AP: Air Asia plane missing w/ 162 aboard

[KestrelBike]

Uh oh. Not to be confused with Malasian Air's lost birds. AirAsia flight from Indonesia to Singapore missing after takeoff.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_INDONESIA_PLANE_?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-12-27-22-40-21

[wyome]

prayers for those on board and their loved ones...

[KAPA]

Very odd to lose a plane during he cruise portion of flight... Well at least until this year.

[sniper7]

Interesting.

[Guylee]

Moral of the story...don't get on asian airplanes.

[buffalobo]

Moral of the story...don't get on asian airplanes.

^^^^This.

[fitz19d]

I actually had to help an asian lady at work get out of her parking spot, and repark it so half the minivan wasn't outside the lines...... I've seen plenty of parking garage vids from asia, so I took her seriously.

[Guylee]

I actually had to help an asian lady at work get out of her parking spot, and repark it so half the minivan wasn't outside the lines...... I've seen plenty of parking garage vids from asia, so I took her seriously.

Whoa hey man that's racist.

[HoneyBadger]

Not good. Don't ever get on a plane to/from/operatedby Malaysia!

[Sawin]

That's not good

[KestrelBike]

First thing I'd want to know are the profiles of the pilot & co-pilot

[sniper7]

First thing I'd want to know are the profiles of the pilot & co-pilot

(Twilight zone theme in background with a deep voice "there wasn't ANY!!!!!!")

[Gman]

Airbus A320 trying to fly over severe weather? Sounds similar to the Air France A330 flight 447 crash.

[KestrelBike]

(Twilight zone theme in background with a deep voice "there wasn't ANY!!!!!!")
Investigators look at the manifest: "Lee, Park, Soong, WILLIAM SHATNER?!?"

[CareyH]

First thing I'd want to know are the profiles of the pilot & co-pilot

looks like the Pilot and co-pilot had about 8000 hours between the two of them. They were requesting a flight plan deviation due to bad weather about 5mins before they lost contact. New Bermuda triangle?!?!?

[KestrelBike]

looks like the Pilot and co-pilot had about 8000 hours between the two of them. They were requesting a flight plan deviation due to bad weather about 5mins before they lost contact. New Bermuda triangle?!?!?

Huh. So they're at ~15,000ft, start getting their ass kicked by the storm, go to climb, turbulence meets stall speed and into the briny deep they go?

[Gman]

Huh. So they're at ~15,000ft, start getting their ass kicked by the storm, go to climb, turbulence meets stall speed and into the briny deep they go?
No, more than double that.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/airasia-plane-with-162-on-board-missing-en-route-to-singapore/ar-BBhhR9T (http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/airasia-plane-with-162-on-board-missing-en-route-to-singapore/ar-BBhhR9T?ocid=ansnewsafp11)

Shortly before disappearing, the pilot asked to ascend by 6,000 feet to 38,000 feet to avoid heavy clouds, according to an Indonesian transport ministry official.

"The plane requested to air traffic control to fly to the left side, which was approved," Djoko Murjatmodjo told a press conference.

"But their request to fly to 38,000 feet from 32,000 feet could not be approved at that time due to traffic, there was a flight above, and five minutes later the flight disappeared from radar."

[BushMasterBoy]

The official religion of Malaysia is Islam.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Malaysia

[sniper7]

Huh. So they're at ~15,000ft, start getting their ass kicked by the storm, go to climb, turbulence meets stall speed and into the briny deep they go?

They were at 32,000 wanting to climb to 38,000' and deviate for weather. Looking at the radar for that area there were some serious cells/thunderstorms. They could have run into severe icing, severe turbulence and stalled it. They could have got huge hail possibly damaging or destroying the aircraft.

I will venture to say this one was weather related somehow.

[KestrelBike]

No, more than double that.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/airasia-plane-with-162-on-board-missing-en-route-to-singapore/ar-BBhhR9T (http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/airasia-plane-with-162-on-board-missing-en-route-to-singapore/ar-BBhhR9T?ocid=ansnewsafp11)


They were at 32,000 wanting to climb to 38,000' and deviate for weather. Looking at the radar for that area there were some serious cells/thunderstorms. They could have run into severe icing, severe turbulence and stalled it. They could have got huge hail possibly damaging or destroying the aircraft.

I will venture to say this one was weather related somehow.

Ah ok, got confused and thought this was all 5 min into the flight.

[NFATrustGuy]

looks like the Pilot and co-pilot had about 8000 hours between the two of them. They were requesting a flight plan deviation due to bad weather about 5mins before they lost contact. New Bermuda triangle?!?!?

8000 hours combined is definitely NOT a bunch of time. I recently upgraded to captain at my day job after 10 years in the right seat. I have roughly 12,500 hours and I'm probably one of the low-time captains. I don't think I've flown with a single co-pilot who didn't have at least 4,000 hours total time. Prior to our recent hiring and upgrades, I would estimate the crew's total combined experience was routinely in excess of 30,000 hours.

FWIW...

Rod

[SuperiorDG]

8000 hours combined is definitely NOT a bunch of time. I recently upgraded to captain at my day job after 10 years in the right seat. I have roughly 12,500 hours and I'm probably one of the low-time captains. I don't think I've flown with a single co-pilot who didn't have at least 4,000 hours total time. Prior to our recent hiring and upgrades, I would estimate the crew's total combined experience was routinely in excess of 30,000 hours.

FWIW...

Rod

They updated the Pilot's hours. 20,000 hours before he worked at Air Asia.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/12/28/airasia-plane-missing-with-162-on-board-indonesia-media-report/

[bellavite1]

Question for the pilots here:
How can airplanes get lost?
When I use the free navigator app on my phone it knows exactly where I am at any given moment thanks to GPS technology.
I cannot imagine that something similar is not in use on such an expensive machine, let alone the negative publicity, lawsuits etc.
I heard about transponders, but it looks like they are just sending signals at intervals, not constantly tracking the position of the plane.
Can you help me understand?

[Gman]

If you were to fold your phone in half, how well would the GPS app track?

[wyome]

the pilots know where they are...the problem is flying thru severe weather that can jack with the instruments they need to accurately monitor altitude , speed, temperature and such....something catastrophic to the jet adds other crap to deal with that affects the pilots ability to fly the jet, or just be alive

[bellavite1]

If you were to fold your phone in half, how well would the GPS app track?
True, but until that very moment it would.
On the MA flight they were (are) looking for the plane on a 360 degrees area, they have no clue where it went for hundreds of miles.

[Gman]

There's no global radar system, at least for civilian use. There's a reliance on the aircraft to report their position. In the case of the Malaysian Air hijacking, the crew disabled the transponder.

[J]

Transponders also have a limited range, it "responds" to radar requests. A standard transponder does nothing when not in radar range. The ELT (emergency location transponder) can do linking to satellites, but not so well from under water... and it is only activated manually or on hard impact, at which point it might be damaged beyond transmitting.

Also, it should be noted that in a severe hail or severe thunderstorm, the GPS and NAV/COM antennas could easily be broken off or rendered inoperable, making the systems significantly less useful. Even if they are not, a severe TS can cause some big noise on a VHF system when it is close enough.

So, you lose those you basically have dead reckoning to work with, but with severe turbulence messing with your static and pitot systems, your altimeter, attitude indicator, climb rate indicator and airspeed indicator start jumping all over the place, and knowing how long you have been doing exactly what gets quite confusing. Especially when a large portion of your attention is to aviating through the severe weather.

So, no, it isn't easy for an airliner to get lost, but it can happen. And when it does, s#!t runs downhill fast. And it could be done with significantly degraded comms.

[Gman]

Is anybody else thinking vertical stabilizer failure...or is it just my paranoia about Airbus?

[hollohas]

So, no, it isn't easy for an airliner to get lost, but it can happen. And when it does, s#!t runs downhill fast. And it could be done with significantly degraded comms.

It's not easy and it's extremely unlikely...but somehow now it's happened twice in very short order.

It has to be some nasty, crazy weather to bring down a full sized passenger airliner. Holes get ripped in the fuselage and the planes land. Turbulence is so crazy it throws passengers against the cabin walls/ceiling and the planes land. I have personally been on a plane that was struck by lighting and we kept on our way. Weather doesn't just pop up. Planes don't end up in supercells by accident or by surprise. They know what's up ahead most of the time. I have been on countless planes when the pilot/co-pilot announced we'd be going up or dropping down because there was turbulence up ahead...and before our particular plane experienced any turbulence.

I have no idea or theory on this one. Maybe it was weather maybe it wasn't. All I'm saying is it sounds fishy, especially since the almost unheard of passenger airliner disappearance has recently become a lot more common in that particular neck-of-the-woods...

[J]

Agreed completely. I was just playing devils advocate, and explaining how it could potentially happen, no matter how unlikely.

[ruthabagah]

Is anybody else thinking vertical stabilizer failure...or is it just my paranoia about Airbus?
Its just your paranoia. There was one failure, provoked by the pilote, and it was on a A300. Most if not all of them have been retired except in the cargo configuration.

[th3w01f]

I feel so sorry for the passengers and family of the Air Asia flight and even though I fly about 100K miles a year it still scares the crap out of me. I'm not sure I would have made it off of this plane -


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDROBNJE9lQ

[KestrelBike]

I think the Malaysian air first flight was deliberate by the suicidal / jihadist pilots, the second Malaysian flight was a deliberate idiocy by Russians, so if this air Asia flight is an accident, it's still the first in awhile.

[Gunservant]

The weather in the area was apparently murderous. Considering how high those tropical thunderstorms go, I don't know how easy it is to out-climb them as a deviation option. There are so many things that could have caused the aircraft to crash, and crash it sure did, that speculating on the numerous potential causes is kind of pointless.

However, I like to dabble in speculation a bit, and I reckon the poor bastards put the thing through a red or magenta patch on their weather radar and never made it out the other side.

[Bunny]

Just a sad situation in general, planes freak me out lol

[MrPrena]

What a bad PR for Malaysian Airline companies.

[Duman]

They found some wreckage and bodies, and have a location of the wreck. Should have more answers in a few weeks.

[Skully]

They found some wreckage and bodies, and have a location of the wreck. Should have more answers in a few weeks.

Yeah saw this on the news this morning. :(

I feel for the families.

Did anyone see the "Family of 10 missed Air Asia flight by minutes." (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/12/29/family-missed-air-asia-flight-by-minutes/20996863/)

They are so lucky. Strange act of fate.

[Chad4000]

^^ yeah thats nuts..

[hatidua]

Did anyone see the "Family of 10 missed Air Asia flight by minutes." (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/12/29/family-missed-air-asia-flight-by-minutes/20996863/)

Considering the flight left two hours early, I'd suspect more than just that group might have missed the flight.

Pretty sad situation over there (again).

[sniper7]

Looks like they have pings from the black box, found the tail section and trying to raise it with flotation devices, and I think they have 42 bodies recovered so far.

[sniper7]

Flight data recorder in hand. Will be pulling data soon. Cockpit voice recorder has been found and will be picked up shortly. Should know pretty soon what happened.
vertical stabilizer was still attached to the tail so the fears of airbus stabilizers is put to rest in this one I believe.