stu7708 244 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 Not much to go on at this stage, but a Germanwings A320 flying from Barcelona to Düsseldorf is reported missing over the French alps, and helicopters have reported seeing the remains of an aircraft on the ground.So sadly it looks like a bad one Prior to disappearing from radars it descended from FL380 to Fl110 in about 8 minutes, and then proceeded down to about 6800 feet before leveling off and shortly after that vanished from radar. Terrain in the area goes well above that altitude though, so the pilots might have been in a situation they couldn't get out of once they got control of the aircraft. EDIT: The whole flight can be tracked here http://www.flightradar24.com/data/airplanes/d-aipx/#5d42675 Link to post Share on other sites
MyPC8MyBrain 273 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 sad news the circumstances sounds like a hijack attempt eliminated by the flight crow Link to post Share on other sites
wain 879 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 sad newa for all on board and friends and families, been window cleaning all morning so not heard any news...... Wayne Link to post Share on other sites
britfrog 180 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 They may have had a decompression problem, hence the dive but this is normally communicated by radio however I dare say all radio units have been told to stay schtum, however it will all come out in the wash sad thing to happen though Link to post Share on other sites
stu7708 244 Posted March 24, 2015 Author Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 A bit of cut and paste, the quote below comes from AVHerald.com. "France's DGAC reported the crew transmitted an emergency call just prior to the aircraft disappearing from radar near Bassinet." No further mention of what type of emergency though. Link to post Share on other sites
dodgy-alan 1,587 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 The mayday now seems to have been sent by French ATC after they lost track of the aircraft. So sad. Link to post Share on other sites
allardjd 1,853 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 A mayday by ATC - that's pretty novel. John 1 Link to post Share on other sites
dodgy-alan 1,587 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 That's what I thought as well. I think it was done to alert other pilots to keep their eyes open . Link to post Share on other sites
Quickmarch 488 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 Sad news. Nothing definitive on the telly, here. Lots of speculation. Link to post Share on other sites
stu7708 244 Posted March 24, 2015 Author Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 Lot's of speculations indeed.. Saw that Der Spiegel among other things mentioned a possible bird strike... at FL380.... sounds rather unlikely... Link to post Share on other sites
donnybalonny 46 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 Its pretty hot stuff here in Spain. The flight was from Barcelona, there were 45 Spaniards aboard and also 16 german kids going home after having been in a family interchange program with school teachers. As mentioned, there werent any mayday from the flight. ATC made the alarm when the AC disappeared from radar.The weather was supposedly good. The AC was a 24 year old Airbus A320 That had been checked yesterday. They are trying to go to the place where the AC is now. The weather will change to snow later on and tomorrow. Its in an area with difficult acces near Barcelonette in the french alps. Maybe I´m wrong, but lots of Airbus falling down lately? THis computer controled sidestick thing gives me the creep. Link to post Share on other sites
hurricanemk1c 195 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 List of accidents (not necessarily in order) - http://avherald.com/h?list=&opt=7681 So 4 Boeings (3 crashes, one shoot down) And 2 Airbuses (both A320's) over the past year and few days. So not exactly a lot recently. Sad to see another crash though - will be interesting to see what happened. Link to post Share on other sites
hifly 925 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 Very sad news, my thoughts for all concerned. Link to post Share on other sites
mutley 4,497 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 @Anders, you have to have 8 computers fail on an airbus to lose control and it won't let you put it in a dangerous attitude. It has to be something devastating, as Micke said, too high at FL380 for birds. An explosion has been discounted due to the size of some of the debris. A sad day for both nations and their families. Link to post Share on other sites
donnybalonny 46 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 I know. Its just me... I dont trust modern world so much. Anyways, they have found one of the black boxes, so maybe we will get to know some more. Link to post Share on other sites
J G 927 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 I think it is strange that there was no distress call given the time taken to lose all that altitude. On the news at ten this evening a woman who lives near the crash site said she heard a loud engine noise and then a huge explosion. To me that sounds like a powered decent which would rule out a high altitude structural catastrophe. So why no distress call if the aircraft was intact during its decent? Link to post Share on other sites
TomDangeroux 4 Posted March 24, 2015 Report Share Posted March 24, 2015 @ J G I'm thinking rapid decomprssion and an imobalised flight crew Link to post Share on other sites
brett 2,315 Posted March 25, 2015 Report Share Posted March 25, 2015 Sad news. Five aircraft go down in one year? That's five too many. Link to post Share on other sites
stu7708 244 Posted March 25, 2015 Author Report Share Posted March 25, 2015 As Anders said one of the black boxes were found yesterday. From what I've picked up it's the CVR, there are however rumors that it was damaged and that it might be impossible to retrieve the data. Link to post Share on other sites
MyPC8MyBrain 273 Posted March 25, 2015 Report Share Posted March 25, 2015 this is not how a crash site looks! nothing's left of the aircraft, its shredded to tiny pieces, so sad http://avherald.com/h?article=483a5651&opt=0 Link to post Share on other sites
MartinW 0 Posted March 25, 2015 Report Share Posted March 25, 2015 @ J G I'm thinking rapid decomprssion and an imobalised flight crew Good call. My thinking too. They had 8 minutes to make an emergency call. Even if they had their hands full handling a rapid decent, you would expect an emergency call. Rapid decompression and immobilised crew sounds plausible to me. As for A320's and accidents...given that the majority of airliners in European airspace are now Airbus, you would expect reported accidents to be predominantly Airbuses'. Doesn't mean they are more prone to accidents at all. Hope I don't start a "which is best" discussion, but my preference is fly-by-wire with it's flight envelope protection any day. Boeing or Airbus. Link to post Share on other sites
donnybalonny 46 Posted March 25, 2015 Report Share Posted March 25, 2015 From what I've picked up it's the CVR, there are however rumors that it was damaged and that it might be impossible to retrieve the data. The news I´ve got is that indeed it is the CVR and it is damaged but it should be possible to retrieve the data. If you see the photo posted before and the video of the scene,... Everything is totally damaged. Speculation about what happened is until now...... speculation. We know nothing. Link to post Share on other sites
stu7708 244 Posted March 25, 2015 Author Report Share Posted March 25, 2015 Interesting, but hardly surprising, that there are such differences in what media reports. Although I did get the information regarding issues with data retrieval from one of the Swedish tabloids (Aftonbladet in case you are from up here originally, Anders could after all be a Swedish name ), so perhaps not the most reliable source.... Link to post Share on other sites
stu7708 244 Posted March 25, 2015 Author Report Share Posted March 25, 2015 Ouch.. that CVR sure is badly banged up... An image of it can be found here... http://www.avherald.com/h?article=483a5651&opt=0 Avherald also says that it's usable, so I guess my previous source was wrong..... Link to post Share on other sites
donnybalonny 46 Posted March 25, 2015 Report Share Posted March 25, 2015 I got my info from teletext in Spanish television. And also now from the news. Here´s the box. Link to post Share on other sites
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