Could a Meteor Have Brought Down Air France 447? 884
niktemadur writes "In light of an Air Comet pilot's report to Air France, Airbus, and the Spanish civil aviation authority that, during a Monday flight from Lima to Lisbon, 'Suddenly, we saw in the distance a strong and intense flash of white light, which followed a descending and vertical trajectory and which broke up in six seconds,' the Cosmic Variance blog team on the Discover Magazine website muses on the question 'What is the probability that, for all flights in history, one or more could have been downed by a meteor?' Taking into account total flight hours and the rate of meteoric activity with the requisite mass to impact on Earth (approximately 3,000 a day), some quick math suggests there may be one in twenty odds of a plane being brought down in the period from 1989 to 2009. Intriguingly, in the aftermath of TWA flight 800's crash in 1996, the New York Times published a letter by Columbia professors Charles Hailey (physics) and David Helfand (astronomy), in which they stated the odds of a meteor-airplane collision for aviation history up to that point: one in ten."
The suck! (Score:5, Funny)
How much does God hate you to put you in a meteor strike, a plane crash, and a lost-at-sea drowning all in the same day?
Re:The suck! (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
They aren't lightning rods! They're aerials to God!
Re:The suck! (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly, I don't understand why churches needs lightning rods if they have nothing to hide from God.
There's a simple explanation, they fear Thor.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Interesting point, but most denominations "stipulate" that God does not prevent bad things from happening to good people. Those that believe otherwise, such as snake handlers and anti-medicine cults, may not actually have lighting rods either..
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Pot. Kettle. Black (Score:4, Funny)
Yeah, right, Air Comet has no intrest whatsoever to accuse a meteor...
Cars (Score:3, Insightful)
Because... (Score:5, Insightful)
70% of the earth is water. I would guess 98% of the land is not covered by buildings or roads. So, a lot of things can hit the ground without us noticing.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Put another way, being over the ocean versus over land does not significantly affect the chances of getting hit by a meteor. Being up there in less atmosphere is probably the key reason. The more atmosphere a rock has to travel thru, the more likely it is to break up.
Re:Because... (Score:5, Informative)
Quote [utk.edu]: "The average velocity of meteoroids entering our atmosphere is 10-70 km/second. The smaller ones that survive the trip to the Earth's surface are quickly slowed by atmospheric friction to speeds of a few hundred kilometers per hour, and so hit the Earth with no more speed than if they had been dropped from a tall building."
Well.
CC.
Re:Cars (Score:5, Informative)
10 cars struck in the last 50 years.
over a longer timespan -
http://imca.repetti.net/metinfo/metstruck.html [repetti.net]
Re:Cars (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Cars (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Cars (Score:4, Insightful)
You also don't have cars flying five miles up in the air, with that much less atmosphere to protect them.
Re:Cars (Score:4, Informative)
Considering the atmosphere height of 120 km, I don't think 10% of height can make such a huge difference.
35,000 feet may only be 10% of the height, but it's a bit more than 75% of the density of the atmosphere. Since air is compressible, there's a lot more of it squeezed into the bottom layers than the top layers. Air pressure at 35,000 feet is about 7.04 in/Hg, vs 29.92 in/Hg at sea level. That is a huge difference.
Deceit (Score:5, Funny)
A company called Air Comet is saying they saw a meteor do it?
Does anyone else smell some blame-shifting?
Re:Deceit (Score:5, Funny)
Sounds more like some sort of sick, subtle branding exercise. Is nothing sacred?
Yeah, Think of the (dead) children!
Oh, damn... I think that's the most tasteless joke I ever conceived.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Deceit (Score:5, Funny)
Except for that one. Nicely done.
Thank you for participating in "Race to the Bottom" Friday.
Nobody Knows (Score:5, Insightful)
So any guess is equally likely/unlikely until there is more information. I think even a lot of the 'debris' they've found is probably not from the jet.
They disengaged the main flight control system because they thought it was flying too fast in the turbulence, or was causing too much passenger discomfort.
They slowed down to a very narrow margin above stall speed.
They hit a 100 mph updraft, causing the AOA to go beyond the stall angle.
They went into a high-speed dive.
Because they were on manual backup control they could not exert enough force on the controls to recover before Vne or the flutter speed of something was attained.
Something (wing, tail surface, aileron, spoiler... whatever) tore off.
The resulting asymmetric forces caused a violent departure from normal flight.
At a speed probably above Vne, that resulted in the aircraft structure being instantly destroyed.
This accounts for the fact that there was a an elapsed time of approximately a minute between the first failure messages and the last.
If it had been a bomb, or simple explosive decompression from another source, that time would have been at most a few seconds, and more likely zero.
The crew was struggling, all three physically, to pull the aircraft out of a high-speed dive and nobody had a chance to radio what the hell was happening.
That's my call.
Re:Nobody Knows (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think you really mean this. It's obvious prima facie that some explanations are more likely than others: regular old human error is more likely than a fatal meteorite strike is more likely than an attack by evil space aliens. It'd be more accurate to say that we lack the information to assign realistic probabilities to the different scenarios.
Pedanticism thus ended.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
They disengaged the main flight control system because they thought it was flying too fast in the turbulence, or was causing too much passenger discomfort.
They slowed down to a very narrow margin above stall speed.
They hit a 100 mph updraft, causing the AOA to go beyond the stall angle.
So far, so good -- although "very narrow margin" isn't even necessary given the 100mph updraft, they could have been 100 mph above stall speed and had problems. (Of course one has to factor in that their stall speed when con
Re:Nobody Knows (Score:4, Insightful)
Look at the bottom of this chart [airbusdriver.net] - as I understand it there is a last level of control that is manual. I really don't know - I'm just making a wag that's as good as any, which I point out up front.
No (Score:5, Informative)
No (Score:5, Funny)
Gravity Brought Down Air France 447.
We still don't fully understand it yet, but gravity is probably THE number one reason for aircraft crashes.
One in twenty? (Score:3, Insightful)
Why cant the plane twitter? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why cant the plane twitter? (Score:4, Insightful)
A ton of data is already constantly sent out and recorded, but the amount the black box records is pretty immense and would be pretty expensive. If cockpit voice data was to be included in this I think there would be resistance from pilot unions.
Tack on the fact that very few people die this way compared to many other ways - it would make more sense to put cameras and microphones in operating and hospital rooms than beam everything live from a cockpit to ground. (The hospital thing is one example- there are many others. Say cameras and microphones in every automobile.)
ADS-B (Score:4, Interesting)
UPS uses this system on all their planes, not only for air safety but also for tracking.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ADS-B [wikipedia.org]
Pilots and air traffic control love the system, it allows them to see visually where everyone is located/speed/atlitude/GPS and all broadcasting is done from the plane to ground based radar.
Doesn't take much bandwidth at all, as they can use the VHF channel, 978 MHz UAT and another mode.
No... not a meteor. (Score:5, Insightful)
Nothing I've read or know from flying in the Air Force and working at the USAF Flight Test Center at Edwards AFB indicates this was a collision....with a meteor or anything else.
I personally believe the aircraft encountered weather conditions that Airbus never tested against or thought possible. 100+ mph updrafts, as some have reported, would definitely cause control issues.
By that, if the plane was on autopilot or simply "in trim" and suddenly went nose up, it would have required immediate and CORRECT actions to handle. Having recently read the transcripts of the commuter crash, where the pilots were inattentive, then compounded a stall problem by pitching up, I think the real cause was a combination of events, including pilot error.
If a lightning strike caused electrical and control problems while the pilot(s) were trying to recover from a sudden attitude change, they were screwed. Going into a flat spin at 35000+ feet at 400 knots would have ripped the airframe to pieces. Given the reported debris field, and no apparent evidence of explosion, I'd bet that's what likely happened; unexpected event combined with control/system problems resulted in an unrecoverable spin and the aircraft came apart well before impact.
Probably a lot less likely. (Score:5, Informative)
Occam's razor = weather in this case (Score:5, Informative)
debris from another plane? (Score:3, Interesting)
Last transmitted messages of AF447 & speculati (Score:5, Informative)
Here you can see the last automatically transmitted ACARS messages of AF447:
http://img32.imageshack.us/img32/7547/acarsaf447d.png [imageshack.us]
Personally, I think this incident was caused by a combination of factors.
ALL speculations tread on thin air before the CVR and FDR are recovered, but based on current data I would QUESS:
-it is a dark, stormy night with no horizon or any landmarks visible
-160km/h updraft brings moist air to a much higher flight level than usual
-this causes sudden icing of the pitot tubes
-this causes the flight computer to think that the plane is in danger of stalling, and it lowers the nose automatically
-the crew switches auto-pilot and flight envelope protection partially off, or a (positive) lightning strike disables them
-the crew has no good idea about the true speed and orientation of the plane
-inside the cumulonimbus' horrible gusts the crew over-stresses the composite flight controls while fighting turbulence
-the place exceeds it's maximum speed and/or structural load (G-) limits
-two-three minutes later the agony of the 228 souls on board finally ends as the slowly disintegrating plane hits the sea near the speed of sound, instantly ripping them to stamp-sized bits
Here's more detailed speculation about possible causes and a crude analysis, taken from Usenet:
1. Terrorism or other malicious use of explosives
A bomb explodes in the cargo hold, crippling the aircraft's control systems or starting a structural break-up that eventually leads to loss of control.
Supportive evidence: According to Wikipedia, a bomb threat had been made on an earlier flight. Lack of communications from the flight crew indicates either a sudden event or something which lead to significant problems that the crew had to focus on. This would be consistent with the effects of a bomb. The automatic messages about computer system failures sent by the aircraft could be interpreted either as indications that the aircraft's movements have exceeded the limits that the systems can handle, or as indications about direct damage to the systems. A flash of light has been seen by other aircraft in the area.
Evidence against: While terrorist organizations exist both in France and Brazil, there has been no recent activity. No organization has claimed responsibility for the act. There is no specific evidence about a bomb. Nothing is known about any individuals or organizations who would have non-terrorism related reasons for malicious acts. It seems too big of a coincidence that a bomb would go off at the same time as the aircraft flies through very rough weather. Finally, what we know about the sequence of ACARS messages indicates that loss of cabin pressure was the last message in the sequence. This appears to rule out an explosion, unless it was contained in the hull and only damaged internal structures and components. This seems unlikely. The flash of light was apparently seen from too far to be caused by AF 447 related problems.
Open questions: Where are the cargo holds that are used to carry the passengers' luggage? Are they physically close to the computer and navigation systems that ACARS messages reported as failing? And obviously, physical evidence would be useful.
Verdict: Can most likely be ruled out
2. Explosion or other rapid, harmful reaction from the cargo
The sequence of events is as in the terrorism theory.
Supportive evidence: The sequence of events fits this theory, as it does the terrorism theory. The cargo might have shifted at the time of turbulence, initiating the reaction.
Evidence against: See the evidence regarding the malicious use of explosives. In addition, there is no information that the cargo could have contained something harmful.
Open questions: More information is needed about what was in the cargo, and who cargo was taken from.
Verdict: Can most likely be ruled out
3. Fire
Fire starts in cargo hold, in sys
It's the decepticons!! (Score:3, Funny)
Proof is in the video [youtube.com], ~36s mark
Re:Could a Meteor Have Brought Down Air France 447 (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Could a Meteor Have Brought Down Air France 447 (Score:4, Interesting)
Some pilots on PPRuNe suggested that it is very unlikely to find any hail of significant size at FL350 (35,000 feet), and that if you find any at all, it was blown up there from a lower altitude (i.e. relatively low speed). Besides, there's no reason to believe a hail ding is going to bring down something the size of an A330.... That said, anything is possible, I suppose, particularly given the amount of composite material involved.
Re:Could a Meteor Have Brought Down Air France 447 (Score:5, Funny)
I speculate that Windows downloaded some critical patches and then rebooted.
I hope they find the blackbox, with the event logs so we can be sure.
I'll leave the blue screen joke for someone else.
Re: (Score:3)
P1 is much, much, much, much, much, much greater than P2.
Yeah, but the headline didn't ask if it was likely. It asked if it was possible ;)
Re:Could a Meteor Have Brought Down Air France 447 (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Could a Meteor Have Brought Down Air France 447 (Score:5, Insightful)
While I don't buy it, either, your reasoning is too simplified.
Let P1 be 0.1
Let P2 be 0.0001
Even though P1 is much greater than P2, P2 will still happen with a probability of 0.0001 - it is independent of P1.
So while for every individual event, the probability that P1 happened will always be 1000 times larger than P2, in a large enough sample size you are still very likely to have P2 events.
wrong (Score:4, Insightful)
The modal verb "could," indicates possibility; thus the GP is (trivially) correct.
Or are you denying that it's possible that a meteor strike could take down a commercial airliner?
Re:EMP Testing (Score:4, Insightful)
I also read a quote somewhere else of somebody saying "Airplanes might be safer than cars, but I'd rather arrive at my destination with a false sense of security than feel like I've narrowly escaped death."
Also- I personally believe statistics aren't all they're cracked up to be. When I'm in control of a situation VS when I'm not. I think I can personally change my chances of survival in a car by not speeding... Maybe only a few percentage points, but still- statistics are cold hard ideas, but don't account for personal decisions.
Statistically, 1 in X number of men will have a heart attack- but eating healthy and excersizing changes your odds. You're not just a sitting duck, y'know?
Sorry for the rant.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Interesting)
That's interesting.
I don't want to knock air travel, which is truly remarkable, but on a holiday weekend, when a highway is at capacity, but not over, and dusk is upon me, the sight of thousands of cars traveling together at 70+ MPH truly amazes me.
The fact that I can, at a moments notice, simply travel hundreds of miles (days or even weeks of travel historically), with hundreds of pounds of stuff, do something and travel back, all in a weekend is quite marvelous.
And I would never fly anywhere in that short of a period willingly (yuck!), though I did it once pre-911.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Funny)
Really... a whole thread about a plane crashing up after a bright white light over the ocean, and not a single LOST joke? I just think Desmond forgot to enter the numbers...
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
I think wasting 24 hours, going through airport security multiple times, sitting in an uncomfortable stuffy hot screamy cabin for 8+ hours, all the waste and waiting and bullshit and potential delays, all in order to attend a 1 hour meeting is the height of byzantine ridiculousness.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:EMP Testing (Score:4, Funny)
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
I think wasting 24 hours, going through airport security multiple times, sitting in an uncomfortable stuffy hot screamy cabin for 8+ hours, all the waste and waiting and bullshit and potential delays, all in order to attend a 1 hour meeting is the height of byzantine ridiculousness.
I like my version, better, given a few recent business trips down to San Diego and back:
--Relax at the airport after a long day of work with a good book and some airport food (on the company card) for an hour before the flight,
--Catch up on some sleep/reading/old Scrapheap Challenge episodes for 2 hours in the air
--Spend the night in comfort in a nicely kept hotel, maybe do some pedestrian sightseeing in the meantime
--Enjoy free soaps and shampoos followed by a continental breakfast along with said book
--Cram a month's worth of discussion into a day of face-to-face meetings, with a team lunch thrown in for good measure
--Resume earlier enjoyment of book, sleep, media, or games at the airport and on the flight home.
Yeah, you can end up being elbowed for half the flight, stuck in security for what seems like an eternity, or simply lost in your destination city, but the experience of travel is extremely dependent on your mindset. I've run into all sorts of problems and hassles while traveling (Was stranded in Houston for 10 hours without my luggage, once... almost didn't make it through customs due to nitpicking another time), but traveling on my own has always been a positive experience for me.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know about that. I'm often largely impressed while driving by how innately our ability to control objects moving far faster than we would ever be able to achieve in these squishy shells. It is quite amazing to me that we have evolved the ability to react to things moving far faster than any remote situation that we would ever run into in nature. With modern nutrition the best of the best barely brake 20 mph for short distances, and fast predators are not that much faster. Even heading towards each other we have little need to react at 200+ mph relative speeds but we do have that ability. Not only that we have the ability to control a vehicle as if it were just another leg with relatively little training.
In rush hour it can definitely get mundane, but if you step back and think what wonderful things our brains are then it becomes very interesting indeed.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Interesting)
You may not be able to move your whole body that fast, but you can get parts up to that speed. It's not too hard to throw a small object at highway speed, so being able to react to someone else doing it could be quite useful. Same idea applies to a punch or kick.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
However, if you look at the way that humans control cars, they're basically controlling a machine that moving over 60 mph like it's moving at less than 30 mph. The interactions with cars around you can be seen as you going (your speed - his speed) mph around a stationary object. The entire system can be modeled (and is, at least by my brain) as the slowest moving car in the vicinity being stationary and everyone else moving in relation to him. Curves cause problems, but the faster you are the more gradual they are, so they can also be treated as a more-sharp turn taken at slower speeds. For the most part, controlling a car going 75 mph is the same as one going 20 mph; the trouble comes when people don't keep a large enough margin of safety and something breaks the general rules that allow you to treat the situation that way.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Interesting)
the trouble comes when people don't keep a large enough margin of safety and something breaks the general rules that allow you to treat the situation that way.
The trouble comes when the real world intersects with your imaginary situation. At 60 mph there's four times the potential force acting on your tires than at 30 mph, and the interface between road and rubber changes dramatically — to say nothing of the rubber itself! The same is true of every other little bit of your car, except that some of those relationships produce a multiplication and/or reduction of force, such as the lever arms in your suspension. The behavior of the bushings, springs, and shock absorbers is wildly different when you hit a bump at 30 mph than when you hit it at 60 mph.
If you're not thinking about what each tire is going to do at your given speed when you press a pedal or turn the wheel, you're not driving. You're chairing a committee.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
"Yet there are more car crashes that people crashes. "
That's not reu at all. Far more people run into each other all the time. They just don't leave piles of wreckage on the road, and the mas and speeds are both a lot lower.
Dude... you have so not imagined it.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Someone from the 1700's? who likely died within 10 miles of where they were born?
trust me- the car would NOT be mundane to them.
Re:Dude... you have so not imagined it.. (Score:5, Interesting)
For comparative purposes, imagine that somebody from the future were to show a modern Earthican two forms of space travel - one that could take you to Polaris (430 light years) in a day, and one that could take you to the Orion Nebula (1,500 ly). Sure, if you know the distances it's obvious that one's faster than the other, but what does that mean to you? Both are so far from anything you know, and so far beyond any distance that you ever imagined travelling, that the difference is meaningless to you.
Re:Dude... you have so not imagined it.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
A fast horse on good terrain could make 100 miles per day.
Uh, that is day one.
You better have a fresh horse or horses waiting or you will be walking on day three or so. A fit human can reasonably cover around 20 miles per day for days on end if they are supplied well. The same human having to pack food and water or forage en route might be able to keep up half that pace. A horse roughly doubles what a human can do. They are big and then need LOTS of forage and water.
In the military I studied quite a bit about effective combat loads and the logistics of movi
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
I enjoy flying simply because the idea is so absurd.
So true:
"Everything is amazing, nobody is happy..."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jETv3NURwLc [youtube.com]
Airplane segment starts at 2 minutes in...
"You're sitting in a chair... In the SKY!"
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Funny)
...Statistically, 1 in X number of men will have a heart attack- but eating healthy and excersizing changes your odds.
But suddenly revealing automobiles and airplanes to someone from the 1700's significantly increases their odds of having one.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I've often had the same thought, but my focus is a tiny bit different: I think about the gas turbines that propel planes. In the end, we're "just" burning a bunch of stuff. It's an application of the discovery of fire millions of years ago. Something about that juxtaposition of the primitive with the sophisticated -- in combination with the thought of how people from the past would see this -- just fills me with awe.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm oprety sure by the time you drove that person to the airport, they would be so amazed at everything else that air flight would just be another crazy thing.
Think about it:
This is my home? AM I rich? no it's only 1800 Dqr. Feet.
This switch gives us light. Too bright, here let me dim it.
This knob here? it gives us clean safe hot water.
This magic box with he funny green lights? cooks my food in 90 seconds.
Hey, do you need to lie down? you look a little pale. Here let me put this blanket that heats it's self for you.
What's they? your hot? ok I'll push this button and nice cool air will circulate around the house.
You feeling better? good.
Hey, lets get in this metal carriage and go to the airport. It's 30 miles away, we will be there in 45 minutes.
When he gets there and sees an airplane take off his head would just explode.
Awestruck (Score:5, Insightful)
If I told someone in the 1700's or 1800's that many people across the country often travel 50+ miles a day to and from work and home, I imagine they would be very awestruck.
Maybe... but perhaps that'd be because they're simply bewildered as to why everyone doesn't just move closer to where they work 8P
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Interesting)
It should also be remembered, though, that people tend to underestimate the extent to which they match the statistics. Like that Garrison Keillor joke about Lake Wobegone, "where all the children are above average." I think I read once (no citation, sorry) that something like 80% of drivers believe they're above average in driving skill. They can't all be right!
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Funny)
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Funny)
What?!? Man, that's just like telegraphing your punches! Rule #2 of driving in Boston: don't give the other drivers advance warning of what you are going to do; that only gives them the opportunity to cut you off! (Rule #1 is "Never make eye contact.")
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Funny)
Oh trust me, the moron drivers down here in Florida are much, much worse than anything Boston can throw at us.
You have, in this corner, a 90% blind, 4'9" old woman who has glasses thicker than the tires on her gargantuan Grand Marquis, who drives two inches from her steering wheel, in the left lane, 20 mph below the speed limit in the left lane, only getting over to the right while crossing intersections, only to get back over very slowly 100 feet later.
In the other corner, you have Billy Bob, red neck extraordinaire, with two gun racks in his pickup truck that has monster truck sized wheels, is jacked about five feet higher than the legal limit, a sticker of calvin peeing on !BrandOfHisTruck, has a small plastic set of antlers for a hood ornament, and changes lanes every ten seconds while driving 25-30 mph over the speed limit, all while never using his blinker and utilizing the turn lane as a merge lane and the shoulder of the road as the outside lane.
Oh yeah, in this other corner over here, we have tool Doctor who drives a BWM, has his cell phone permanently attached between his left hand and his ear, while driving 10 inches from the car in front of him no matter what speed they are moving at. He drives 20 mph over the speed limit when coming up behind you, passes you on either side as fast as he has to to pass you, and then drives 10 mph below the speed limit once he has cut you off. He slams on the brakes coming up to green lights and only floors it once the light begins to turn yellow.
There are probably at least a few more examples I can throw out there of your typical Florida drivers, but let's also not forget that once bad drivers from other states perfect their suckage at driving, they retire to, you guessed it, Florida.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
the odds of an accident for a typical driver may be X, but if you drive safely, or very rarely, or only in optimal conditions, etc., then your personal risk will be less than X...
That may be true, but I think drivers (especially people who would rather drive than fly, for this reason) find false security in their perception of control. It's easily forgotten that there are OTHER DRIVERS out there, and sloppiness by any one of them can result in fatal car crashes. Unlike airplane pilots, drivers, including
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Driving skill or not, it's important to understand that the odds always win. In terms of airplane vs. car travel, unless the difference in risk is extremely narrow, the slight percentage that better driving gains you is probably still not enough to make it safer than an airplane.
Consider that while an airplane crash is big news, it's big news because its uncommon. When I commute to and from work, there is at least one accident of some form on the side of the road, and I only live 12 miles from work. Som
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I think I read once (no citation, sorry) that something like 80% of drivers believe they're above average in driving skill. They can't all be right!
Almost every human on earth has an above average number of legs. All those drivers could be right.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, you can change your chances of survival in a plane as well. Not choosing the ultra-cheap airline that's known for skipping maintainance every now and then, for example.
The rest is, sadly, intuition not fitting to facts if numbers are very large or small. Rationally, you would always choose a 0.1% to die in a situation with no control over a situation where, depending on your behaviour, your chance is between 0.1% and 0.2% - but if you'd set that experiment up, I'm pretty sure that a lot of people
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Informative)
Not choosing the ultra-cheap airline that's known for skipping maintainance every now and then, for example.
Most maintenance schedules for aircraft are set by the FAA, not at the airline's whim. The majority of aircraft crashes are due to environmental factors (such as turbulence or other bad weather), or pilot error.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If your goal is to improve safety, it is not sufficient to find a way to blame the pilot and stop your investigation.
If your goal is to assign blame, then you can blame the pilot and stop. Unfortunately, that doesn't tend to improve safety, which ought to be the goal of a crash investigation.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Informative)
And you actually trust that every plane gets every bit of scheduled maintenance done properly and on schedule?
Actually, yes I do. As a pilot, I know very well how strict and picky the FAA is with this stuff. They're not exactly a "wink, wink, nudge yeah we did the maintenance" kinda group. You get caught fudging records, and it's your ass. To put it simply, doing the maintenance correctly and on schedule is financially cheaper and safer than trying to creatively interpret the regs or forge records.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
What you want (and what you are getting with your thought process) is the illusion of control.
We want to feel as if we are in control of our destiny, not handing it over to some faceless being behind a locked cabin door. It doesn't matter if you are the sort of driver that spends more time on the sidewalk racking up points for hitting old ladies; you believe in your heart that you would be better at saving your skin than some highly trained but anonymous professional.
This is also why there is such a huge push against automated driving, not because it isn't safer than letting the average driver control things, but because we as a species have a difficult time trusting in a 'higher power' to save us.
(Incidentally, you probably don't want me to get into my ideas on what the implications this has on our 'need' for religion.)
Re:EMP Testing (Score:4, Interesting)
This is also why there is such a huge push against automated driving
The push against automated driving was initiated by the car companies, it was called buying up rail, bus, and streetcar lines, mismanaging them to drive users away, then terminating them when it could be justified by lack of profit.
There's one right way to do automated driving, it's called rails. Roads are stupid, wasteful, and unnecessary. They are inefficient to produce and to maintain. Their only advantage is that tanks can still drive on them when they've been bombed full of holes and if we're going to stick to a military mentality forever, someone please let me know how to get off this fucking planet without cutting off my nuts and eating the pudding.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:4, Insightful)
I read somewhere that statistically, airplanes are safer than cars, you're more likely to die in a car accident. I also read a quote somewhere else of somebody saying "Airplanes might be safer than cars, but I'd rather arrive at my destination with a false sense of security than feel like I've narrowly escaped death." Also- I personally believe statistics aren't all they're cracked up to be. When I'm in control of a situation VS when I'm not. I think I can personally change my chances of survival in a car by not speeding... Maybe only a few percentage points, but still- statistics are cold hard ideas, but don't account for personal decisions.
Your confusing your personal risk assessment (I'm in control vs when I'm not) with actual risks. Yes you can raise your chances of avoiding or surviving a car accident by taking precautions - but the overall risk levels are still vastly in favor of airplanes. People generally feel more comfortable when tehy are "in control" and discount risks (won't happen to me" yet fear much safer things that they feel are out of their direct control. Add to that the rarity of airplane fatalities and so they make the news, heighten people's apprehension.
Bottom line - people are very bad at assess risks realistically; and even worse at probability and statistics.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
> Statistics are cold hard ideas, but don't account for personal decisions. ...
>
> You're not just a sitting duck, y'know?
It's exactly the attitude you've so nicely expressed which keeps people from living happier, healthier, and safer lives. Since perceived control is *so* much more important than outcome, you'd rather run riskier odds on the hope that you've got some special stuff in you that will make you an outlier in the statistically probable outcomes of your actions.
The fact is, that on the road (or on a bus, or on a bike) you *are* a sitting duck to an inattentive, incompetent, or otherwise overly aggressive driver... regardless of your actions. The reason we even have most traffic accidents is that many drivers overestimate their abilities and underestimate the risks involved with their actions. When you get on the road, you're out there with other multi-ton vehicles where there is no barrier of entry (other than a key or a hotwire job) for control of those vehicles.
What the statistics actually show is that if you replaced all of the hours you spend in a car on the road with hours in a plane in the sky, you're chances of being injured or killed are still *lower*. So, if you take how many hours you fly during the year, your chances of dying on a plane are just about zero. Got it? So stop spreading the fear and ignorance and enjoy the plane ride.
Sorry for the counter rant.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
Also- I personally believe statistics aren't all they're cracked up to be. When I'm in control of a situation VS when I'm not. I think I can personally change my chances of survival in a car by not speeding... Maybe only a few percentage points, but still- statistics are cold hard ideas, but don't account for personal decisions.
Control is an illusion. There are so many variables when driving in a car that you have no control over despite your best efforts.
What if the brakes spontaneously fail because of a manufacture defect?
What if you get blindsided by a Mac truck when you are going through a green stop light?
What if you get a head on collision of a drunk driver who crosses over the median?
And I could sit here all day talking about instances were you get into a car accident where you had no control or chance to prevent it because it just wasn't your fault and you had no time to act defensively.
Well I suppose you could control it by just not leaving the house or always taking the bus but that would be impractical.
The point that is even if you mitigate by driving carefully and defensively, you would still have a astronomically greater chance of dying in a car wreck than dying in a plane wreck even if you flew every day of the year.
The reason for this is that aircraft have a pretty good system of traffic control while local traffic does not and people aren't very good at controlling how to deal with traffic even though they like that sense of control
Of course if they ever automate cars in the future like they did with the DARPA Grand challenge, I'd argue that driving in a car would be more safe than flying in a plane.
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Funny)
What if you get blindsided by a Mac truck when you are going through a green stop light?
It's probably because Apple made a truck with only one pedal. Such a senseless decision :(
You're in control in a car, not so in an airplane (Score:4, Insightful)
Feeling of helplessness greatly influences perceptions of safety of an airplane.
In case of a car, you can actively increase your safety, by...driving safely. Granted, sometimes you are at a mercy of some moron, but even then - you can often recognise such situation soon enough, or at least point at the other guy. Furthermore, in relation to "you can always blame the other guy", most morons on the road think they are great drivers. And this is all about perception, of safety in this case.
But the planes are different. You're just a cargo. When things unfold you have no idea who/what is responsible and can activelly increase you chances (proper position and evacuation) only in part of the cases.
And people hate beeing reminded how small and fragile pieces in the grand scheme of things they are.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
As someone who has done a fair amount of driving, I don't think "not speeding" is your best protection. In fact, the best is moving with the flow of traffic. If traffic is going 85, and you are doing 65, guess what? You are now a rolling road block, and causing an unsafe situation as all the rest of the traffic has to adjust to you.
Your best protection is to practice what the MSF calls SIPDE. And I do mean practice, its really about a state of mental awareness more than anything. SIPDE btw stands for "Scan
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
My method of avoiding accidents is much more simple and much more effective than yours. I simply assume that every driver around me is going to do the most asinine, idiotic, and jackass thing possible. When I come to an intersection, I assume that at least one idiot will run a red light or that one moron will lane change in the intersection. Hell, I avoided an accident last week when I assumed that the jackass sitting to my left in a two lane turning lane would turn wide and end up in my lane, which he d
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Informative)
2009
- Fedex Flight 80, McDD MD-11
2008
- British Airways Flight 38, Boeing 777
- Kalitta Air, Boeing 747F
- Sudan Airways Flight Flight 109, Airbus A310
- Fedex Flight 80, McDD MD-11
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Funny)
Fedex Flight 80, McDD MD-11 crashed TWICE??!?!
Now THOSE are some long odds!
Re:EMP Testing (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:EMP Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
I guess lots of people are bad at math. Look at the popularity of gambling!
Maybe people should be encouraged to take a probability and statistics course in high school.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Why? Why would they need to test it this way? IT's more expensive and pointless. The could use an empty plane to do it. For actual EMP effects this large, passengers would not matter.
Also, there was a report of a sudden loss of pressure. an EMP large enough to take ut a plane means no such information would have been radioed.
The Odd of it being an EMP is pretty much 0(ZERO)
Just becasue you think of something doesn't mean it's real or even likely.
Re:In the absence of any evidence of any sort..... (Score:5, Insightful)
Glad they hang out on Slashdot.
Fair?
Finding the REAL causes - through speculation and investigation - are the route to improvements that prevent this sort of thing from again happening.
I can think of no more fitting tribute to the departed ones, and their families.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Fact: There are no recorded cases of death by meteor, unless you count a dog in France.
Given this information how do they get the statistic of around 100 people per decade killed by meteor without ignoring reality?
I agree with the OP, TFA is psuedo-scientific ambulance chasing.
But there is some evidence (Score:5, Informative)
Equipment on the Air France airplane transmitted a signal about an equipment failure. So, we know when the plane could have been struck.
If the Spanish pilots can nail the meteor sighting to something like a radio transmission (all of which are recorded) or a course change, we know approximately when the meteor happened.
Meteors generate a radio signal. Such signals are often recorded. http://www.k5kj.net/meteor.htm [k5kj.net] That would give us an exact time for the meteor.
If the meteor happened exactly when the plane sent the message about equipment failure, I would say we have a pretty good case.
Re:calculations wrong I think (Score:4, Informative)
Re:calculations wrong I think (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Reduces liabilty. (Score:4, Interesting)
Super, now all the insurance company should need to do is establish that God exists.
And if they can do that, then isn't the entire Universe an Act of God?
What do we pay insurance for, then?
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Aeris dies. Just saying.
NOOOOOOO!