Malaysia T7 down!!

[Jpmkam]

Questions Asked About MH17 Flight Track Over Ukraine:

Analysis of the FlightAware.com flight-following site by AINsafety has revealed that Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 on July 17 was between 150 and 300 nm farther north than some previous flights by the airline on the Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur route. AIN learned, however, that some of FlightAware.com’s data tracks over Ukraine were created using information estimates. The question still remains whether the jetliner would have been shot down had it adhered to a more southerly track. However, alternative site FlightRadar24.com does not reveal any such deviation from the usual course and appears to use actual ADS-B- and ATC-derived flight data.

The airspace in eastern Ukraine was open at the time of the crash. Malaysia Airlines and many other international carriers continued to fly through it, even though several other airlines had chosen to reroute away from the conflict zone. Malaysian transport minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai said MH17 followed the route it did because the airspace was deemed to be safe above FL320 and was being regularly used by other commercial flights.

After the crash, the airspace was fully closed by Ukraine, and several national aviation authorities, including the FAA, banned aircraft registered in their jurisdictions from overflying the area around the Simferopol and Dnipropetrovsk flight information regions. In April, the FAA issued a notam barring U.S. flight operations from nearby Crimea, the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea. It remains unclear when or if international investigators, including a small NTSB team, will be allowed to access the as yet unsecured accident site. The FAA said it plans to re-evaluate the airspace prohibition by the end of October.

Source: Aviation International News

[retox]

Are none of you interested in placing any blame at the main party responsible for this tragedy, the people or persons who fired an advanced radar controlled anti-aircraft missile at a civilian airliner?

These sound like the same old tropes used to excuse the US Navy shoot down of Iran Air 655.

Yes in hindsight that airspace should have been avoided and it was a high risk area to fly over. But lets not beat around the bush here, whoever fired that missile A. was not intending to shoot down an airliner B. is ultimately the main bearer of responsibility for the deaths of all those innocent people.

It goes without saying that Putin and his animals are "responsible" and should be dealt with.

I would argue, however, that aviation safety involves the mitigation of all risk that CAN be controlled. A hurricane or an erupting volcano can bring down a plane. They are outside of the control of the aviation industry so they are avoided.

War involving alcohol-addled sub-humans with advanced AA weapons is outside the control of the aviation industry and it too must be avoided.

This is a situation where placing blame on the culprit feels good but does absolutely nothing to prevent this from happening again.

I suppose we agree, you are talking morals and maybe politics and I am talking systems and procedures.

[Jpmkam]

Black boxes:

Separatists in eastern Ukraine will hand over the black boxes from a downed airliner to Malaysian experts at 1900 GMT on Monday, Sergei Kavtaradze, an official of the rebels' self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, told Reuters.

[retox]

Questions Asked About MH17 Flight Track Over Ukraine:



Source: Aviation International News

It was reported 2 or so days ago that they were avoiding a thunderstorm to the South.

[Jpmkam]

Does anyone know if the Dutch or Malaysian aviation authorities have the capability to analyze the CVR and Flight data recorders themselves?

[brianw999]

Apologies for the lengthiness of this quote but it gives the latest news on the release of bodies, handover of Black Boxes and the hardening attitude of Westen leaders. It is however noticeable that it doesn't outline an agreed timeframe for access being given to the crash site for the purpose of a full investigation. Bold text highlighting is mine....

Leaders of pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine have agreed to hand over the bodies of victims of the Malaysia Airlines crash, along with the plane's black boxes, and to allow international investigators access to the site, Malaysia's prime minister has announced. Najib Razak said he had secured agreement from Alexander Borodai, the self-proclaimed prime minister of the "Donetsk People's Republic", after days of behind-the-scenes efforts to establish contact with those in control of the crash site.

His announcement came as David Cameron called on Russian president Vladimir Putin to end his support for separatists and warned Moscow it faced international isolation, including a "new range of hard-hitting economic sanctions" from the EU. In a statement to the House of Commons, Mr Cameron said Russia was facing a "defining moment" and warned that Europe would fundamentally change its relations with its giant eastern neighbour if Mr Putin continued to foment violence and instability in Ukraine.

The United Nations Security Council was due to vote on a resolution tabled by the UK and Australia demanding "safe, full and unfettered access" to the crash site for international investigators and for the bodies of victims - many of which are being held in refrigerated train carriages - to be handled with respect and dignity.

Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond will tomorrow meet EU counterparts in Brussels at a meeting in which the UK hopes to accelerate the implementation of extended sanctions on specific Russian businesses, organisations and individuals, as well as discussing broader sanctions which could target wider sectors of the Russian economy, such as financial services, energy exports, trade and defence co-operation.

In a statement, Mr Razak said he had spoken personally to Mr Borodai and agreed that the remains of 282 victims of the crash, accompanied by six Malaysian members of the recovery team, will be moved by train this evening from Torez to the city of Kharkiv, where they will be handed over to Dutch officials.

The remains will be flown to Amsterdam on a Dutch C130 Hercules, together with the Malaysian team. The black boxes were due to be handed over to a Malaysian team in Donetsk this evening, said Mr Razak. Independent international investigators will be guaranteed "safe access to the crash site to begin a full investigation of the incident", he said.

"I must stress that although agreement has been reached, there remain a number of steps required before it is completed," said Mr Razak. "There is work still to be done, work which relies on continued communication in good faith. Mr Borodai and his people have so far given their co-operation.

"I ask that all parties continue to work together to ensure that this agreement is honoured; that the remains of our people are returned, that the black box is handed over, and that the international team is granted full access to the site. Only then can the investigation into MH17 truly begin; only then can the victims be afforded the respect they deserve. We need to know what caused the plane to crash, and who was responsible for it, so that justice may be done."

Mr Cameron told MPs: "The world is watching. President Putin faces a clear choice in how he decides to respond to this appalling tragedy. I hope he will use this moment to find a path out of this festering and dangerous crisis by ending Russia's support for the separatists. If he does not change his approach to Ukraine in this then Europe and the West must fundamentally change our approach to Russia."

Following phone calls in recent days with European leaders including German chancellor Angela Merkel and French president Francois Holland, Mr Cameron said that for too long there had been "reluctance" on the part of some European nations to face up to the implications of the unrest in eastern Ukraine. He said: "It is time to make our power, influence and resources felt.

"If Russia does not change course then we must be clear Europe must keep increasing the pressure: Russia cannot expect to continue enjoying access to European markets, European capital, European knowledge and technical expertise while she fuels conflict in one of Europe's neighbours," the PM told MPs.

"We must do what is necessary to stand up to Russia and put an end to the conflict in Ukraine before any more innocent lives are lost." Mr Cameron, who also discussed the Ukraine crisis at a meeting of the National Security Council, dismissed Mr Putin's "bluster and obfuscation" over the crash and rejected claims that Ukraine's armed forces could have fired the surface-to-air missile that downed the Malaysian jet at 33,000ft.

"The picture is becoming clearer and the weight of the evidence is pointing in one direction: MH17 was shot down by an SA-11 missile fired by separatists," he said. French arms sales and German dependence on Russian fossil fuels have been seen as possible barriers to tougher measures, but Britain will argue in Brussels that the whole union must share the burden.

Chancellor George Osborne said the UK was prepared to take an "economic hit" to put pressure on Moscow. Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said that the EU had so far failed to "act with the right collective resolve", but that the downing of flight MH17 had brought about "a change of mood" among "previously much more reticent" EU states.

Mr Clegg said: "At the end of the day, the Russian economy is far, far more dependent on access to the European market than the other way round. It would be, in my view, a betrayal of the collective clout that we have in the EU - the world's largest single market with 500 million consumers - it would be a betrayal of the clout that we could wield to good effect if everybody were only to look at their own national economic interests, given what is at stake here."

Mr Putin warned Western powers not to use the incident to advance "vested interests" at Russia's expense. "No one has the right to use this tragedy for any kind of vested interest in the political sense. Such incidents should unite people rather than separate them," said the Russian president.

"It is necessary that all people who are responsible for the situation in the region of Ukraine improve their responsibility to their own people, and to the people of the countries whose representatives have been victims of this crash. We need to do everything to ensure the security and safety of the observers and the experts working at the crash site."

The separatists placed bodies from the downed Boeing 777 in refrigerated train carriages in the rebel-held town of Torez, nine miles from the crash site, and said they would remain there until the arrival of an international aviation delegation. They also claimed the plane's black boxes had been recovered and would be handed over to the International Civil Aviation Organisation.

Labour leader Ed Miliband said evidence was growing that the MH17 crash was "not simply a tragedy but a crime". Speaking to the Centre for American Progress think-tank during a visit to Washington DC, Mr Miliband said: "This is a moment of reckoning for Europe. We know enough about this disaster to know that this is a moment when Europe needs to show its strength as well as its sorrow.

"It is evident from Russia's continuing actions in Ukraine that the international community has not done enough to show that Russian aggression cannot be allowed to stand. Europe's economic well-being relies upon the upholding of international norms and international law. Our collective security requires every European country to accept its responsibility. European unity must not be an excuse for European inaction."

[Jpmkam]

Apologies for the lengthiness of this quote but it gives the latest news on the release of bodies, handover of Black Boxes and the hardening attitude of Westen leaders. It is however noticeable that it doesn't outline an agreed timeframe for access being given to the crash site for the purpose of a full investigation. Bold text highlighting is mine....

Thankfully the train is already on it's way. The handover of the black boxes was suppose to have occurred 2 hours ago. They invited news media to the handover location, but according to a CNN reporter they are still expecting that handover to occur later this evening. CNN said the NSTB investigators are still in Kiev at this time.

[Gabriel]

Are none of you interested in placing any blame at the main party responsible for this tragedy, the people or persons who fired an advanced radar controlled anti-aircraft missile at a civilian airliner?

Well, Evan called them "trigger-happy morons targeting anything that flies above them on a mission of destruction for destruction's sake" and I said that they were "criminally negligent, guilty of manslaughter and comparable to monkeys with machine guns".

Does that qualify?

[BoeingBobby]

Are none of you interested in placing any blame at the main party responsible for this tragedy, the people or persons who fired an advanced radar controlled anti-aircraft missile at a civilian airliner?

These sound like the same old tropes used to excuse the US Navy shoot down of Iran Air 655.

Yes in hindsight that airspace should have been avoided and it was a high risk area to fly over. But lets not beat around the bush here, whoever fired that missile A. was not intending to shoot down an airliner B. is ultimately the main bearer of responsibility for the deaths of all those innocent people.

+1 Excellent post!

[Jpmkam]

Black boxes finally handed over?

Pro-Russian rebels are handing over Flight 17 black box data recorders to a Malaysian delegation in Ukraine, CNN's Phil Black reports

[Highkeas]

Does anyone know if the Dutch or Malaysian aviation authorities have the capability to analyze the CVR and Flight data recorders themselves?

Following the crash of Turkish Airlines Flight 1951 the Dutch Safety Board (DSB) sent the CVR and FDR to Paris to obtain the data readout.

In this case there may be a conflict between the DSB and Dutch prosecutors over who handles the recorders should a criminal investigation take place.

[Jpmkam]

Following the crash of Turkish Airlines Flight 1951 the Dutch Safety Board (DSB) sent the CVR and FDR to Paris to obtain the data readout.

In this case there may be a conflict between the DSB and Dutch prosecutors over who handles the recorders should a criminal investigation take place.

Thank you for the information.

[Jpmkam]

CNN confirms the Malaysian authorities are now in possession of the black boxes.

Hrabove, Ukraine (CNN) -- Pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine handed over the black box data recorders from downed Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, days after the passenger jet crashed.

The self-declared rebel leader in Donetsk said at a ceremony early Tuesday that they were giving the black boxes to the Malaysian government with the understanding that the information would be shared with aviation experts around the world.

https://twitter.com/ChristopherJM/status/491344671436967936/photo/1

[Graham2001]

CNN confirms the Malaysian authorities are now in possession of the black boxes.



https://twitter.com/ChristopherJM/st...967936/photo/1

Lets hope that as after the handover of the KAL007 black boxes checks are made to ensure that what is on them has not been tampered with, or that they don't open the boxes and find the contents have been smashed by rifle butts...

[Jpmkam]

Lets hope that as after the handover of the KAL007 black boxes checks are made to ensure that what is on them has not been tampered with, or that they don't open the boxes and find the contents have been smashed by rifle butts...

Given the grand presentation in turning them over, I would be surprised if that's the case. At least that's what I think.