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Malaysia Airlines Says It Lost Contact With Plane Carrying Over 200
- te_chris 13y agoEdit: the top reply made me realise what has probably happened. Awful :(
- rayiner 13y agoGPS position must be calculated on the plane and transmitted off the plane. You can't see how that connection might be interrupted?
- magic_haze 13y agoGPS just means the plane knows where it is. The equipment necessary for the plane to inform the airline ops about its location is still vulnerable to all sorts of problems, even with the kind of anal development practices required by FAA and equivalent agencies. Airports usually have have radars that track nearby airspace, but otherwise, I think most planes are tracked by the ADS-B signals that they actively transmit (insecurely).
- jfoster 13y agoDoes that mean that they pretty much know where the plane is likely to be? I recall from previous accidents that sometimes they can't find the plane very quickly. I don't know much about this subject, but what stops them from locating the plane within just a few hours?
- lucaspiller 13y agoI was wondering the same thing. I'm guessing as much as the media and Hollywood want us to believe that the government / military is tracking everything in the air, in reality that isn't really the case.
- lsh123 13y agoOver water or in other remote locations, there is no radar coverage thus there is absolutely no information about the plane location except position reports from the pilot. Airliners have "ping home" systems that regularly send various info (including GPS location) back to the central company servers using satellites. However, the reports frequency varies from 15 to 90+ minutes and even 5 minutes is A LOT for a plane traveling at MACH 0.7. But even if the position reports will be timely and accurate, during the descend (after a catastrophic event onboard), the plane might travel tens of miles from the last reported position. Then, ocean currents can move the pieces even further from the last reported position (as it have happened with Air France plane pieces). Lastly, ADS-B is not a solution for over the ocean position reports - the radio is not powerful enough to transmit data over the long distance (this is why we need to build so many ground stations in the US to actually use it). Not to mention, that ADS-B is not fully operational even in US.
- yeukhon 13y agoI think they could look at satellites looking at that region at the time. There are satellites just taking photos and they probably have captured something.
- objclxt 13y ago...there really aren't satellites 'just taking photos' of the ocean. You might have a spy satellite taking pictures of a naval exercise. I think you are underestimating a) how vastly big the ocean is, and b) satellite capacity (most intelligence satellites are over land). 71% of the world is ocean. The ocean is vast, and most of it has very little going on. Last month someone washed up having been lost at sea for over a year, having only seen two or three ships (which didn't stop). A few ships in 13 months. http://www.cbsnews.com/news/jose-salvador-alvarenga-healthy-after-lost-at-sea-ordeal-but-in-no-shape-to-explain-anything/ http://www.cbsnews.com/news/jose-salvador-alvarenga-healthy-...
- slurry 13y agoNormally, you are right. 'Lost contact' therefore suggests something very wrong has happened.
- robzyb 13y agoGenerally the tracking doesn't work so well after the plane has crashed into the ocean. Saying that you've lost contact with a jet is another way of saying that "it's probably crashed, but we don't have any solid proof yet."
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- sidwyn 13y agoLooks like they just located it, and are sending emergency teams now: http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=vi&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fvnexpress.net%2Ftin-tuc%2Fthe-gioi%2Fdo-duoc-tin-hieu-may-bay-malaysia-cach-mui-ca-mau-120-hai-ly-2960870.html http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=vi&tl=en&js=n&prev=...
- theboss 13y agothose reports were already confirmed false (insane, less than a minute later) http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/08/malaysian-airlines-plane-live http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/08/malaysian-airli...
- fname 13y agoEDIT: The Guardian has a pretty good live blog feed giving constant updates - http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/08/malaysian-airlines-plane-live http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/08/malaysian-airli... Very sad. Only the third crash of a 777 since being introduced in the 90s. [1]Confirmed 14 nationalities amongst the passengers, including: China - 153 (including 1 infant) Malaysia - 38 Indonesia - 12 Australia -7 USA - 4 (including 1 infant) France - 3 Canada - 2 New Zealand - 2 Ukraine - 2 Russian - 1 Italy - 1 Taiwan -1 Austria - 1 Netherlands - 1 [1]: http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/my/en/site/dark-site.html http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/my/en/site/dark-site.html
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- pcurve 13y agoCaptain had almost 20,000 hours under his belt. (Btw, I'm not sure why the airline web site used that particular html file name.)
- tkrajcar 13y agoLikely a reuse of their "site down for maintenance" functionality.
- gregman 13y agoLooking at the update at 2.32pm AEST makes me sad. Two people mourning over the loss of their relatives and everyone in the airport takes pictures of them. Here is the image (although I'm just spreading it around more): http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2014/3/8/1394249180451/dd3ed19d-b8cc-4791-a540-22aecf15f089-460x276.jpeg http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/20...
- baby 13y agoTaking pictures of suffering people is so inhuman, we rarely see this side when we look at the news.
- obituary_latte 13y agoIt's not clear from the article: what happened to the flight?
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- Flammy 13y agoIt isn't known or at least not yet announced. If it crashes into the ocean (or somewhere remote) this isn't surprising. As for the cause, that will likely take months for a comprehensive report.
- obituary_latte 13y agoYeah, it does seem to be the assumed case. Hope not. Thanks.
- Oculus 13y agoCan't begin to imagine how horrible it must be to be the one informing next of kin of what just happened.
- whbk 13y agoOr, you know, to be next of kin. :( The last time Twitter was taken over by a Friday night flight was much more enjoyable, thoughts go out to all those affected.
- jonah 13y agoFlightAware track of the flight: http://flightaware.com/live/flight/MAS370 http://flightaware.com/live/flight/MAS370 EDIT: And track log: http://flightaware.com/live/flight/MAS370/history/20140307/1635Z/WMKK/ZBAA/tracklog http://flightaware.com/live/flight/MAS370/history/20140307/1...
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- einhverfr 13y agoThe flightaware track for flights in the area doesn't tell much because apparently ground radar is relatively limited, unfortunately.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- lostlogin 13y agoAfter a few days of interesting aviation related stories here, this happens.
- BorisMelnik 13y ago3:30am update: At Beijing airport authorities have provided buses for relatives to go to a hotel about 15 kilometres away for further briefings. Associated Press reported one woman on the bus was weeping while saying on a mobile phone, “They want us to go to the hotel. It can’t be good!”
- khc 13y agoThat seems to be a very sensible thing to do though. Consider that there are 153 Chinese nationals, the number of relatives waiting at the airport is probably at least couple hundreds. Since the event is ongoing and they have no idea how long it will take to have new updates, moving them to a place where they can be better accommodated while freeing up resources at the airport for its normal duties is probably a good thing.
- 8ig8 13y ago> UPDATE [12:37]: Tuoi Tre, a leading daily in Vietnam, reports that the Vietnamese Navy has confirmed the plane crashed into the ocean. According to Navy Admiral Ngo Van Phat, Commander of the Region 5, military radar recorded that the plane crashed into the sea at a location 153 miles South of Phu Quoc island. http://my.news.yahoo.com/mas-aircraft-goes-missing--says-airline-023820132.html http://my.news.yahoo.com/mas-aircraft-goes-missing--says-air...
- ChuckMcM 13y agoWell that is good to know, the Air France jet took a long time to find because there was no radar information about where it went down. Large jets actually crashing feels very jarring these days to me, whereas 20 years ago it seemed much more common of an occurrence. Could just be a form of survivor bias though.
- dchuk 13y agoYou realize a bunch of people died in this right?
- kunai 13y agoI'm sure he does, but knowing what happened and where it went down (for the main purpose of locating the CVR and FDR) is critical to help prevent things like this from happening in the future. It sounds very grim, but we learn from our mistakes. Although blunders in mission-critical situations like aviations can cause loss of life, we save many more by learning about what happens in scenarios which we aren't prepared for. With AF447, we had to wait years for the investigation. It's likely this one will start faster. My condolences to the families of everyone involved. It's a sad day for aviation – the first fatalites of the 777's spotless record – and a much, much more solemn one for everyone onboard. May they rest in peace.
- khuey 13y agoNit picking, but the first fatalities on a 777 happened last summer in San Francisco in the Asiana 214 crash.
- meritt 13y agoPhilip Wood, an IBM Technical Storage Executive, was one of 3 Americans on the flight manifest. http://www.linkedin.com/pub/philip-wood/3/a46/4a9 http://www.linkedin.com/pub/philip-wood/3/a46/4a9
- chaostheory 13y agoWhat bothers me aren't so much the adults on the flight. They've more or less lived full lives, especially the ones from the US. What eats me is thinking that there were two babies on that flight =(
- wyager 13y ago>What bothers me aren't so much the adults on the flight. Why? The first years of life aren't disproportionately more valuable than the last. >especially the ones from the US. Does that really imply that they've lived "more" than everyone else on the aircraft?
- chaostheory 13y agoAfter re-reading my comment, let me elaborate. I do feel bad for the adults but maybe after reading world news regularly I just feel numb. If I didn't, I'd be constantly depressed. Yet I just feel horrible for the two babies. >Why? The first years of life aren't disproportionately more valuable than the last. Adults have a few decades of experiencing life over babies. Infants have just started. I'm personally not very sure of the existence of an afterlife to make up for it. > Does that really imply that they've lived "more" than everyone else on the aircraft? It implies that they've had a better standard of living, a fuller life than most people in the world. You know 40-60 hour work weeks, clean air, cleaner water, hot water... stuff like that. I've lived outside of the US in 3rd world countries in South East Asia as well as other parts. The standards of living in the US is way better than China, Malaysia, and Vietnam. So yes (except for other people from developed countries)
- adventured 13y agoThe ones from the US, as opposed to Canada, France or New Zealand? What a bizarre thing to say.
- balls187 13y agoThis is very sad. My thoughts with all those involved and those related. :(
- United857 13y agoLast transponder position of #MH370 was Lat: 6.90 Lon: 103.57 http://pic.twitter.com/PVsNuYtbtS http://pic.twitter.com/PVsNuYtbtS
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- homakov 13y agoThis is one of the scariest thing i read on the internet in a while... I feel so sorry.
- mukeshsharma 13y agoWell this is very bad news that plane lost its contact with control rum, and its taking over 200 passengers. Hope for the best that they can contact soon with them.
- mukeshsharma 13y agoWell this is very bad news that plane lost its contact with control rum, and its taking over 200 passengers. Hope for the best that they can contact soon with them.
- CoachRufus87 13y agoWhy is black box data only stored locally, thus requiring investigators to recover the box in order to figure out what happened?
- awakeasleep 13y agoIs intercontinental wireless communication reliable?
- adamcanady 13y agoI don't have a ton of information to back it up, but I imagine they record a ton of data and it would require a pretty constant and huge data transmission from the airplane to get it all to the ground in near-real-time.
- objclxt 13y agoBecause transmissions are unreliable. If you're over the ocean there is no ground to send your transmission to. Black boxes store considerable amounts of data - telemetrics, voice recordings for the past two hours...stuff that to be useful you really have to stream. So the only viable option for streaming that kind of data is over a satellite link, except it should come as no surprise that when you most need the data the uplink won't work (maybe something ripped the fuselage and damaged the transmitter, power was lost, you no longer had line of site to the satellite because the plane rolled, etc). There's no benefit. You are going to be sending people out to the plane anyway. If the plane is under the ocean you're going to investigate regardless. Flight recorders are designed to last - the Air France 447 recorders were finally found two years later, 4000 meters under water. Data links are unreliable, not there when you most need them, and not worth the trouble.
- Zancarius 13y ago> There's no benefit. You are going to be sending people out to the plane anyway. This is a fantastic point. I can't think of many accidents that were resolved by the FDR alone. The FDR tells a substantial part of the story, obviously (flight control positions, instrumentation data, etc), but the wreckage suggests where potential points of failure occurred. The importance of this cannot be understated, and I'd highly recommend watching (albeit rather dramatized) Crash of the Comet [1] and related videos for how important wreckage and metallurgical analysis has been in resolving otherwise difficult accidents. To add to your comment, the FDR and CVR have demonstrated that they can function up to the point of impact (with some exceptions, such as a few accidents caused by severe in flight fires), which yields some very important telemetry as to the attitude of the aircraft, state of the engines, etc. So really, if it's not broke... [1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ws-GAiQKsBs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ws-GAiQKsBs
- balladeer 13y agoSo, they made an announcement after 5 hours? Lost contact: 2:40 AM Announcement: 7:30 AM
- callesgg 13y agoWell it could have been so that they just lost their radio due to malfunction. And after 5 hours i imagine the fuel would be about out so after that one can with a very high accuracy say that it was worse that just a radio glitch. It would not look good to say that the plane crashed and then one hour or so later it lands on some remote runway.
- balladeer 13y agoBut they could say after 30 minutes or 45 or hell, 60 minutes, "guys, we lost contact with our plane and that happened sixty minutes ago".
- amix 13y agoThis is sad, but kind of strange with all the fear and media publicity of an airplane crash. For example, 1.2million people lost their life in road traffic in 2010 alone... We rarely read or fear about this fact.
- fragsworth 13y agoYeah. Every day, more than ten times as many people die in traffic accidents than in this single plane crash.
- caf 13y agoI'm sure we would read about a single road accident claiming a few hundred lives as well.
- humannature 13y agoit's because air travel is the safest mode of transportation, and plane crashes rarely happen
- bariswheel 13y agoThis is very unfortunate, but why is it on Hacker News?
- tomrod 13y agoBecause a lot of hackers care.
- joering2 13y agoWithout disrespecting victims (RIP), can someone briefly explain how and why people die during plane crash? Is it lack of oxygen, or cold temperature or actually a hard landing on the water surface? AFAIK most studies conclude there is no good place on the plane to be safer than other, whether its front, back, left side or right. Any ideas how to expand ones survival chances? Will TSA let you in with parachute -- is it even worth carrying one??
- balladeer 13y ago> parachute That would mean an opening if there's an opening in the plane, while still above the ground, the plane is done anyway. I think it's the fire or suffocation (the plane is sealed) if it falls in the water. I really don't know. Go over to reddit, there people there are better chances of an answer.
- joyofdata 13y agoWhy is stuff like this on HN?
- einhverfr 13y agoMalaysia Airlines has a reasonable safety record. The 777 has a very good safety record. This specific plane apparently had damage to the wingtip from a previous on-ground incident/collision. It's a big mystery.