5 ms·

Gold? needs to be something worth stealing a plane for.

by justincormack 13y ago

jdimov 13y ago
Mangosteens
- jdimov 13y ago
  Who downvotes someone over mangosteens??
nyrina 13y ago
I don't think gold is valuable enough for stealing a whole plane and killing 220 passengers. Gold, for it's weight, is very expensive. Transporting gold of high enough volumes for it to be worth killing so many people, steal a plane as well as making all of that possible wouldn't be worth it, I would say.
- gambiting 13y ago
  If the plane was carrying a tonne of gold(and could have been carrying more) then that gold would be worth 44 million dollars[1]. [1]http://www.onlygold.com/tutorialpages/value_of_gold.asp http://www.onlygold.com/tutorialpages/value_of_gold.asp
  - nerfhammer 13y ago
    The plane itself costs more than $200 million
    - gambiting 13y ago
      Yes, but I imagine that you can sell gold a lot easier without having to explain where it comes from,than a Malaysian Airlines branded 777.
ry0ohki 13y ago
The plane itself is worth about 6 tons of gold
- Tuna-Fish 13y ago
  Sold where and how? 2 tons of gold are something that a reasonable person can actually expect to be able to convert into money without undue risk to his person. A stolen airplane isn't. People keep talking about how this needs so much sophistication that it's probably a state action. All I can see is something that one person with good planning could have done. That is, the pilot or the co-pilot waits until the other guy visits bathroom, climbs high enough and disables pressurization to knock out/kill the passengers and the rest of the crew, then disable communications, turn off transponder, sneak out of controlled airspace behind another plane, land anywhere with an unused strip with a truck waiting, abscond with the cargo. That requires sophistication and careful planning, but is not beyond the realm of the possible.
  - donutz 13y ago
    a reasonable person can convert 2 tons of gold to cash without undue risk? Given that 2 tons of stolen gold can't be legally sold, I'd suspect that anyone with that kind of cash on hand might be the kind it would be risky to do business with...
    - Tuna-Fish 13y ago
      A reasonable person can convert smallish amounts of gold to cash without undue risk, and gold can be easily worked and divided by basically anyone. If you stole a ton of gold, you could sell it piecemeal for the rest of your life and live like a king.
jzwinck 13y ago
Reportedly some 50 seats were blocked off to save weight for extra cargo. Suppose each person plus their baggage weighs 80 kg, that's 4000 kg. Let's say 50% of that is taken up by containers, packing, and security devices, yielding 2000 kg of gold. It comes out to 90MM USD at today's prices. A lot of money, but probably not enough to go to so much trouble.
- unabridged 13y ago
  >50 seats were blocked off to save weight for extra cargo. Combining this fact with the 20 Freescale engineers that were on board is it possible they were transporting some kind of important prototype chips?

Gold? needs to be something worth stealing a plane for.

jdimov 13y ago

Mangosteens

jdimov 13y ago
Who downvotes someone over mangosteens??

nyrina 13y ago

I don't think gold is valuable enough for stealing a whole plane and killing 220 passengers. Gold, for it's weight, is very expensive. Transporting gold of high enough volumes for it to be worth killing so many people, steal a plane as well as making all of that possible wouldn't be worth it, I would say.

gambiting 13y ago
If the plane was carrying a tonne of gold(and could have been carrying more) then that gold would be worth 44 million dollars[1]. [1]http://www.onlygold.com/tutorialpages/value_of_gold.asp http://www.onlygold.com/tutorialpages/value_of_gold.asp
- nerfhammer 13y ago
  The plane itself costs more than $200 million
  - gambiting 13y ago
    Yes, but I imagine that you can sell gold a lot easier without having to explain where it comes from,than a Malaysian Airlines branded 777.

ry0ohki 13y ago

The plane itself is worth about 6 tons of gold

Tuna-Fish 13y ago
Sold where and how? 2 tons of gold are something that a reasonable person can actually expect to be able to convert into money without undue risk to his person. A stolen airplane isn't. People keep talking about how this needs so much sophistication that it's probably a state action. All I can see is something that one person with good planning could have done. That is, the pilot or the co-pilot waits until the other guy visits bathroom, climbs high enough and disables pressurization to knock out/kill the passengers and the rest of the crew, then disable communications, turn off transponder, sneak out of controlled airspace behind another plane, land anywhere with an unused strip with a truck waiting, abscond with the cargo. That requires sophistication and careful planning, but is not beyond the realm of the possible.
- donutz 13y ago
  a reasonable person can convert 2 tons of gold to cash without undue risk? Given that 2 tons of stolen gold can't be legally sold, I'd suspect that anyone with that kind of cash on hand might be the kind it would be risky to do business with...
  - Tuna-Fish 13y ago
    A reasonable person can convert smallish amounts of gold to cash without undue risk, and gold can be easily worked and divided by basically anyone. If you stole a ton of gold, you could sell it piecemeal for the rest of your life and live like a king.

jzwinck 13y ago

Reportedly some 50 seats were blocked off to save weight for extra cargo. Suppose each person plus their baggage weighs 80 kg, that's 4000 kg. Let's say 50% of that is taken up by containers, packing, and security devices, yielding 2000 kg of gold. It comes out to 90MM USD at today's prices. A lot of money, but probably not enough to go to so much trouble.

unabridged 13y ago
>50 seats were blocked off to save weight for extra cargo. Combining this fact with the 20 Freescale engineers that were on board is it possible they were transporting some kind of important prototype chips?