Malaysia Airlines plane shot down in Ukraine near Russian border[Mod warning post#193

The Cool

Stinicker - I'm not into the paranormal but you'd nearly say someone somewhere was looking out for you. While of course it's no help that 295 people still died, even still - glad to have you still with us. I hope the rest of your travels go well and if you need to, talk to somebody about how you're feeling. Sending happy thoughts.

the_monkey

Lucky you escaped, but I wouldn't think about it too much, you could get survivors guilt - and don't think "what made me change my flight" - nothing did, randomness did.

There is no answer here , and if there is you'll never find it .

Glad you are ok .

the_monkey

The Cool wrote: »

Stinicker - I'm not into the paranormal but you'd nearly say someone somewhere was looking out for you. While of course it's no help that 295 people still died, even still - glad to have you still with us. I hope the rest of your travels go well and if you need to, talk to somebody about how you're feeling. Sending happy thoughts.

Please --- this is crap ... while 295 people deserved to die including 80 kids ???

I'm glad he's ok , but it's luck - pure and simple.

Don't be so arrogant to think he/she has a guardian angel - it's disrespectful to those who died.

dowlingm

Eurocontrol have issued a statement noting that Ukraine (a Eurocontrol member, which Russia is not) had closed the airspace below 32,000 feet but not above that and thus Eurocontrol were allocating routes accordingly. MH17 was at 10,000m/33,000ft.

Ukraine has now closed the Dnipropetrovsk FIR completely and routes filed will be rejected.

http://www.eurocontrol.int/news/mh-17-ukraine

A Primal Nut

fits wrote: »

Does anyone know if any Hungarian passengers on board? ( relying on my phone for internet as travelling so can't look properly)

Unofficial list of nationalities here but there are 58 passengers not included yet. No Hungarians mentioned.

http://www.thestar.com.my/News/Nation/2014/07/18/MH17-unofficial-nationality-list/

Stinicker

the_monkey wrote: »

Please --- this is crap ... while 295 people deserved to die including 80 kids ???

I'm glad he's ok , but it's luck - pure and simple.

Don't be so arrogant to think he/she has a guardian angel - it's disrespectful to those who died.

I believe something, guardian angel be it whatever, saved me but I respect your opinion also. MH17 on Wed was overbooked and I was going to volunteer off as there was a typhoon here in Manila and I was afraid I'd get stuck in KL for a day as many flights into MNL were cancelled.

I was also wrecked tired as I flew from Cork at 6am and had no sleep since 9am the morning of the 15th, volunteering myself as an offload was the sort of thing I'd normally do in this situation as I travel alone and could have badly done with the sleep at the time, free hotel, food in Amsterdam, my normal decision was to do this and adding to my decision was that I also had the centre crappy seat in the 2-5-2 layout which they couldn't change due to it being full, however again something told me not to bother volunteering and staying overnight in Amsterdam which In hindsight would have put me on the fateful flight. I tried sleeping put can't due to jet lag and this.

Two changes of mind prevented me from being on MH17 on Thursday against my normal chain of thought / habits. Some of the people who I seen and possibly talked to in the gate area are now dead as they volunteered as offloads for Thursdays flight which seems was also full now as they got offloads from Wednesdays flight unless they went by a different airline.

beer enigma

What strikes me looking at the dreadful images is how concentrated the crash site is bearing in mind it was travelling at 33,000 ft. The missile must have just clipped it.

I see APN are now saying that they saw a BUK missile system in the town of Snizhne earlier in the day - you'd wonder why the info wasn't picked up on and a flight warning issued.

Sugar Free

fr336 wrote: »

It's sad that if ATC and the airlines had simply done the most stupidly obvious thing imaginable - not flying commercial or even any other aircraft over a POTENTIALLY dubious area at times or unrest - this would never have happened.

I was listening to the TV and British Airways have a flight that goes straight over there. Can you imagine if it had to be a BA..not saying Malaysian aren't important, but the West collectively would have had a fit.

God we're a stupid species sometimes.

I'm not well informed about this but don't commercial airlines regularly fly routes over the likes of Afghanistan/Iraq etc? Surely this would have been a similiar principle?

Edit: Just read back a few pages. Seems it could have been an anti-aircraft missile system that can fire missiles capable of reaching cruising altitude.

the_monkey

They say the missile strike is not confirmed , but is this just safe talk ? is it 90% likely it was a shoot down?

mickmackey1

the_monkey wrote: »

Please --- this is crap ... while 295 people deserved to die including 80 kids ???

I'm glad he's ok , but it's luck - pure and simple.

Don't be so arrogant to think he/she has a guardian angel - it's disrespectful to those who died.

Stop pretending you know more than anyone else.

The universe is a hugely complex place and you haven't got a clue what the answers are.

cml387

Andip wrote: »

What strikes me looking at the dreadful images is how concentrated the crash site is bearing in mind it was travelling at 33,000 ft. The missile must have just clipped it.

I see APN are now saying that they saw a BUK missile system in the town of Snizhne earlier in the day - you'd wonder why the info wasn't picked up on and a flight warning issued.

An inflight explosion would tend to scatter the debris over a wide area (like Lockerbie).
A missile strike would disable the aircraft but it could remain relatively intact until it hit the ground.

dowlingm

Basically two assumptions were in play:

1. UKR wouldn't use high altitude SAMs as the rebels didn't have fixed wing aircraft. Same thinking in Afghanistan.
2. Rebels had MANPADs but not high altitude SAMs.

Flight area had been closed to 26000ft but was increased to 32000ft. Whether that was because the rebels were crowing about nicking SA-17s from the Ukrainians or something else I don't know. Clearly the Ukrainians should have closed the airspace entirely, and Eurocontrol should be made to account for what discussions were had with UKR about doing so.

The same people saying "well they should always route around any hot spots" would probably be the first to complain if their southeast asia sun holiday went up 20 Euro to pay for the extra fuel burn and the flight took 20 minutes longer, bearing in mind that between Iraq, Syria, Georgia etc. etc. it's pretty hard to thread the needle these days.

andy_g

Guys and Gals this is is a general warning to play nice.

1. Conspiracy theories we have a forum for that please take it there.

2. Be respectful.

3. If you cannot play nice dont play at all.

4. Anything outside the general rules please report.

Anything outside this will be a instant month ban or infracted.

And Stinicker glad your safe.

Simon Gruber Says

From the pictures it seems that the tail section is separate from the rest of the wreckage. Whether this is a result of an explosion or it separated due to the forces on the plane when it lost control is anyone's guess at the moment, but it would appear that the aircraft was not intact at the time of impact. The distance between the "four corners" nose, tail and wingtips, can help determine how intact the aircraft was at the point of impact.

beer enigma

cml387 wrote: »

An inflight explosion would tend to scatter the debris over a wide area (like Lockerbie).
A missile strike would disable the aircraft but it could remain relatively intact until it hit the ground.

A missile would carry a warhead though, designed to cause an explosion, the wreckage is almost as though the flight had been disabled by an unarmed missile which damaged or disabled the flight like a cannonball. It could be that if insurgents were involved it wasn't properly armed.

It's dreadful that these weapons can get into the hands of such people.

Sully

the_monkey wrote: »

Please --- this is crap ... while 295 people deserved to die including 80 kids ???

I'm glad he's ok , but it's luck - pure and simple.

Don't be so arrogant to think he/she has a guardian angel - it's disrespectful to those who died.

I don't see anything insulting or disrespectful with someone's beliefs. Just because you and others may not believe, or think it's rubbish, doesn't mean the OP did. There is nothing insulting in the post in the slightest.

It's a tense and sad moment for everyone, lets not get into a tiff over something small.

dowlingm

It's been some hours now and it doesn't seem like the pilots had a chance to get a mayday off. Given that modern aircraft as big as a 777 can take a hit and survive (the A300 at Baghdad for example) one can only presume the warhead caused damage in the avionics bay sufficient to leave the aircraft uncontrollable and, if the pilots were conscious, unable to communicate.

The chances of the black boxes being verifiable seem long at this point in time, given the hands they are likely to pass through.

KungPao

Andip wrote: »

A missile would carry a warhead though, designed to cause an explosion, the wreckage is almost as though the flight had been disabled by an unarmed missile which damaged or disabled the flight like a cannonball. It could be that if insurgents were involved it wasn't properly armed.

It's dreadful that these weapons can get into the hands of such people.

From looking at the video of the impact (and images)...there was a huge impact and fireball. This makes me think the plane was relatively intact as it fell from the sky. Jesus, the thought of it

Frank Lee Midere

mickmackey1 wrote: »

Stop pretending you know more than anyone else.

The universe is a hugely complex place and you haven't got a clue what the answers are.

Every single flight has someone who missed that flight. Thinking you had a "guardian angel" is a sickening belief that God or some "angel" has chosen to save you and kill hundreds.

Sully

fits wrote: »

Does anyone know if any Hungarian passengers on board? ( relying on my phone for internet as travelling so can't look properly)

From the nationalities released so far, no Hungarian passenger. But there not all confirmed.

pfurey101

I can only imagine what the families of the deceased are going through, but just to talk about another angle for a moment.

I worked in Aer Lingus -> SR Technics maintenance for 31 years and most people there would be affected in some slight or other way whenever there was a serious incident anywhere in the world and even more if it was a similar aircraft that we worked on or it involved a partner airline/customer. Especially when the initial Crash Report identifies a work area that you had an input into - that could be disturbing

There were some local scares and not so serious incidents over the years that put the shivers up a lot of those of us that worked there.

When an airline has a catastrophic incident, it has a major impact on the staff that work there. From those who were close friends of the crew, to those who think it could have been something to do with what they should or should not have done and so on.

For a second huge disaster in so many months - it will take a huge amount of strength and will power for most MAS employees to struggle through.

My heart goes out to them and I wish them all the strength.

weisses

154 dutch confirmed dead

Sully

On board were 154 dutch passengers, 27 Australian, 23 Malaysian, 11 Indonesian, 6 from the UK, 4 from Germany, 4 from Belgium, three from the Philippines and one from Canada.

mickmackey1

Frank Lee Midere wrote: »

Every single flight has someone who missed that flight. Thinking you had a "guardian angel" is a sickening belief that God or some "angel" has chosen to save you and kill hundreds.

I'm not saying the bloke's beliefs are right, I'm just saying other opinions are not provable either.

Lingua Franca

47 of unconfirmed nationality

Confirmed:
154 Dutch
15 Malaysian crew
23 Malaysians
27 Australians
6 British
4 Germans
4 Belgians
11 Indonesians
3 Filipinos
1 Canadian


French Embassy says 4 of their citizens were also lost.

asteroids over berlin

dowlingm wrote: »

It's been some hours now and it doesn't seem like the pilots had a chance to get a mayday off. Given that modern aircraft as big as a 777 can take a hit and survive (the A300 at Baghdad for example) one can only presume the warhead caused damage in the avionics bay sufficient to leave the aircraft uncontrollable and, if the pilots were conscious, unable to communicate.

The chances of the black boxes being verifiable seem long at this point in time, given the hands they are likely to pass through.

the missile would probably been a heat seaker etc/have that technology, chances are it would of hit an engine(s)? also the baghdad one was an over the shoulder launcher, if rumours are true, that pro russian group have much larger weapons - so it would do way more damage one would assume, also regardless if the aircraft got hit a missile, it wouldn't just falll from the sky, it would still descend? indicating to me it was shot at well inside Ukraine or even russia etc

regardless

RIP to the lost and best wishes to their families

RoryMac

Sully wrote: »

On board were 154 dutch passengers, 27 Australian, 23 Malaysian, 11 Indonesian, 6 from the UK, 4 from Germany, 4 from Belgium, three from the Philippines and one from Canada.

I thought there were 295 passengers or is that not the full list? Reports earlier seemed pretty sure there were Americans onboard

Edit: I see there are still some passengers unconfirmed

Lingua Franca

47 of confirmed nationality as yet, but France is claiming 4 of them.

martinsvi

I don't understand the whole deal with unconfirmed nationalities? there's a passenger manifest with names on it, cross reference it to the advanced passenger information and you should have a complete list. Of course I understand that no one involved want's to take any chances and announce someone dead too soon, but what kind of message does this lack of knowledge sends to the general public?

Lingua Franca

Malaysia is flying a team of experts to Kuala Lumpar to drop them off to start an investigation, then continuing to Amsterdam to pick up any families who want to visit the crash site.

Dutch news is now showing the footage of the hit plane. I was hoping that it would have exploded and the passengers killed instantly but that's not the case. I can't imagine the horror of those on board. Those poor souls.