UPDATED 5/21/16: Egyptian authorities have released photos of MS804 debris recovered from the ocean. Here’s a cropped version of one of them:
The size, the shape of the edges, the amount of exposed honeycomb and even the presence of fasteners is quite reminiscent of MH370 debris found in the western Indian Ocean, especially “No Step.” Of course, marine fouling is absent.
UPDATE 5/20/16: CNN has posted a screengrab showing ACARS error messages just before MS804 crashed:
As you can see in the diagram below, there is a lavatory directly behind the captain’s seat. If there is thick smoke in there, it could penetrate down into the avionics bay below:
Gerry Soejatman points out: “It appears that aircraft may have had an in-flight fire and if so, the aircraft maneuvers could be due to Smoke Removal Emergency Procedures, which involves descending the aircraft to 10,000 feet and also opening the cockpit window.”
A reader interprets the ACARS messages:
00:26 ANT-ICE R WINDOW; a fault is in either the right sliding window or fixed window (not the windshield).
00:26 R SLIDING WINDOW SENSOR; the right window heat control unit detects a problem with the sliding window sensor circuit.
00:26 SMOKE LAVATORY SMOKE; smoke detected in the lavatory.
00:27 AVIONICS SMOKE; smoke is detected in the Avionics bay.
00:28 R FIXED WINDOW SENSOR; the right window heat control unit detects a problem with the fixed window sensor circuit.
00:29 AUTO FLT FCU 2 FAULT; autopilot flight control unit (Mode control panel) channel 2 is faulted. Channel 1 still OK so no big deal.
00:29 F/CTL SEC 3 FAULT; the number 3 spoiler elevator computer is faulted. Number 1 and 2 still OK.If a bomb has gone off near the forward toilet the blast may have damaged the right window heating somehow. There would be a short delay until the toilet smoke detector goes off.
ORIGINAL POST, 5/19/2016:
At timing of writing, 6.15am Eastern Daylight Time, Egyptian and Greek military boats and planes are still hunting for a missing airliner, Egyptair Flight 804, which disappeared over the Mediterranean Sea at approximately 2.30am local time. The plane was three and a half hours into a scheduled flight from Paris, France to Cairo, Egypt.
Airbus has put out a statement which reads, in part:
The aircraft involved, registered under SU-GCC was MSN (Manufacturer Serial Number) 2088 delivered to Egyptair from the production line in November 2003. The aircraft had accumulated approximately 48,000 flight hours. It was powered by IAE engines. At this time no further factual information is available.
Here’s a screenshot of the ADS-B data reported by FlightAware. Note that this data is considered highly unreliable–but at the moment it’s all I’ve got:
Open in a separate tab to see full resolution. Note that the disappearance is sudden — the ADS-B doesn’t show any descent profile. This would be consistent with a catastrophic loss of electrical power (as perhaps due do a bomb or missile strike) or to someone deliberately turning off the electronic forms of communication, as was done in MH370. Below is a plot of the plane’s last known location.
Worth pointing out that the weather at the time was fair, suggesting that the incident was not weather-related, like AirAsia 8501 or Air France 447. I find it interesting that the disappearance took place right after the plane crossed from one Flight Information Region (FIR) to another–that is to say, when transferring from one air traffic control zone to another. MH370 disappeared under similar circumstances (also in fair weather in the middle of the night.) I would be very interested to see the ATC transcripts–in particular, to know if the plane signed off with the Greek controllers and failed to contact Egyptian ones.
The Mediterranean is a heavily-traveled body of water, both by sea and by air. It is heavily monitored. One can only presume that at the time it vanished from secondary radar screens it was being tracked by primary (military) radar as well. What’s more, based on historical precedent, when planes get into trouble at altitude like this, they tend to come down very close to their last known position. At the exact moment I write this, no debris has been found, but given the good weather conditions and the very small area to search, we should expect wreckage to start turning up very soon.
The Independent notes, “In March, an EgyptAir plane flying from Alexandria to Cairo was hijacked and forced to land in Cyprus by a man wearing what authorities said was a fake suicide belt. He was arrested after giving himself up.” In air crash circles, the name Egyptair is synonymous with EgyptAir 900, which crashed off Nantucket when one of the junior pilots deliberately steered into the ocean. At this point, both terror and suicide remain possible causes in the current incident.
UPDATE 7am EDT: The Guardian has just published this timeline, put out by Greece’s civil aviation department:
02:24: EgyptAir flight 804 from Paris to Cairo enters Greek airspace, air traffic controller permissions it for the remainder of its course.
02:48: The flight is transferred to the next air traffic control sector and is cleared for exit from Greek airspace. “The pilot was in good spirits and thanked the controller in Greek.”
03:27: Athens air traffic control tries to contact the aircraft to convey information on the switch of communications and control from Athens to Cairo air traffic. In spite of repeated calls, the aircraft does not respond, whereupon the air traffic controller calls the distress frequency, without a response from the aircraft.
03:29: It is above the exit point (from Greek airspace).
03:29:40: The aircraft signal is lost, approximately 7 nautical miles south/southeast of the KUMBI point, within Cairo FIR.
Immediately the assistance of radars of the Hellenic Air Force is requested to detect the target, without result.03:45: The processes of search and rescue are initiated, simultaneously informing the Flight Information Region of Cairo.
It seems, then, that unlike MH370, the flight crew here did not sign off with ATC before leaving their airspace.
@Ge Rijn
Yes, you’re right, it’s early days yet.
There is one strange similarity between MH370 and MS804 – they both ended up in the middle of nowhere. MH370 finished up that way because the pilot intended it to, so could this be an indication of malicious intent in the case of the Egyptair plane, as well?
@Rob
As this has been discussed many times, it’s difficult to know if you are clueless or stubborn, my vote would be stubborn.
It is your opinion, “MH370 finished up that way because the pilot intended it to…..”
Regardless of how strong your opinion is, it should not be stated as proven.
You may very well end up being right but it appears as propaganda to deliver an opinion this way.
I think it’s a bit of a fetch to suggest that either, let alone both, were caused by ‘malicious intent’ at this juncture.
And we don’t know where Malaysian ended up, and we do know where 804 ended up and it wasn’t in the middle of nowhere.
Not entirely sure what the point is?
@Susie Crowe @Rob
Susie Crowe, I agree.
Rob, please don’t try to trick me into answering a question that could suggest I agree with you on your MH370 ‘malicious intend’ scenario as being a fact. For I don’t.
I don’t like it the way you put things in ‘context’ like this.
Talking about terrorist action-could it be a suicide attack with some kind of fire bomb or explosives by one or two individuals who are “lone wolves” inspired by Al-Qaida or ISIS or whatever, but not in contact with the actual groups. Then there would be no one to claim resposibility.
While the above speculation is very unlikely to be true of MH 370, it would be more plausible for aircraft starting from cities such as Paris and other cities in Western Europe.
@Susie
Certainly not clueless. So you will have to call me stubborn!
I always seem to find myself for merely speaking my mind. If participating successfully in a blog requires tact rather than honesty, then I am doomed to fail in the venture.
@Susie
[Rude comment redacted by JW]
Irrational stubbornness eventually degrades into stupidity.
I’ve never posted here, but I have a few questions for this community, dedicated to investigating aviation mysteries, given the possibility of a fire bomb / incendiary device in this situation…
Is it just me or does anyone else see a potential problem with Duty Free shopping and the capability to easily create a highly flammable situation? I mean come on, I walk into Duty Free, buy a few liters of 130+ proof booze, a few bottles of perfume, a gourmet bottle of olive oil, etc, etc. Then I head over to the news stand and pick up some news papers, books, petroleum jelly, and hand sanitizer. I stuff it all into my backpack and board the plane. I head into the forward lavatory with my backpack, clog the sink drain, mix up a highly flammable soup, soak all of the paper in it, coat the walls, and with a flick of a cigarette lighter, the entire lavatory is up in flames.
Never really thought of a fire bomb as a threat before, but it would really be very simple. Kind of scary actually.
It was the last part of the flight half an hour or so to go.
I guess flight attendents were allready prepairing for this and most passengers would be awake too.
If a terrorist act he/she/they waited a long time and it seems to me then not chose a ideal moment with most people awake and busy preparing for the last leg before landing.
And the plane was 2/3 empthy with 3 safety guards on board and 8 flight attendents.
Looks to me very difficult to get past them or do things unnoticed.
The FIR boundery could not been known by a terrorist if not in the cockpit allready and with a defined purpuse to attack on this point. If not it would then be pure coincidence it happened there. All rather unlikely it was a terrorist act imo.
If the FIR boundery was not a coincidence than imo you can only suspect one of the pilots of a deliberate ‘terror’ act. But since all the clues first point to an accident imo this is too far fetched for now.
Hello, thanks for the comments on this blog. It’s good to read clearly the technical details and then see what the media leave out! It’s also a difficult time for everyone.
Yahoo are saying that M6 are saying (!) that the crew talked for a couple of minutes with the Egyptian authorities, talking presumably about the smoke before the breakup, and perhaps confusingly, some of the other French channels are giving extracts of what seems unimportant standard communication between the crew and Swiss ATC that occurred much earlier in the flight.
Paris are partly responsible for security so they probably want to distance themselves til things calm down, and the Egyptian president, looking very concerned, is saying that there is no hypothesis at present.
Seems we’ll just have to wait for more solid information. -unless there exists a site for airline communications.
Some interesting reading about A320/A330 incidents with fires / window sensors:
(I know most people aren’t to happy with the ATSB.)
https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/2500360/ao-2009-027%20final.doc
It might have been a electrical short arcing which could have started a electrical fire like the one on swissair flight 111. YouTube swissair flight 111.
Have the French or Egyptian victims been named? It is interesting also that 3 security guards were on board. Is there any word on the cargo? And how would you find out what it was, and if the a/c was fully laden?
@Cay
There were two incidents involving cockpit fires involving windscreen overheating.
One in 2009 and one in 2011.
The ATSB report covered A330’s and A320’s
It stated “The ATSB have been advised that due to limited fleet-wide completion of the windshield replacement program, the European Aviation Safety Authority (EASA) is considering the implementation of an Airworthiness Directive (AD) that will require all European operators of applicable Airbus aircraft to comply with the Airbus windshield replacement program”.
The EASA released a “revised” AD (last updated in 2013). This covered only the A330.
Windows –
Fixed Windows / Windshield Heating Connectors –
Inspection / Replacement
(SB) A330-56-3009
It was rather “soft” in it’s approach.
For example, it uses the phrase “leading in some cases to diversion”.
In this case (reported) the a/c indeed did divert….after the fire was TWICE put out (once having then re ignited).
Consider the fact that the CB would have blown and the first fire extinguished (using the one fire extinguisher in the cockpit). The “re-ignition” meant, one pilot leaving the cockpit to get another extinguisher from the rear pax cabin.
The EASA limited it’s “recalls” to the A330 fleet. The reason it concluded was the issue with the Saint-Gobain Sully (SGS)
windshield connector terminal block batch, specifically the sealant (PR1829) contained therein.
This issue, whether there is an “issue” with the A320, needs to be looked into.
How fast does the airline industry react ?
The first incident took place in 2009.
The “final” EASA AD was published in 2013.
It seems only windshields produced in 2007/8, but not in 2003, were affected and have been replaced.
Key Phrase….
“Since we issued AD 2013-10-06, Amendment 39-17459 (78 FR 32347, May
30, 2013), the manufacturer has identified a new batch of windshield
parts that are subject to the identified unsafe condition”.
Wednesday, April 9, 2014
In Full.
On May 16, 2013, we issued AD 2013-10-06, Amendment 39-17459 (78 FR
32347, May 30, 2013). AD 2013-10-06 requires actions intended to
address an unsafe condition on all Airbus Model A330-200 Freighter,
A330-200, A330-300, A340-200, A340-300, A340-500, and A340-600 series
airplanes.
Since we issued AD 2013-10-06, Amendment 39-17459 (78 FR 32347, May
30, 2013), the manufacturer has identified a new batch of windshield
parts that are subject to the identified unsafe condition. The European
Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), which is the Technical Agent for the
Member States of the European Community, has issued EASA Airworthiness
Directive 2013-0256, dated October 21, 2013 (referred to after this as
the Mandatory Continuing Airworthiness Information, or “the MCAI”),
to correct an unsafe condition for all Airbus Model A330-201, -202, –
203, -223, -223F, -243, -243F, -301, -302, -303, -321, -322, -323, –
341, -342, and -343 airplanes; and Model A340-211, -212, -213, -311, –
312, -313, -541, and -642 airplanes.
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2014-04-09/html/2014-07954.htm
“Mohamed Said Shoukair was believed to have lost contact with airspace operators, but French aviation sources today said he called in to say he was making ‘an emergency descent’ because of a fire.
The Airbus A320 flight MS804 plunged into the sea last Thursday while travelling from Paris to Cairo.
Sources in France said there was ‘conversation several minutes long’ between Captain Shoukair and the controllers, which amounted to ‘a distress call’.
M6, the French TV channel, reported that the pilot then initiated a ‘rapid descent’ aimed at putting out the fire on board, and clearing the smoke.
Rapid descents involve dramatic changes in cabin air pressure, and can be extremely dangerous, but the claims about the flight’s last moments fit in with earlier information.
According to Greece’s defence minister, Pano Kammenos, the plane dropped sharply from 37000 feet to 15000 feet, and then made ‘sudden swerves’. ………..
…………….But Simon Hradecky, editor of the highly respected website Aviation Herald, said available data suggested an electrical fault on the jet was more likely than a terrorist attack.”
source: http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/672773/EgyptAir-pilot-Plane-Distress-call-France-Egypt
The above seemingly points to a technical fault. Though speculative,it seems that this aircraft make had been experiencing fire related problems lately that have released smoke, vapour or fumes hence the triggered alarms as indicated in the flight incident reports (March to May 2016) I linked from Aviation Herald earlier.
While agreeably things are rather murky, there is a different perspective as to what happened. This article retrieved from Scribd proposes a scenario which firmly assigns blame to the pilot:
https://www.scribd.com/doc/313483362/Egyptair-Pilot-Smuggled-Bomb-Into-Cockpit:
EGYPTAIR PILOT SMUGGLED BOMB INTO COCKPIT
EXPLOSION SET OFF IN COCKPIT BLOWS OUT WINDOWS AND SPREADS FIRE FROM COCKPIT TO LAVATORY FROM LAVATORY FIRE SPREADS TO AVIONICS BAY
00:26Z 3044 ANTI ICE R WINDOW
00:26Z 56200 R SLIDING WINDOW SENSOR
00:26Z 2600 SMOKE LAVATORY SMOKE
00:2!Z 2600 AVIONICS SMOKE
00:2″Z 5600 R FIXED WINDOW SENSOR
00:2#Z 2200 AUTO FLT FCU 2 FAULT
00:2#Z 2!00 F$CTL SEC 3 FAULT
@Rob, The two cardinal sins here are spreading false information and insulting other commenters. You’ve stepped over the line today. Final warning.
WELL, is this true?? Reported in the Daily Mail, French TV reports that the pilot talked with Egyptian air controllers for several minutes about smoke filling the cabin. He attempted to clear the smoke by making a rapid descent.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3603127/Egypt-deploys-submarine-capable-diving-10-000ft-search-downed-EgyptAir-jet-flight-data-suggests-plane-downed-fire-toilet.htmlhttp://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3603127/Egypt-deploys-submarine-capable-diving-10-000ft-search-downed-EgyptAir-jet-flight-data-suggests-plane-downed-fire-toilet.html
@all
I found this link via Twitter. It says the search for MH370 will be reinstated in June 2016 with an Australian based search team. I was under the impression the search is going to come to an end in June/July…?
http://www.marinelink.com/news/macartney-equipment409952.aspx
@Lisa. Current Chinese search vessel according to ATSB Operational Update is Dong Hai Jiu 101. The vessel of this article is Nan Hai Jiu 102. Maybe this is a routine relief of 101. A couple of days ago the ATSB head was reported as saying the search present search would extend into August due to weather.
Lisa – Maybe these guys are trying to manufacture some pressure to keep it going? As far as the govt is concerned, I think they have been pretty adamant that unless there is some new data it curtains next month.
@Lisa. Extension to August. Supplement/relief of Chinese search vessel?
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/aviation/mh370-search-deadline-may-be-extended/news-story/c218935e7db67e2cb630848e63cba1c8
@ Lisa.
Apologies, URL for subscribers.
Ones section read,
‘The hunt for the missing flight has entered the last 13,000sq km of its designated 120,000sq km search area and is scheduled to conclude by July.
But Martin Dolan — the chief of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau leading the $180 million effort on behalf of the Malaysian, Australian and Chinese governments — said it was likely to extend its deadline to early August as wild winter seas and 12m waves hampered investigators’efforts……………………………..Mr Dolan said there was no indication from the Australian, Malaysian or Chinese governments that the search would be expanded once the 120,000sq km area was covered.
“The technical capability is there to continue the search but the resources to do it is a matter for government,” he said.”‘
Lisa_Perth Good find! I spoke with Steen Fiejo of Macartney Singapore just now and he said, that to his knowledge, a Chinese research institute would be taking up the search in the wake of the Australian effort.
Over to you, Jeff; in your inbox.
Also on MH370 from the above article in “The Australian” 20th May, the reporter writes,
“Should the search prove fruitless, the ATSB is working on a report for the government that will consider alternative possibilities for what happened to the plane, including the “rogue pilot” theory that the captain of MH370 hijacked his own aircraft and deliberately crashed it into the sea.”
It would be great if Lisa’s lead pans out and it proves that the search is continue. If any party were to step up it would be the Chinese, while their reticence re their plans is easily understandable, as they are largely unaccountable to anyone.
A Chinese search? Hmmmm. Will it be anything like the acoustic ping episode? We’ve found it!!! Sounds dodgy to me. Where would they be searching exactly once the 120k is covered?
@Matty Man, remember those guys in their plastic helmets with their gramophones and fish finders stuck in the water? Don’t worry, once the Chinese get organised, they’ll step up with the right people – I think. They do have the right gear lined up, apparently.
What if Martin Dolan were to assume the role of search consigliere in a private capacity post retirement? At least it would give him a chance to get the proverbial monkey off his back.
@Matty
For what it’s worth, my guess is they will continue outside the 7th arc, downrange of the DSTG’s Bayesian hotspot, to fully cover the extended glide zone. That is all I’m going to say at this stage. I have to be very careful, in the light of my final warning.
Where I am glad that the search may continue, how effective is a search through the winter going to be?
I live in the Southern Hemisphere.
It’s not even proper winter yet (starts in June) and the storms and sea conditions have been bad.
Weather dependent, and search conditions dependent, they may want to suspend a search to after winter.
Co-incidentally my husband is going to Mozambique tomorrow for 6 days. I have asked him to take a nice long walk on the beach. (Unfortunately he is not the most observant person… )
@JEFF
@SUSIE
I apologize if I offended or insulted you Susie.
@JEFF
I can work on curbing the insulting behaviour, by keeping my temper and biting my lip, however I have a problem with the charge of spreading false information, because I don’t know what you are actually alluding to.
This is particularly worrying for me because I don’t know quite what you define as false information, and would therefore not know when I was in danger of transgressing again, something I am obviously keen to avoid.
Could you possibly give me a few guidelines?
@Rand, Thanks for looking into this. Bear in mind that it’s not just a question of funding a search vessel, there is the issue of the legal framework under which the search is conducted. Under ICAO rules Malaysia was in charge of the overall investigation, and delegated the ocean search to Australia. Is Australia going to resign this authority, after which the authority is re-assigned to China? Or is China going to march off and do what it wants without having reached any formal understanding with other parties? I don’t know what was officially arranged back in April 2014 when the erroneous acoustic pings were detected, but the impression was that the Chinese were storming around doing things on their own, rather amateurishly and without coordinating with the official search. Not to put too fine a point on it, but I don’t think it’s a given that whatever they accomplish on the seabed would be of high enough standard to be considered definitive. (That is to say, if they say they’ve searched an area and not found it, would we consider that strong evidence that it’s not actually there?)
Brass tacks: As it stands, Australia will finish the 120,000 sq km in July or August, and at that point will declare that it has fulfilled its mandate, essentially kicking the ball back to Malaysia. We have expected that this would trigger the Malaysians to declare the case closed and issue a final report. If the Chinese step up in the interim and declare, “We will take over the seabed search,” and Malaysia agrees, then presumably they will leave the case open. A reasonable goal, if they state one, would be as @Rob suggests: to search out the southward glide range. By my calculations this would amount to a further 80,000 sq km. With their three ships, the Australians have been managing about 7000 sq km per month. If the Chinese manage 1/3 that with 1/3 as many ships, they’ll be at it for another three years. With time off for bad winter weather and repairs, call it, conservatively five years.
Matty,
“Will it be anything like the acoustic ping episode?”
That was definitely a very interesting episode. A very plausible location consistent with everything we know so far including drift studies; just right frequency of 37.5 kHz; signal picked twice; near a possible “Curtin boom” location. Why was it completely discarded from future considerations? It was stated that their hydrophones were not certified to pick signals from 4.5 km depth. Weird reason for not giving any future considerations. Btw, does anyone know the exact location? East or west of 101E?
@Oleksandr
My notes have Ocean Shield working with the Bluefin at 104.12E, 21.02S
@Rob, I appreciate your taking my feedback as constructive criticism. I’d certainly like to keep you in the conversation. To answer your question, it’s important to draw a distinction between facts and suppositions. Each of us has a favored theory about what happened but must recognize that at it’s just a theory, however strongly we may feel in our gut that we’re right. So it’s one thing to put together a scenario and calculate how well it fits the Inmarsat data, it’s another to declare that it occurred. Someone who’s new to the forum might be mislead into believing that it is a matter of fact. In other words, I’m all in favor of people arguing persuasively for a hypothesis in an effort to bring others on board, but I don’t want people to lobby for their scenario by braggodacio and force of will. Out in the wild people like Simon Hardy and Chris Christianson have gotten a fair bit of play by declaring that they have intuited what happened to the plane. That kind of behavior might appeal to a public hungry for definitive answers, but it doesn’t encourage a productive conversation.
@Oleksandr, the ping frequencies were wrong and the multiple detections were out of range of one another, i.e. not consistent with stationary objects.
@Jeff I am rather hoping that the questions that you have posed will be put to another. It would indeed prove interesting to see how the Malaysians have responded to such an overture from the Chinese, if it has in fact been extended. You know me: I don’t believe that the Malaysians actually want to see the remains of the aircraft recovered.
@Jeff
Ok, thank you.
@Rob
Thanks for the apology, however I completely missed your response to me, so didn’t know anything about it until I saw the deleted post and Jeff’s comments this morning.
I didn’t intend to anger you with what I posted yesterday. I was just confused.
I trust that’s the last we’ll mention it.
Richard, Jeff,
I was talking about Haixun’01, which detected two pulse signals of 37.5 kHz on Apr 4 and Apr 5 using handheld hydrophones. The frequency was just right. CNN reported location of 101E, 25S, which was apparently rounded up:
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/04/05/world/asia/malaysia-airlines-plane/index.html
The scepticism was about the ability of their primitive hydrophones to detect a signal produced by a pinger at 4.5 km depth, not about the frequency. Experience vs technology? We may never know.
@Susie
Ok, good. And thank you for accepting my apology.
No worries : )
We shouldn’t underestimate the technical capabilities of the Chinese.
If they can put a man into orbit, and soft land a robotic craft on the Moon, they probably have the capabilities of finding MH370.
In the early days, nobody really knew how best to approach the problem.
@Oleksandr
If I remeber well this ship had a beacon on board which produced the black box frequency to tune their hydrophones on and it was thought they had registered their own beacon. Also sea mammals tagged with pingers of similar frequencies were reporte to possibly swim around in thos waters.
Can’t find reference to this story anymore but maybe someone else knows or remembers also.
Anyhow I think it could be a good idear to test those same hydrophones in the search of the MS804 black boxes.
Just to see if its possible to detect them from the surface water.
The depths are more or less similar. A test like this could rule out or confirm the possibilty imo.
@Jeff. I think it would be worth getting confirmation of such a venture from other than a third party.
@David, Definitely!