Oh noes!

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2014/04...n_5163074.html

Yeah, that's definitely a "We've been wanting to fire him for awhile and this was the last straw/good opportunity".

So I was talking to a friend of mine who has flown commercial and military for over 25 years, and has an aviation consulting practice. His theory is:

1) Plane was hijacked.
2) Pilots may or may not have been involved.
3) Plane dropped below 12,000 feet to make a drop (of what he had no idea), either out of the main cabin or the cargo hold. He says that the area where the plane went below 12,000 feet is perfect for making a drop.
4) US has the tech to know where the plane went down, but can't say so explicitly.
5) Plane is unlikely to be found.

This theory sounds quite far out to me. In particular, I have no idea why the criminally minded would use a commercial aircraft to make a drop of anything.

Baseless speculation, but if it is pilot suicide, somebody was certainly controlling the plane as it crossed over Malaysia. I wonder if the pilot wanted to crash into somewhere/something in Malaysia but got cold feet but had gone far enough with his plan already-- maybe the passengers were incapacitated due to altitude or he had locked the copilot out of the cockpit-- that he knew he was screwed and was essentially pot committed. He decided not to take anyone else on the ground but still wanted to bury the plane.

I had similar theory in the beginning of this incident, but W0X0F said it's not possible to open the doors of a modern commercial aircraft to jump or drop something out.

The friend is a nutjob.

"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing"

I asked my friend this question. He said it was possible to open the emergency exit doors. I have no independent knowledge who is right, but in any case, I agree that my friend's theory seems highly unlikely.

Dude that's actually terrible. Mitchell Casado and the flight sim was the best part of CNN's ongoing MAH370 coverage.

You could open the emergency exit doors if the airplane was depressurized first.

239 total posts: 4,479
239 posts NOT in the Amanda Knox thread: 240

It won't be hard for CNN to find a new sim guy, and I thought casado was a little stiff with his dialogue.

Even so, you agree that his theory is highly unlikely, right?

When in doubt




[spoiler] aliens [/spoiler]

What if the plane was still pressurized but below 5000 feet?

Yes.

The key is the differential pressure. At altitude, the psid is somewhere in the 8-10 range. If it's 8, that means that you have 8 lbs/sq. in. pushing outward. For an average size emergency exit, maybe 20" x 30", that's 600x8 pounds of force. So you'd have to overcome 4800 pounds to open it.

At 5000 feet, the psid would be much lower, maybe only 1 or 2 pounds per square inch (I'm guessing; I'll look at it on my flight in two hours). So that would now be only 600 or 1200 pounds of force to wrestle with.

Still difficult.

How long would you have to apply that kind of force? Seems like once you got it even a crack of the way, that would equalize pressure more, making it easier, and if you got anything substantial, it would have force of the air traveling buy possibly pushing it in some direction. Still 600 lbs seems hard for something like this, especially if you don't want to fall out.

Good question, but I think it would be more than just a few seconds. It would be an interesting experiment.

Well but at 30k feet the PSI in the cabin is like 11-12 and and the PSI outside is 4 (PSI of 10 would mean that the cabin is sea level which I understand is not true). Doesn't pressurizing the cabin bring it up to some fairly large fraction of the outside pressure? Like at 30000 feet it's 7k in the cabin. It goes from 4 PSI outside to like 11 PSI inside. So what's the cabin pressure at 5000 feet? Is the cabin being pressurized the whole way or does it kick in only once you go above like 10k feet?

Actually I saw a youtube on the Air France 447 and in fact is the case. Sully says the FO's actions are inexplicable.

Honestly I think I might have seen/read something like this a while ago and half remembered it.

If someone intentionally switched the ACARS and other systems off, he had to go down to the E/E Bay,so I watched this video where a 777 Captain is showing the E/E Bay and I've noticed two interesting things, maybe W0X0F can answer my questions.

http://youtu.be/2S-Cggs1jOo

1.) There is a pressurized door in the floor that goes outside, would it be possible to open it in flight after dropping below 5000 feet?

2.) You can reach the forward cargo department from the E/E Bay.

He's absolutely right. This accident should not have happened. Holding full back stick all the way down from 30,000+ feet is just unimaginable.

I'm not sure what kind of door the E&E compartment has. I've seen it open when doing a walk around and it simply hangs open from the bottom of the plane. I don't think it's a plug type door (like the cabin doors and emergency exits), but I'm not sure. I've never looked at the door closely.

As for access to the cargo compartment from the E&E bay, I'm not sure if that's possible. I can't see the need for it and aircraft manufacturers don't put doors where they're not needed. But I don't know.

2+2 would be the greatest website ever if we had 100 W0X0F's, each with a different area of expertise. His contributions to all threads related to aviation have been mega-elite in terms of substance and tone.

W0X0F: Do you think you could smuggle a parachute onto a plane?

Sure. A packed parachute is no bigger than many carry-ons I've seen and there's nothing about it that would fail TSA screening. When I lived in Hawaii, I had a friend visit who was an avid jumper and he brought his chute so he could do some skydives on the North shore (Dillingham Field). I'm pretty sure he carried his chute on with him...it was his most valued possession.

Of course, it's possible that TSA has that particular item on a watch list. I'll ask the screener when I go to the airport today.