Russian airliner missing over Egypt
- Thread starter DJMK4
- Start date
Soldato
Theres quite a lot of different forces acting on sometimes not a great deal of metal though, and remember this is a plane that has gone everywhere at 500mph and 30 odd thousand feet for around fifty thousand hours.
Theyre designed not to of course, but **** happens unfortunately.
Soldato
A plane can quite easily break up if it is exerted under extreme forces. i.e. dive too fast and the wings can buckle and bend. Roll a giant aircraft and it's no doubt going to damage it, the wings quite literally can fall off. It's not like the movies.
![[TW]Fox](/data/man-of-honor/2009.png){kind=avatar}
What?
Soldato
? Planes aren't designed to withstand a bomb or some other form of explosive decompression at 32,000 ft.
Associate
There's been more than enough in the last 30 years alone. JAL123 being the most deadly and probably most famous due to the release of the CVR. (If you really want to listen to it, it's on Youtube but I'd recommend discretion, you're listening to over 500 people die.)
Planes are pressure vessels and any weakness, no matter how microscopic, if not picked up and repaired properly will eventually lead to a failure with repeated cycles of pressurisation.
The fact this particular aircraft suffered a tailstrike on landing years ago, coupled with reports of flight crew complaining about shoddy maintenance puts a rear pressure bulkhead failure just as much in the running speculation-wise as a bomb or other such nefarious act.
Ones that are previously damaged especially in rear bulk head, which has happened before. And didn't this plane have damage there.
My armchair hat says rubbish repair job.
Associate
It spent many months in the shop after a hard tailstrike on landing. Landing tailstrikes are generally much more stressful on the airframe than TO tailstrikes, which is usually a relatively gentle scrape more than one big impact.
Tex Johnston famously rolled a 707 during testing.
Soldato
Yes, a dangerous stunt. What's your point?
Associate
A barrel-roll, mind. Even a quite slippery commercial airliner can't sustain inverted flight. Lift vectors, and all that.
Wasn't there a 747-400 that rolled past 70 degrees during testing too? IIRC that wasn't intentional though.
Soldato
[TW]Fox;28761390 said:
Every mechanical component has a limit. Here is an example of a rear stabiliser coming off thanks to pilot error alone. No one survived.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Airlines_Flight_587
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It hit the ground with both wings still fitted so no idea what relevance that has to a comment addressed at his claims that wings can just 'fall off'.
Soldato
[TW]Fox;28761480 said:
He said, and I quote "A plane can quite easily break up if it is exerted under extreme forces". There is an example right there m8.
Soldato
[TW]Fox;28761480 said:
Think he was merely referring to the fact that mechanical faults do happen, a bit of an extreme example obviously
Working in aviation I've seen first hand stuff just 'falling off', stuff gets old and while we've got non destructive testing to check for these things, you cant cover everything.
I specifically quoted the part of his post I was replying to - that is the purpose of the quote function.
I'm aware of the fact a plane can break up under extreme force, which is why it wasn't included in the part of his post I quoted. I was referring specifically to his comment about wings falling off. It is exceptionally rare on a passenger jet due to the way the structure of the plane is designed and the forces they are designed to tolerate.
Why the hell would the pilot try and roll a passenger plane
Its not like he was in a jet!My guess is that it was probably a pretty old beat up Russian plane.
My dad went a Russian plane (duploff ?SP) in the late 80s / early 90s and he said he thought it was going to break up - panels inside shaking all over, leaking on his mates head the whole journey, stick of celery for dinner etc.
Soldato
You ain't experienced aviation in Russia until you've flown in an AN-2 that was more repairs than aircraft with a pilot whose breath smelled like he'd secretly been drinking the fuel.