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Wreckage Found By Brazilian Searchers Is Not From Flight 447
A Separate Air France Flight Received a Bomb Threat Days Before Atlantic Ocean Crash
Brazilian Searchers Find Aircraft Wreckage in the Atlantic

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SharonTaint
06/05/09

In reply to Wreckage Found By Brazilian Searchers Is Not From Flight 447
Tighten those tin foil hats, people...
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BaconCat
06/05/09

In reply to Wreckage Found By Brazilian Searchers Is Not From Flight 447
And somewhere in the Brazilian heartland a jet engine has just fallen from a crear sky and crushed 17 year-old misfit Donnie Darçao.
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boozeshaman
06/05/09

In reply to Wreckage Found By Brazilian Searchers Is Not From Flight 447
This story fits creepily well into some of the kooky but strangely resonant theories about 2012 I have read; in particular, the notion that in these last couple years there will be a series of developments involving high-profile "disappearances" that will accelerate panic and awe on the planet, and send world religions into deep philosophical crises. This stuff is "supposed to" begin this summer.

Jesus, I'm stoned.
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koniki
06/05/09

@boozeshaman: Please expound on this. What are the deets of these 2012 theories?
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Smitros
06/05/09

@koniki:

I think most serious Mayanologists don't place much stock in the 2012 thing.
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dado
06/05/09

In reply to Wreckage Found By Brazilian Searchers Is Not From Flight 447
One time at a bed and breakfast the girl I was with lost a diamond earring...not a very big one. While searching through the carpet I found another diamond earring, a bigger one. So these things can happen. She kept the earring and we broke up shortly thereafter.
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Richard Lawson
06/05/09

In reply to Wreckage Found By Brazilian Searchers Is Not From Flight 447
WOW.
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TableNine
06/05/09

@Richard Lawson: And here I thought the Brazilian Triangle had to do with landscaping.
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AndIAmTellingYou
06/05/09

@TableNine: LOL
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Astigmatism
06/05/09

In reply to Wreckage Found By Brazilian Searchers Is Not From Flight 447
Wait, so there's debris and an oil slick too large to be from this flight? Meaning something even bigger crashed there?

Screw Lost - this is beginning to look like Sphere.
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badasscat
06/03/09

In reply to A Separate Air France Flight Received a Bomb Threat Days Before Atlantic Ocean Crash
This is the exact kind of reporting that aviation geeks (of which I might be one) hate.

"Here's one thing that happened. Here's another thing that happened. And another that might have happened, we're not sure. COINCIDENCE??!!?!"

That's what this entire post seems to boil down to.

First, there's absolutely nothing related in any of these things that supposedly happened. Second, the first ended up being a non-event (people call in bomb threats all the time that end up being unfounded). The third was probably a pilot in need of corrective lenses (or a good night's sleep) seeing things. But regardless, it has nothing to do with an airplane trying to fly through a violent tropical thunderstorm and crashing.

Also, I mean, this is tragic and everything, but literally every time a plane crashes, some newspaper asks "how could an airliner literally drop out of the sky??" You guys are media critics, you should know this. It is the standard aviation-related story you run after any plane crash, because the media doesn't know any better and has no clue about aviation issues but they know they need to run something given the magnitude of the story, and the "why does a plane that's supposed to fly suddenly not fly?" article is all they can ever come up with to fill the blank spaces created by the lack of any real hard info on the cause of the crash (which takes months or years to come out).
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VoxPopuli
06/03/09

In reply to A Separate Air France Flight Received a Bomb Threat Days Before Atlantic Ocean Crash
Well, if American Airlines is to be believed, bomb threats in Latin America aren't unusual. I remember this tidbit causing quite an uproar in the region at the time (and rightfully so):

[books.google.com]
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Gonkette
06/03/09

In reply to A Separate Air France Flight Received a Bomb Threat Days Before Atlantic Ocean Crash
It strikes me as a touch journalistically irresponsible to tie together speculative events admittedly at random ("And in a kind of related story") and close with an ominous third-person "We're just glad we're not planning on flying anytime soon right about now."

Certainly doesn't do anything to quell the unfounded conspiracy theories designed to needlessly frighten people.
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ligmasagbatch
06/03/09

@Gonkette: Sometimes I simply cannot believe how seriously people take Gawker posts, and the 'journalistic' standards they expect from Gawker.
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VoxPopuli
06/03/09

@ligmasagbatch: Yes, thank you. I love Gawker, but it's not journalism.
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ChillbearLatrigue
06/03/09

In reply to A Separate Air France Flight Received a Bomb Threat Days Before Atlantic Ocean Crash
It seems to me that if this were anything other than an accident, the saboteurs would have claimed responsibility while the search for debris was going on. Also, terror is a lot more effective if there are a lot of witnesses. You don't plan to have a bomb go down in the ocean where most of the debris and evidence would be washed away. It makes almost no sense from the terrorism standpoint to blow up a plane over an ocean and then also not claim responsibility. So I would wager that terrorism is off the table.

I'm sorry for the families of the occupants.
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The Cajun Boy
06/03/09

@ChillbearLatrigue: That's a good point, one I hadn't thought of actually. If this were terrorism, someone would probably be crowing about it. I just hope the salvage teams can find the black boxes, and ABC is saying this morn that they will be hard-pressed to do so, and put it all to rest, otherwise conspiracy theories will be around forever.
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AmandaMugen
06/03/09

In reply to A Separate Air France Flight Received a Bomb Threat Days Before Atlantic Ocean Crash
this whole tragedy reminds me of TWA flight 800, which crashed off of long island in 1996. The plane just went down because of some explosion or something.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TWA_Flight_800
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Almostbanned
06/03/09

@AmandaMugen: It was near-empty fuel tanks that had been sitting on a runway in extreme heat for a couple of hours, which vaporized most of the jet fuel in them, basically turning them into massive fuel-air bombs. A small electrical short in the AC wiring lit the fuse and that was it.
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Mediahohoho
06/03/09

@Almostbanned: I've heard about the fuse but in connection with a leak in the fuel lines. Otherwise, why would a 747 take off for a transatlantic flight with near-empty fuel tanks. Explain, please.
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Front_Towards_Enemy
06/03/09

@Mediahohoho: Its called weight. Why carry the fuel when you don't need to ?

A 747 is designed to fly very long distances. I believe the longest non-stop in the world is the New York to Singapore run of approx 10k miles.

That's alot of fuel.

Now if a 747 is flying New York to London (approx 3400 miles) it need much less fuel to fly there.

Remember; fuel = weight = more fuel consumption.

Typically, Airliners fly from point A to B with a 1/3 fuel reserve in case of unforeseen delays; headwinds, etc. So if A 747 which can carry 50,000-60,000 gallons of fuel only needs 20,000 gallons (including reserve) to reach from New York to London the plane will fly with empty tanks. The center tanks are the only which are the empty ones so the plane can be properly balanced.

Up until TWA 800 civilian aircraft tanks were filled with plain ole' air when empty unlike Military Aircraft which replace empty tanks with Nitrogen so the tanks no go boom when hit by enemy fire. After TWA 800, Civilian airliners are required to retrofit all aircraft with a inert gas system if the aricraft's tanks are flying empty. This is to be installed on all aircraft by 2010 I believe.

This is your Gawker aircraft factoid of the day.
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Mediahohoho
06/03/09

@Front_Towards_Enemy: Thanks! Didn't know 747s had that much more capacity than they would need for a transatlantic flight, but it stands to reason.
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Pope John Peeps II
06/02/09

In reply to Brazilian Searchers Find Aircraft Wreckage in the Atlantic
Oil and an airplane seat...

I had a date end that way once.
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momof3wildkids
06/02/09

@Pope John Peeps II: Olestra?
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Trulymadlyme
06/02/09

@momof3wildkids: Alli.
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kimsama
06/02/09

In reply to Brazilian Searchers Find Aircraft Wreckage in the Atlantic
It's possible that the plane's autopilot or automatic systems could have been involved. There were two separate incidents of A330 failures in Australia (one plunging several hundred feet in turbulence, one with a malfunctioning autopilot. I've heard the A330s criticized as being "too automatic" -- instigating procedures that the pilot would not. It's sadly possible that there was some combination of factors involved here.

I fly to Asia very frequently, and have actually flown through "walls of storms" -- and it's terrifying, but modern planes are supposed to be able to withstand them. I hope whatever caused the accident is discovered and rectified as quickly as possible. It still makes me nervous about my next long transpacific flight (especially during Typhoon season).
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bboston88
06/02/09

In reply to Brazilian Searchers Find Aircraft Wreckage in the Atlantic
I just hope they can find the black box otherwise we'll never know what happened and I may never fly again. At least on an Airbus 330.
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SharonTaint
06/02/09

@bboston88 (star please?): whatever happened was definitely a one in a million event. The A330's are highly reliable; the last time a fatal accident occurred in one was in 1994.
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Cheap Shot
06/02/09

@bboston88 (star please?): As soon as I saw the first Airbus 330 I said to myself that I would NEVER go on that thing. It's weird but I feel safer in smaller planes, something about having over 200 people in a metal structure that scares me. Especially if it's boarded by a majority of overweight Americans.
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Crustaceans Rarely Get Past Me
06/02/09

@Cheap Shot: Statistically, smaller planes are less safe...
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ligmasagbatch
06/02/09

@Cheap Shot: I think you might be thinking of the big giant A380. This one is a smaller plane designed for low-demand long hauls (like Rio to Paris). It's not a monster plane like the 380.

Love,
Nerdlinger Jones
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Cheap Shot
06/02/09

@ligmasagbatch: Ah! thanks for clearing that up.
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The Lone Scout
06/02/09

@Crustaceans Rarely Get Past Me: Is that true across the board, or only for smaller aircraft in general (as opposed to commercial) aviation?
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wry_bred
06/02/09

In reply to Brazilian Searchers Find Aircraft Wreckage in the Atlantic
I'll just continue to believe this is a cover-up perpetrated by Charles Widmore and that the passengers are all safely on Lost island now.
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