Air France AF447 crash into the Atlantic: Airbus A330 aircraft parts found

[sdbelgium]

Some more info about the crew of flight 447 according to the Associated Press

Captain
Marc Dubois, age 58, joined AF in 1988, ex-Air Inter, type rated on the A332 in February 2002 and 11000 hours TT (of which 1700 on type).

F/O 1
David Robert, age 37, joined AF in 1999, type rated on the A332 in April 2002 and 6600 hours TT (of which 2600 on type).

F/O 2
Pierre-Cedric Bonin, age 32, joined AF in 2004, type rated on the A332 in June 2008 and 3300 hours TT (of which 800 on type).

Purser
Anne Grimout, age 49, joined AF nearly 25 years ago and from the town of Ermenonville, France.

[mschatje]

Hi! I'm not an expert at all in aircrafts....but I would like to know what do you think about this: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008 ... 391134.htm
any coincidence? could it be the same?
Thanks!

[sdbelgium]

Don't think so, none of the computerized systems worked with the Air France...

[sn-remember]

Hi! I'm not an expert at all in aircrafts....but I would like to know what do you think about this: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008 ... 391134.htm
any coincidence? could it be the same?
Thanks!

Don't think so, none of the computerized systems worked with the Air France...

Well I wouldn't discard this extremely serious issue that forced this QF to a sort of emergency landing as being independant and unrelated to the current catastrophe ..
I am in no way knowlegeable on these matters, but reading some (seemingly competent) comnents on Airliners.net (check the very interesting postings of Globex), I like to think the 2 cases will be duely and intensely cross checked

[JOVAN]

Being 'only' a passenger, but then also a frequent flyer since 25 years (I fly frequently to Middle East and Asia), I have the impression that there are more and more flights during which heavy turbulences occur.

Then we see also more heavy storms everywhere, with 10's of thousands of lightnings, extremely heavy hail storms (that damage planes seriously).

So, my impression and question: are todays planes still well enough equipped to go thru 'real heavy storms' and don't we simply have a lot more heavy storms than 10-20 years ago??

[TCAS_climb]

The weather out there is getting "more aggressive" with time (due to global warming ?) but that's just a feeling that maybe a meteorology freak could comment with credible statistics.


An airliner may seem strong (yet flexible) from a human perspective, but compared to a storm cloud that's 10 km high and several km wide it's totally insignificant. Even if you managed to make a concrete airliner fly, it would still be squashed and reduced to rubble in the updrafts and downdrafts of a cummulonimbus cloud, or thrown to the ground.

Weather radars are getting better and better but the danger is still out there. Avoidance will always remain the best strategy for aircraft.

[Zorba]

Fist bodies have been found.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americas/ ... index.html

[ambrew]

Pictures of debris of the AF447 plane have been published by many media. On one of them you can clearly read "CREW REST". Could this be an A330 Crew Rest Container? If so, where are these usually located?

http://www.lemonde.fr/societe/article/2 ... _3224.html

[LX-LGX]

A large tail section has been found.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,525389,00.html

[YYZ727]

Purser
Anne Grimout, age 49, joined AF nearly 25 years ago and from the town of Ermenonville, France.

A grim coincidence...
Ermenonville is the town near Paris where the THY DC10-10 crashed on march the third 1974....

[safety]

Air France Flight 447:
A detailed meteorological analysis

Update / June 9, 2009:

Myself and Scott Bachmeier at University of Wisconsin/Space Science and Engineering Center are requesting that airline pilots who observed a significant warming episode at cruise altitude within the past 10 years and know the exact date/time and approximate location please drop us an e-mail with the story and include your credentials (which will remain anonymous). Unfortunately we must have an exact date and time in order to research the event. I have received a number of anecdotes from pilots who report encountering the phenomena, and while neither of us see evidence yet which supports this occurring in the Air France 447 storm cluster we believe it's a good idea to research this further rather than just dismissing it at this point. We appreciate your help.


Update / June 8, 2009:

It was brought to my attention (thanks Bill S.) that a 1979 episode of sudden upper tropospheric warming has been quantified in the peer-reviewed literature (see here, PDF). Though I had ruled out sudden warming in earlier updates, I had only been considering buoyant cumulonimbus ascent, in which case a 30-degree rise in the cloud would be unprecedented and indeed unsupportable by the theta-e profiles in the air mass feeding the storm, though if it did occur the vertical velocities and turbulence potential would be astronomical.

Though stratospheric "warm sinks" and "cold domes" have been a part of forecasting for years, this paper proposes a very intense, small-scale, convectively driven downdraft mechanism caused by the penetration of a mesoscale convective system into the stratosphere. The paper identifies a scale of about 75 km in width and an anomaly of 18 Celsius degrees. Any forced downward motion from the stratosphere like this will cause very strong adiabatic warming and associated drying, characterized by a profound lack of high cloud layers and low radiance on water vapor imagery (which by a stroke of luck is most sensitive to the upper troposphere). Since a mesoscale signature like this is well within the sampling capability of the GOES and METEOSAT platforms, I immediately reviewed the water vapor loop (SSEC). However it does not appear to show any anomalous subsident signatures. The area to the north of the MCS appears to show normal synoptic-scale subsidence within the trade wind inversion and the A330 is not believed to have made it this far north anyway.

I do have grave doubts a warm, mesoscale subsident area would be enough to significantly disrupt the A330 flight, and occurring in clear air there is a good chance any failure would be recoverable. I will however continue pondering this idea, will work this topic into the study, and will be glad to entertain other thoughts in this direction. The mystery continues.

-- Tim Vasquez
Weather Graphics / Norman, Oklahoma

http://www.weathergraphics.com/tim/af447/

[regi]

When we see officials carrying around small square boxes with the remarks that those are containing human remains, I wish those people a lot of strength to go through this gruesome procedure.

Despite the horrible times for the relatives, it is better for them that at least something is found back and traceable through DNA than nothing at all. Depending on country and legislation, the lack of human remains can cause very serious problems concerning inheritance and life insurance.

[BrightCedars]

The A330/A340 has been flying in ever growing numbers since the early '90's and there never was a problem as the one currently incriminating a speed indicator or some kind of such device.

One thing drawing my attention is that it is reported that there was a program in place to replace these devices started before the crash, this program seems to be accelerated and we don't know why.

But I think that as the great majority of crashes are related to human error, could it be that the indicator on that plane turned faulty or was wrongly installed or, or, or? I remember the crash of a B757 related to a mere layer of sticky tape covering an altimeter duct or something of that sort.

This event is really a tragic loss for all the families involved. RIP

[TCAS_climb]

Sorry for the folks who don't speak French, but there's a website out there that published a strong case against some of the pitot probes installed on AF airplanes: eurocockpit.com

[sidestick]

To MEA: yes, numerous case of faults regarding these pitot tubes installed on 320/330 and 340. Even AF acknowledge that. (See the above link to Eurocockpit web site and related link to the Air Caraibes incident....)
Looks like to me that the chronology of the messages is almost exactly the same

[Desert Rat]

In case of loss of 3 ADR's, the crew will apply the "Unreliable speed/ADR check procedure" there's memory item to be conducted:
-AP/FD off
-Autothrust off
-Pitch/thrust 5 degrees nose up/ Climb power
level off for Troubleshooting
Check GPS altitude on MCDU
the flying technique is then :
-if the A/C pitch tends to increase,A/C is slow,thrust needs to be increased.
-if the A/C pitch tends to decrease,A/S is fast, reduce thrust.
When stabilized - select probe Heat to try to deice the probes and retrieve reliable speed indication.

The pilots must identify the faulty ADR's and then swith them off.during the identification procedure, the flight control laws may be affected,so it is recommended to fly the A/C with care.

The loss of the ADR, can be due to sudden icing of the probes but also due to radome destruction,creating turmoil around the pitots,the static ports and the AOA sensors...

[regi]

and than this comes up:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8092463.stm

[L-1011]

Sorry for the folks who don't speak French, but there's a website out there that published a strong case against some of the pitot probes installed on AF airplanes: eurocockpit.com

I side with you on this one. eurocockpit.com has produced a wealth of information, sometimes drown in sarcasm and I-told-you-so, but based on very sound facts. See http://www.eurocockpit.com/archives/indiv/E009426.php (only in french)

It seems that a sudden loss of at least two pitot tubes due to icing in unstable meteorological conditions can start the fault sequence seen in the ACARS messages hereunder. Note that teh ACARS messages are not ordered in time and messages from the same minute cannot be put in a timeline (no information on seconds + first arrived does not mean first sent/occured or somewhere special in list)

The earliest Fault Report able to cause the warnings and subsequent faults is marked in red.


I don't have the time to translate everything into english , but if someone has the time and motivation it would be great.

The A330/A340 has been flying in ever growing numbers since the early '90's and there never was a problem as the one currently incriminating a speed indicator or some kind of such device.

Well I'd say if it is an extremely rare phenomenon it's going to appear once in maybe 10million flight-hours, you will start to see such occurences when the fleet egt bigger and logs enough hours .... statistics ....

One thing drawing my attention is that it is reported that there was a program in place to replace these devices started before the crash, this program seems to be accelerated and we don't know why.

I'd say this is more because of public relations than anything else (at least the way it is told in Press Releases)
They probably don't know why they would accelerate it either but not doing anything would be bad (although doing it can be interpreted as : "Ha They knew and hid it")

My condolences go out to all the families of those involved in this tragic accident

[Desert Rat]

Some of the message are due to crew action:
Auto FLt A/THR OFF
Auto FLT AP OFF

[RC20]

When we see officials carrying around small square boxes with the remarks that those are containing human remains, I wish those people a lot of strength to go through this gruesome procedure.

Despite the horrible times for the relatives, it is better for them that at least something is found back and traceable through DNA than nothing at all. Depending on country and legislation, the lack of human remains can cause very serious problems concerning inheritance and life insurance.

In this type of case it does not.