gut;1611054 wrote:The US and Australians have been leading the search since the first few weeks. None of the satellite analysis or ping locators are Malaysian tech.

Yes, but it has been the Malaysian PM who has served as the de facto spokesperson of the search throughout most of the process and he's been wrong at every turn (his declaration several weeks ago that the plane did in fact go down in the southern Indiana Ocean now appears to have been wildly premature and ill-judged). And yeah, I know Immarsat is a British (I believe) intelligence firm or whatever.

That plane flew a lot longer than they thought if it made it to the Indiana Ocean.


Kidding

Midstate01;1611336 wrote:That plane flew a lot longer than they thought if it made it to the Indiana Ocean.


Kidding

Haha. Didn't notice that.

Given the sheer vastness of these open waters, hundreds of thousands of square miles; ocean currents, wind directions, wind speeds, weather conditions, elapsed time etc...etc.... I don't think most people realize that it is almost like trying to find the proverbial needle in a haystack. Hope something turns up, but it could take months before something turns up somewhere.

QuakerOats;1611342 wrote:I don't think most people realize that it is almost like trying to find the proverbial needle in a haystack. .

Or as the Australia PM has said, trying to find WHICH haystack for starters.

The surprising thing to me is they brought in the best technology out there, and they had near "certainty" they had detected one or both black boxes because there's a distinct signature to begin with, and they had multiple separate detections.

Maybe the sonar mapping they used to search the bottom really isn't up to the challenge. It may be as simple as that and just a matter of getting actual eyes on the bottom to search.

Did not know of the "certainty" they had ....................and of course the depths could be massive, potentially out of reach ??

QuakerOats;1611350 wrote:Did not know of the "certainty" they had ....................and of course the depths could be massive, potentially out of reach ??

Where the sonar mapping searched was near the limits of its depth, but mostly within those limits. Hilly/mountainous bottom can also be a problem, but it was mostly fairly flat.

They were highly confident the "pings" they had picked-up could only have been from a blackbox - it pings at a measurable frequency that is intentionally distinct from marine life and man-made objects (not sure what that could be other than a sub). So they had multiple "confirmations", which should have ruled out human error (the most likely source of mistake). They had multiple independent detections (from presumably different crews) around the same area of the source, i.e. "verification".

I'm only speculating, but I think the depth might have prevented any tell-tale bottom disturbances resulting from sinking wreckage. Also, depending on the angle of impact it's possible the plane disintegrated into thousands of tiny pieces that such sonar wouldn't detect.

Just remember, it took over 2 years to find the bulk of the wreckage and black box with the Air France flight and they had known approximately where it went down. Not sure if it's the same tech, but that small debris field (@ 30 acres) was located with side-scan sonar that failed here. A depth of 13k feet, which is comparable to the depths of most of this search area.

ccrunner609;1611367 wrote:I am sticking with the idea that its on dry land somewhere

Stick with gym class.

ccrunner609;1611367 wrote:I am sticking with the idea that its on dry land somewhere

I bet you $20 it isn't.

I came to make an outlandish claim and put "/ccrunnered" at the end, but he apparently already did that himself today.

ccrunner609;1611367 wrote:I am sticking with the idea that its on dry land somewhere

Well, this option can be safely crossed off the list of potential locations.

QuakerOats;1611342 wrote:Given the sheer vastness of these open waters, hundreds of thousands of square miles; ocean currents, wind directions, wind speeds, weather conditions, elapsed time etc...etc.... I don't think most people realize that it is almost like trying to find the proverbial needle in a haystack. Hope something turns up, but it could take months before something turns up somewhere.

Heck, pretty sure they were saying it took two years to find an Air France flight and they knew where it had crashed into the ocean.

Looks like a possible piece has finally washed ashore:
https://gma.yahoo.com/mh370-debris-found-indian-ocean-appears-boeing-777-223631685--abc-news-topstories.html

bump