Malaysian Flight 370

[Rick Otto]

Sometimes a constitutional republic is just a fascist dictatorship with window dressing.

 

[Psalm 91]

Sometimes a constitutional republic is just a fascist dictatorship with window dressing.

Yep. I hope the passengers are still alive.

 

[DannLeavitt]

"Things" were put in place? What kind of "things"? Like many, you have a misconception about how thoroughly the globe is covered by satellite, particularly GPS, or radar.

It is a misconception that airline pilots are in constant communication with air traffic control, or that planes are constantly watched on radar. Once a plane is more than 100 or 150 miles from shore, radar no longer works. It simply doesn’t have the range. At that point, civilian aircraft communicate largely by high-frequency radio. The flight crew checks in at fixed "reporting points" along the way, providing the plane’s position, air speed, and altitude. It isn’t unusual at all for crews to maintain radio silence between reporting points because cruising at 35,000 feet is typically uneventful. Some aircraft communication systems don’t require pilots call in because flight management computers transmit the info via satellite link.

That's another misconception. Modern flight management systems use GPS for navigation, but they only tell the crew where theire airplane is -- it doesn't tell air traffic control where the airplane is. If you take an iPhone into the heart of the Mojave Desert, it will tell you you're in the heart of the Mojave Desert. You won't be able to use "Find My Phone" because there’s no cell coverage. Although it is possible to stream data from an aircraft in real-time via satellite, it is extremely expensive and not considered cost effective. Obviously Rolls Royce does, because that's where we got the very limited and incomplete (probably also inaccurate) information about the plane's flight path after going silent. Even in this day and age of terrorism, implementing such a system across the industry would cost billions of dollars, and wouldn't prove useful 99.9999% of the time.No it isn't, particularly since that part of the world is the most under-covered area of the globe with the technology that might have been able to track the plane after it disappeared.You'll have to show me what "experts" say that, because clearly it is not, as most of them have provided the information included in this post to explain how you lose an airplane in 2014.And we all know what that does, right?They might be right. Or the plane might have been stolen by terrorists. It could also have been stolen for other purposes, like who or what was onboard.

But maybe, just maybe, it might have just plain crashed. Sometimes a mystery is just that, and nothing else.

I'm not on board with the whole GPS tracking thing. You can track flights real time on their respective websites, I've done so several times while awaiting family's arrival on flights. If they weren't equipped with some kind of tracer, they wouldn't be able to be tracked. Besides, reports have already indicated that the pilot manually disabled much of these features, which just goes to say that the features were there before they were disabled.

The entire scenario just sounds suspicious. The records released from the airline are constantly changing. One day they say the last words were one thing, and the next week they change the entire reply completely. And when I say completely, I mean there was no room for an accident, they changed the records.

Experts were oh so convinced that they would find the plane in the ocean. They said that if such and such equipment was used, it would be found. So they use the equipment, and nothing is found. Now they are convinced it's not even in the ocean?

And as for being in a "dead zone" for signals, I don't think that flies necessarily, either. They were searching the ocean via satellite for plane debris, and besides, they were headed for Beijing, and Lord knows China would see them coming.

I'm not saying that this is some kind of government terror incident. I'm just saying that there are a lot of grey areas that should be cleared up. It really seems like the public is being ripped off and lied to on this one. If the information was solid from start to finish, maybe then I would buy the notion that it simply crashed and no one knows anything more about it.

 

[DannLeavitt]

That's another misconception. Modern flight management systems use GPS for navigation, but they only tell the crew where theire airplane is -- it doesn't tell air traffic control where the airplane is. If you take an iPhone into the heart of the Mojave Desert, it will tell you you're in the heart of the Mojave Desert. You won't be able to use "Find My Phone" because there’s no cell coverage.

I disagree with this. I've tried using my phone GPS outside of coverage before. It only shows my last connected location.

 

[OGM]

I disagree with this. I've tried using my phone GPS outside of coverage before. It only shows my last connected location.

Depends on the phone/firmware.

 

[DannLeavitt]

Depends on the phone/firmware.

That's not necessarily true, either. If there is no GPS signal, there is no possible way for the device to find where it is located. It traces it's location by checking in with satellites. I've never seen any device where you could disconnect/go out of range from the towers/satellites and till find yourself on its map.

If it's got network connection, any device with the capability to be traced (smart phones, tablet, etc), in my experience, will be able to do so.

 

[OGM]

That's not necessarily true, either. If there is no GPS signal, there is no possible way for the device to find where it is located. It traces it's location by checking in with satellites. I've never seen any device where you could disconnect/go out of range from the towers/satellites and till find yourself on its map. If it's got network connection, any device with the capability to be traced (smart phones, tablet, etc), in my experience, will be able to do so.

The GPS/GLONASS section of the phone receives the satellite signals regardless of the carrier network conditions, as they are two separate receivers.

 

[pgp_protector]

That's not necessarily true, either. If there is no GPS signal, there is no possible way for the device to find where it is located. It traces it's location by checking in with satellites. I've never seen any device where you could disconnect/go out of range from the towers/satellites and till find yourself on its map.

If it's got network connection, any device with the capability to be traced (smart phones, tablet, etc), in my experience, will be able to do so.

No, phones don't check in with GPS satellites. They're Read Only communication. This is why phones / tablets / GPS units without carrier service can still get a GPS location.

 

[ThisBrotherOfHis]

I'm not on board with the whole GPS tracking thing. You can track flights real time on their respective websites, I've done so several times while awaiting family's arrival on flights. If they weren't equipped with some kind of tracer, they wouldn't be able to be tracked.

That isn't "real time tracking," it's a computer model of the aircraft's vector combined with the expected flight path information, which varies only for weather and wind conditions from day to day or flight to flight. You weren't getting GPS info from those websites.

For the rest of your objections, go here. While this guy gives the grossly erroneous impression that things are more sophisticated than they really are, he makes a lot of good points about why planes can easily get lost, even in this day and age.

 

[Lollerskates]

Sometimes a constitutional republic is just a fascist dictatorship with window dressing.

 

[ThisBrotherOfHis]

Sometimes a constitutional republic is just a fascist dictatorship with window dressing.

What a pithy and utterly irrelevant and ridiculous remark! Yay for you!

 

[Zanting]

What a pithy and utterly irrelevant and ridiculous remark! Yay for you!

I thought it was really funny

...but then what makes one person laugh, may make another person angry.

 

[ThisBrotherOfHis]

I thought it was really funny

...but then what makes one person laugh, may make another person angry.

Oh, I'm sorry! You've mistaken my mood for "anger." More like "gobsmacked."

 

[Rick Otto]

Dismissive of any criticism of the military-industrial complex, ignoring blatant warnings from the likes of Woodrow Wilson & J.F. Kennedy, one can be lost at sea over coincidences, no matter how overwhelming the circumstantial evidences. Warm sand around the head & ears is reassuring. Helps take the smack out of your gob.

 

[Lollerskates]

Dismissive of any criticism of the military-industrial complex, ignoring blatant warnings from the likes of Woodrow Wilson & J.F. Kennedy, one can be lost at sea over coincidences, no matter how overwhelming the circumstantial evidences. Warm sand around the head & ears is reassuring. Helps take the smack out of your gob.

Yep.

Hitler got Germany by demagoguery, and public incredulity. Dismissal of anything is more dangerous than tanks and bombs in my opinion. I would go as far to say that weapons are useless in an aware population that entertains even the most "insane" of things.

[ It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

- Aristotle.

 

[ThisBrotherOfHis]

​

 

[Rick Otto]

lol!

 

[David Brider]

BBC News - Malaysian MH370: Inmarsat confident on crash 'hotspot'