2. missile strike 3. collision with an aircraft larger than a hobby drone 4. metal fatigue 5. evil in the cockpit
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- nkurz 7y agoI agree it's interesting. But since I haven't seen it mentioned here elsewhere in this thread, I'll bring up the alternate theory that this is a "limited hangout". In this version, Iran starts by professing complete innocence, but eventually confesses to shooting down the plane by mistake, whereas in actuality they shot down the plane intentionally. I have estimate of the likelihood of this explanation, but if it were true, I think it would be a very effective strategy of misdirection. The main argument against this interpretation is that Iran would have no reason to intentionally shoot down an innocent airliner. I don't know that this is true. One theory is that there were people on the plane they wanted dead even at significant cost in embarassment. This doesn't seem impossible. Another theory is that they shooting was done intentionally by a faction trying to make Iran look bad, and Iran decided that calling it a mistake was less embarrassing than calling it treason or mutiny. Anyway, my point isn't that there is necessarily some deeper conspiracy, only that it may still be too early to claim that the initial conspiracy theory was entirely correct, or offers a full explanation.
- cjbprime 7y agoYes, fair enough. I think our immediate theories on seeing the video didn't try to establish the level of intentionality, but were still correct about the basic facts known so far ("uh, that plane looks like it got shot down by a missile, probably by Iran").