'Contact lost' with Malaysia Airlines plane

[Tuppy_Glossop]

They were saying in the news that the signal can travel quite far underwater. Does anyone know roughly how far it would be? I'd have put my money on 'not very'.

Depends on the ocean conditions. Wave propagation depends on the carrier medium and the nature of the waves. The oceans sometimes stratify into thermal layers with different densities and thicknesses. These can attenuate/amplify/alter the signal.

 

[touch]

Depends on the ocean conditions [...] and the nature of the waves.

Skim read that, got mixed up with different types of "waves" in the ocean, became very confused

 

[MOOGLEYS]

Depends on the ocean conditions. Wave propagation depends on the carrier medium and the nature of the waves. The oceans sometimes stratify into thermal layers with different densities and thicknesses. These can attenuate/amplify/alter the signal.

Holy science batman....

Its generally around 4-5km depending on conditions and listening equipment in use...

 

[Tuppy_Glossop]

Sorry about the science. I did wonder if the acoustic waves might be confused with the ocean waves. Is anybody interested in the piezoelectric transducers used in hydrophones ?

 

[mcast]

I can see why the conspiracy nuts are loving this one, it's certainly the most unusual flight crashes in a while. As always, a rational explanation will be found, yet the CTs will batter on about this for eternity, patent issues, give me a break.

It smells something to do with the pilots or a hijacker that knew exactly what he was doing. The only problem with the hijack theory is why he chose to fly on for hours instead of crashing it into a public place. A massive fast decompression seems unlikely as there were course changes after the loss of contact.

Truthfully, I'm stumped on this one.

 

[Shelster]

As a general rule of thumb, sound travels 7 times further under water thatn through air, but has been mentioned, different factors such as temperature and salinity can alter that significantly, along with the differing layers that can either trap the sound and stop it reaching shallower waters or can trap between layers and cause the sound to be reflected between two layers before emerging several miles from where it originated.

 

[wiltonson]

Two more pings detected on April 8 - at 4.27pm and 10.17pm, Perth time

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/national/miss...light-mh370-20140409-36cif.html#ixzz2yMDHS3Wf

 

[Jokester]

It sounds like they're now rapidily zooming in on the final resting location of the plane.

 

[wiltonson]

Yup sounds like it and I hope they will find something soon. The kind of conspiracy theories developing at work is driving me nuts.

 

[Lethagized]

Why don't they fit more batteries on the transponder thingy? I saw one on sky news, and it only had a single battery in it. Surely they could design a system, where one battery drains, it switches to a new battery. It would give them more than 30 days to find it surely?

 

[Django x2]

The 30 days thing is largely moot anyway, that's technically the maximum time they are guaranteed to work, yet, like a watch battery, they will go on for years. The simple way to understand this is, AF in 2009 was still pinging faintly, two years after the accident.

This won't be the final resting place of MH370 though, it will just be where the blackbox is. With a cyclone having passed over that immediate area two days after the flight went missing, finding any actual debris is going to be tough unless there is sunken wreckage around the BB

 

[Stolly]

The 30 days thing is largely moot anyway, that's technically the maximum time they are guaranteed to work, yet, like a watch battery, they will go on for years. The simple way to understand this is, AF in 2009 was still pinging faintly, two years after the accident.

This won't be the final resting place of MH370 though, it will just be where the blackbox is. With a cyclone having passed over that immediate area two days after the flight went missing, finding any actual debris is going to be tough unless there is sunken wreckage around the BB

I would guess that there will be a debris field of many square miles......even if larger items stay in intact...

 

[The Running Man]

How much does bad weather on the surface impact an object on the seabed 4.8 km below the surface?

Also all the debris that was spotted has any been aligned to the actual flight as that's gone a bit quiet.

 

[koolpc]

Any wreckage would be strewn over a vast area by now. Many many miles from where the black box could be. Its a very difficult task indeed.

 

[MooMoo444]

The lack of any real accountable wreckage makes me think the whole plane is in more or less one piece on the ocean floor. Would be pretty crazy to find it like that.

 

[koolpc]

The lack of any real accountable wreckage makes me think the whole plane is in more or less one piece on the ocean floor. Would be pretty crazy to find it like that.

As likely as hens teeth i would have thought

 

[MOOGLEYS]

The lack of any real accountable wreckage makes me think the whole plane is in more or less one piece on the ocean floor. Would be pretty crazy to find it like that.

It would be crazy but very unlikely. I would say it hit hard which means the plane would have obliterated upon impact. Any wreckage by now would have moved away or sunk.

If these signals turn out to be nothing I doubt they will ever find it.

 

[Tuppy_Glossop]

I saw a piece that said the fuel tanks are independent so are unlikely to run out at the same time. This means the plane would become unstable before ditching. It seems likely to have been a fairly destructive impact. Heavier parts, like engines, should sink immediately.

 

[MooMoo444]

It would be crazy but very unlikely. I would say it hit hard which means the plane would have obliterated upon impact. Any wreckage by now would have moved away or sunk.

If these signals turn out to be nothing I doubt they will ever find it.

How could the signals turn out to be nothing though? Something must be making them.

Even if the don't find the plane, they might find an underwater city like Rapture.

 

[Narj]

Plot twist - search team discovers Rapture.