Thought that once. Figured "score!" when I was asked to move before a flight back to Van from Hawaii. But then found out on the plane that the seats don't recline. No more emergency row for me.

It's amazing how this story is unfolding. The bottom line fact that "planes just don't disappear is just mind-bottling".

And I quoted that picture because, just for a short second, I was thinking "man, that Asian achieved a high-top fade..." :thumbs:

http://i.imgur.com/dDqOA26.jpg


Not sure if this has been posted yet, I thought it was really touching

White House says recent information has opened possibility of a new search area in Indian Ocean for missing airliner.

many pilots, no matter commercial, military or recreational do what they do because they love all that is aviation. I don't see how having a flight sim setup at home is indicative of anything other than the fact that the person is an aviation nut. Hell I have one at home.

to add to the pictures... here's one a bit more local that I found on Facebook

https://fbcdn-sphotos-b-a.akamaihd.n...20324057_o.jpg

Let's just hope the EUS at UBC has a bit of heart in their drunken minds to let this sit for a while

Because the engines don't have GPS receivers?

I think the only thing that's "officially confirmed" so far is that the plane is missing and nobody has the first fucking clue what happened to it.

The problem with issuing any sort of "official statement" is that the media (including social) will jump all over it and extrapolate all sorts of stories based on things they know nothing about, then when something changes that contradicts anything people think they already "know", it's played out as officials either being incompetent, or covering something up.

Consider their position: they're dealing with something that's never happened before in exactly this way - in decades of commercial air travel, millions if not billions of flights, and thousands of crashes, never has a plain simply disappeared without a trace this way.

But instead of letting experts and authorities just sit back and try to figure it all out, they have to fend off media, armchair (or office chair) quarterbacks, looky-loos of all sorts... and then they have to address all manner of speculation and rumours constantly being circulated as fact. Someone overhears something, tells his buddy, who tells his buddy who's a reporter, and next thing you know, something completely imagined is being splashed across the headlines.

The main ones fucking up, frankly, are the rubberneckers who keep confusing things with sketchy information.

#MH370: KLIA 'bomoh' stunt spawns parodies

http://l1.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/X5...4-TMI-AFIF.jpg

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Bilau8aCcAAixxZ.jpg

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BiitIi7CcAAWKTQ.jpg

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BimNHV1CUAA5rhA.jpg

Well they do have equipment to measue altatude speed engine RPM and other things. One of the reasons they claim the plane does not sent GPS info via satilite is the cost. But if they are already sending out engine info why can't they sent out 12 numbers along with it.

I would expect it is not about the cost of the data, but rather the cost of implementing the GPS device. Keep in mind that development costs for aviation are HUNDREDS of times what it would normally cost due to the incredible testing and approval process required for FAA certification. You already have a device and a backup that transmits GPS data from the plane, there is no reason to duplicate this in the engine. The engine transmits information that isn't duplicated elsewhere - operating information - for the purposes of optimizing operations.

Mark

Imagine this was some Marketing plan for a new season of LOST
http://static1.wikia.nocookie.net/__...st-season1.jpg

But nothing was transmitting GPS data from the plane. It somthing was we would know where the plane is. According to someone on CNN it would cost $2800 per flight to have real time data from the plane via satalite. I still have know idea why a piliot is able to turn off the transponder.

I realize this, but the plane is not designed to ever have that transmitter turned off. If that is not supposed to be able to be turned off, there is no reason to believe why the ones from the engine wouldn't also be able to be turned off.

It doesn't actually fix anything to just add more transmitters if they can be turned off, and if they are going to be added and not able to be turned off, why not skip adding them and just make the main transmitter unable to be disabled?

Either way it doesn't fix anything to simply add more transmitters...

Mark

The transponders can be turned off by the piliot by hitting a switch on the cockpit. CNN just showed the switch. The system that sends engine data can't be turned off by the piliot.

I loved the first few seasons of Lost, it got pretty whacky later on though.

I would assume there are valid reasons why a pilot may need to turn off the transponder, otherwise they wouldn't go through the cost and effort to add that switch.


Good point, to the average media person (especially if they're looking to add drama) they're gonna call that an "elaborate" setup. They would likely say the same about anyone with a Logitech wheel setup for Gran Turismo. And when you think about it, I'm pretty sure most of you would prefer to be flown by a pilot who is very passionate about flying.

Okay. So my point is that GPS data is considered to be essential to the safety of operating the plane to the point of considering adding it to the engines without the ability to turn it off, then it makes much more sense to just remove the switch to turn the regular GPS off rather than add a secondary GPS transmitter.

Another way to think about it is if there is some legitimate benefit to being able to turn off the GPS - privacy, whatever, that's fine. However, it's totally useless to have one GPS that can be turned off if there is a secondary one in the engines that can't be turned off. Does that make sense?

To get GPS data with the engine stats I think they would need to add a GPS system to the engines, since the engines and their system are built by RR and not Boeing. Even if they were able to do this, it wouldn't help in this case because from what I have read this airline is getting the bare minimum maintenance reporting (presumably as they are having financial issues, or perhaps they didn't see any added value) and it wouldn't have been sending any reports during flight.

The engines comunicate with the rest of the plane. How else do you think they get altatude and plane speed. Right now when a plane is over the ocean there is no way of tracking it. There should be.

Ha, I have the same controls for FSX and P3D.

http://s2.hubimg.com/u/270967_f260.jpg

The engine has nothing to do with the plane measuring altitude or speed for the plane. And on the other hand, the plane does not pass this information to the engines either. The only information the engines transmit is basic operational information about whether they are running and some vital stats - nothing about the plane itself.

You are right that the engine does communicate with the plane, but it has nothing to do with altitude and speed.

Mark

Why the shit can I go buy a SPOT global GPS satallite transmitter for under a couple hundred bucks, but putting a GPS system in a commercial airliner costing 300 milliion dollars, is not in the budget?

Hire someone to maintain it
Hire someone to implement it
Hire someone to monitor it
Hire someone to plan it
Hire someone to research it
Hire someone to program it to work with the plan
Hire someone to teach others how to use it

I'm sure the equipment is cheap, but as you can see the process is not.

according to cnn the us is saying the plane did fly for several hours and they're searching the indian ocean

differences between us/uk media

cnn is saying its certain the plane tunred back based on the radar blip even though the blip is not identified and the malaysian investigation is a clusterfuck

bbc is saying the radar blip doesn't identify the plane as MH370 but simply an unidentified object and no one really knows whats going on as this is unprecedented and malaysia cant be blamed really

overview of 6 theories
6 theories on what happened to Malaysia Flight 370

It almost sounds like they are all just using this as an excuse to mobilize and map in to the pan-pacific area

I assumed a full flown 777 setup. I said it myself, the comment was uncalled for. If he had a 777 sim, I still find it weird. If it was a different type of aircraft I could understand. That would make him "plane crazy" like I described. I still agree, uncalled for, especially if the guy isn't around anymore :(
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