Ken Worthington

Not that your post has any relevance, but it's 3 crashes in 9 years.

sbm12

Why not? Everything is speculation at this point. No one really knows for certain what happened as of yet. Quite frankly, the discounting of that possibility seems more irresponsible lacking data to support the claim, and right now that data doesn't seem to be present.
The weather patterns way up north are rather different than those around the equator. That likely explains why you haven't experienced similar turbulence. As for why they cannot avoid it, there are many factors, including:

• Actually knowing where it is; it isn't like turbulence shows up on a radar like a thunderstorm. Yes, it is possible to have ideas of where there is potential trouble, but it is not as exact a prediction.
• Capabilities of the plane; to fly around might require a much longer routing that the plane can't make.
• Travel time considerations; planning a much longer route to minimize chances of hitting weather costs a lot of time and money (fuel, crew, etc.) which is something they don't like to do.

It is a terrible tragedy regardless of why it went down. Hopefully we'll learn more and be able to prevent similar scenarios in the future, but it is certainly too soon to know if that will actually happen since we don't even know what happened yet.

baggage_claim

FYI. For those that missed the earlier link here is the article (translated) to english that states that they've narrowed down the search area to an area of tens of miles. The article also mentions that the ELTs did not work.

http://translate.google.com/translat..._state0=fr|en|

CNN is also reporting the following regarding the automatic communications:

But about 4:15 a.m. Paris time, Flight 447's automatic system began a four-minute exchange of messages to the company's maintenance computers, indicating that "several pieces of aircraft equipment were at fault or had broken down," he said.

"This succession of messages signals a totally unforeseeable, great difficulty," he said. "Something quite new within the plane."

During that time, there was no contact with the crew, Gourgeon said.

"It was probable that it was a little bit after those messages that the impact of the plane took place in the Atlantic," he added.

Gaucho100K

This apparent accident almost hit very close to home... one of my biggest clients is a regular on this flight, luckily, he was not....

ELAL

He's simply concerened that none of our friends from here, were on board

sbm12

Yes, there are many of them. Radar has a limited effective range for many reasons, including the curvature of the earth. So out over the oceans it is very common to not be "covered" by radar signals. When flying US-Europe there is a decent chunk of the route where even radio comms are less available and it is harder to do things like request a new altitude or otherwise alter flight plans from what you are given by the dispatchers in Canada or Ireland.

GadgetFreak

Because most of us view our fellow Flyertalkers as friends and in many cases socialize with one another as we travel.

vsop

Guys let's not jump om each other. This thread was closed once for leaning up posts of members jumping on each other, let's not have that happen again. As others above me said it was out of concern.

Ken Worthington

At the time of your post, if it hadn't crashed then it must have been breaking all sorts of records for the longest glide performed by an airliner. Not to mention it had not arrived in the relevant west African FIR (airspace) many, many hours previously. Where do you think it's gone?

MarcelL_GER

A german yellow-press write that a manager of Thyssen Krupp was aboard (Erich Heine), although Pedro Luis Orleans e Braganca (26), member of former brazilian royal family, Adriana Francisco S. (40), assistent to boss of Petrobas, Giovanni Batista L., major of Trento ,Luiz Roberto A., South America President Michelin.

dimramon

A lot of us actually know each other in real life.
It's called "being concerned".

Fnate

Please stay on topic guys... I am sure no offence was intended by any parts.

Norwegian newspapers www.vg.no are now writing that text messages was sendt from several passengers on the airplane.

Does that not mean that it has been rather low, close to land and still flying at the time?

sxf24

There are multiple flight data recorders on every commercial aircraft. Since catastrophic accidents are rare, there has never been a compelling reason to incur the significant costs associated with continuous satellite monitoring.

jms_uk

I was wondering this as well.

Apparently, today's flight 447 is cancelled.

Christobal

Here is the translated version: http://translate.google.com/translat...istory_state0=

I wonder if these statements are true or rumors, but that would as mentioned above that plane was within cell range.