So back to the question, what was the debris from?

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In summary: I can at least see them or have pictures of them.In summary, conflicting reports are being made about why Air France jet crashed with 228 aboard. It is unclear if the debris found earlier is from the missing plane, but the air force has said that it is not. Two Spanish pilots say they saw "intense flash" in the area where the jet crashed, and Brazilian minister says that oil slick is ruling out a midair fire or explosion as the cause of the crash.
  • #1
moose
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Whaaaaaat?? So what was the debris from?

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americas/06/04/plane.crash/index.html

# Story Highlights
# NEW: Wreckage, debris found earlier is not from missing plane, air force says
# Conflicting reports over why Air France jet crashed with 228 aboard
# Oil slick appears to rule out midair fire or explosion, Brazil minister says
# But two Spanish pilots say they saw "intense flash" in area where jet crashed

I think conspiracy theorists will have a ball with this one.
 
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  • #2
An interesting quote:

"Whoever has faith, whoever believes in God, believes in the eternity of the soul," said Mauro Chavez, whose friend lost a daughter on the flight. "This means everything."

Funny how people care about such nonsensical things. Why people care about finding the bodies of dead loved ones is beyond me. Either they are at the bottom of an ocean, or at the bottom of a ditch. Either way, there certainly not going to care.
 
  • #3
Cyrus said:
An interesting quote:



Funny how people care about such nonsensical things. Why people care about finding the bodies of dead loved ones is beyond me. Either they are at the bottom of an ocean, or at the bottom of a ditch. Either way, there certainly not going to care.

Do you have kids? I would guess not.
 
  • #4
A bit harsh there Cyrus. As much as I do agree with you, finding a body wouldn't make a bit of difference to myself. However, for some people it brings comfort/closure to the events. Makes things seem more real and deffinite (no, I can't think of the right word here).

Jared
 
  • #5
I have to say if there was no doubt they died, a body would be meaningless. It would only be an issue if the person had just "disappeared" and there was no evidence that they were dead.
 
  • #6
Hmm...I'm going to have to agree with Cyrus here. From personal experience...I had a brother die in an avalanche in New Zealand many years ago. He was part of a 3-man team climbing Mt Cook (also called Aoraki or Aorangi).

We didn't get his body back at that time, it was buried. But it didn't make a bit of difference to me; I knew he was dead...he was gone, period.

Funny thing, when his partial remains were found some 15 years later, my family decided to leave them on the mountain. The government of New Zealand objected so we had the remains creamated and (secretly) returned to the mountain. It didn't make a bit of difference, that his remains were found. There was no "closure" feeling for us, we had accepted his death many years earlier.

Perhaps that's just the unique attitude my family.
 
  • #7
Yeah there's a point there guys, its just a statistic to us.

But if the people in the crash were my parents, tbh, I would want to see their body again and I would've been devastated.
 
  • #8
lisab said:
Hmm...I'm going to have to agree with Cyrus here.
It just happened to me too. How weird !
 
  • #9
lisab said:
Hmm...I'm going to have to agree with Cyrus here. From personal experience...I had a brother die in an avalanche in New Zealand many years ago. He was part of a 3-man team climbing Mt Cook (also called Aoraki or Aorangi).
OMG, lisab, that's terrible.
 
  • #10
drankin said:
Do you have kids? I would guess not.

Will dead kids care? Will dead old people care? Will dead pets care? Will dead (fill in the blank) care?

I'd rather want them to salvage the airplane so that someone else's kids don't die for the same reason.
 
  • #11
It depends on the family. For some, they just can't process that the person is really dead and let go of the hope that they might instead be crash landed on a deserted island and living out their own version of Gilligan's Island or Lost if they don't find a body...or at least confirm that the plane really wrecked.

Though, I hope they're carefully examining that NONE of that wreckage is from 447. A mid-air collision with an unregistered flight in an area without radar coverage is certainly more plausible as a reason for a crash than a lightning strike, or it's also possible that dumb luck landed the plane on a boat or ship when it hit the water, and debris are from something struck by the plane in addition to the plane. Otherwise, it seems there are not one, but two incidents to investigate...a bad enough storm to down a jet could have also capsized a boat in the same area (the flash someone else reported could have been a signal flare).
 
  • #12
Three people agreed with me! I AM GOD!

Lets give this another shot:

"I'll pay money for every post Cyrus makes"
 
  • #13
physicsnoob93 said:
if the people in the crash were my parents, tbh, I would want to see their body again
Seriously !? :bugeye:
I would definitely prefer to remember them in their alive form.
 
  • #14
Thanks for derailing my thread Cyrus :biggrin:

Pretty interesting conversation so I don't mind.

However, why is nobody wondering what plane the debris they did find were of?

Moonbear said:
(the flash someone else reported could have been a signal flare).

Aren't signal flares red?
 
  • #15
Cyrus said:
Three people agreed with me! I AM GOD!
God believes in my existence !
 
  • #16
humanino said:
God believes in my existence !

...god dammit. I mean, Cyrus dammit.
 
  • #17
moose said:
Thanks for derailing my thread Cyrus :biggrin:

Pretty interesting conversation so I don't mind.

However, why is nobody wondering what plane the debris they did find were of?

If its another airplane, someone will realize it soon enough when it never lands where it was supposed to. So, whatever it is, its not really a mystery.
 
  • #18
Cyrus said:
If its another airplane, someone will realize it soon enough when it never lands where it was supposed to. So, whatever it is, its not really a mystery.

I would really like for this to deal with aliens. Make it happen Cyrus.
 
  • #19
http://z.about.com/d/urbanlegends/1/0/U/3/smuggled3.jpg

The airplane was weighed down by all the illegal aliens. You can't fly the airplane by sitting inside the instrument panel, that's just crazy.
 
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  • #20
moose said:
Aren't signal flares red?

I don't think so; that wouldn't make a lot of sense, since red is harder to see at a further distance. Signal flares are meant to be very bright and stay lit as long as possible to maximize chances of them being seen. So, something described as an "intense flash" could be describing a signal flare.
 
  • #21
moose said:
Thanks for derailing my thread Cyrus :biggrin:

Pretty interesting conversation so I don't mind.

However, why is nobody wondering what plane the debris they did find were of?



Aren't signal flares red?
I guess it's possible it could have been another plane flying off course.
 
  • #22
Cyrus said:
Funny how people care about such nonsensical things. Why people care about finding the bodies of dead loved ones is beyond me. Either they are at the bottom of an ocean, or at the bottom of a ditch. Either way, there certainly not going to care.
One might feel different if one or more of those poeple were one's parents, brother or sister, or son or daughter, or spouse. It might be nonsensical to one but not to those people who lost a friend or relative. It's part of the grieving over a great loss. Hopefully one will not have to suffer such a loss.

Such grieving is not nonsense, anymore than loving someone such that their loss is very painful.
 
  • #23
Moonbear said:
I don't think so; that wouldn't make a lot of sense, since red is harder to see at a further distance. Signal flares are meant to be very bright and stay lit as long as possible to maximize chances of them being seen. So, something described as an "intense flash" could be describing a signal flare.

Emergency flares are almost always red. I'm not 100% positive if this is true on water though.
 
  • #24
moose said:
Thanks for derailing my thread Cyrus :biggrin:

Pretty interesting conversation so I don't mind.

However, why is nobody wondering what plane the debris they did find were of?



Aren't signal flares red?


There are many sources for debris at sea. Ships typically just dump garbage overboard, floating garbage does not necessarily signify a wreck.
 
  • #25
physicsnoob93 said:
But if the people in the crash were my parents, tbh, I would want to see their body again...
No, you really wouldn't. It is a very unpleasant thing and totally unnecessary to see the remains of someone who died in a plane crash. Heck, you may not even recognize them as anything more than random charred tissue.

I think people get hung up on the idea of a pretty body in a casket. You don't always get that and you shouldn't try to force it.
 
  • #26
Moonbear said:
...a bad enough storm to down a jet could have also capsized a boat in the same area...
That's what I was thinking.
 
  • #27
Integral said:
There are many sources for debris at sea. Ships typically just dump garbage overboard, floating garbage does not necessarily signify a wreck.

When a country claims "100% sure that this is flight 447" initially, I'd like to think that they at least saw a plane. Otherwise, they aren't doing their jobs right...

EDIT: I understand that it can be difficult when debris is in tiny pieces all over the place, but my point still stands. Of course, if this happens to be something from a ship along with flight 447, then everything still makes sense.
 
  • #28
moose said:
Emergency flares are almost always red. I'm not 100% positive if this is true on water though.

Doing a bit of googling, it looks like you may be right on the color. There was nothing mentioned about the color of the "intense flash" though. Or, I suppose lightning in the area is still a perfectly reasonable explanation for seeing an intense flash.
 
  • #29
Moonbear said:
Doing a bit of googling, it looks like you may be right on the color. There was nothing mentioned about the color of the "intense flash" though. Or, I suppose lightning in the area is still a perfectly reasonable explanation for seeing an intense flash.

They said it was white, so lightning does seem to fit the profile, except for the part about the trajectory...

"Suddenly, we saw in the distance a strong and intense flash of white light, which followed a descending and vertical trajectory and which broke up in six seconds," the captain wrote.

EDIT: That actually does sound like a type of white flare.
 
  • #30
It's not surprising that other debris was found and originally misidentified. Lots of containers fall off of ships every year. According to these articles, it is on the order of 10,000 containers per year.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Container_ship"
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/06/0619_seacargo.html"
 
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  • #31
moose said:
I would really like for this to deal with aliens. Make it happen Cyrus.

I was thinking the exact same thing. Like that episode of the X-files where the aliens freeze space and time of that airplane to get their radioactive thing-a-magigger back.

Anyway, I think they should leave the bodies to sea and do what they can to discover the wreckage. After sitting in salt water and possibly being eaten by sharks/fish a dead body probably won't be very recognizable. That's assuming it wasn't torn to pieces or burned up in the crash.

What parts of an airplane float besides the seat cushions?
 
  • #32
Topher925 said:
What parts of an airplane float besides the seat cushions?

Running shoes will float. And they'll protect people's feet from decomposing.
 
  • #33
BobG said:
Running shoes will float. And they'll protect people's feet from decomposing.

Sick but, true...

http://www.cbc.ca/national/blog/video/healtheducation/bcs_maritime_mystery.html"
 
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  • #34
Borg said:
Sick but, true...

http://www.cbc.ca/national/blog/video/healtheducation/bcs_maritime_mystery.html"
Why you say "sick", it's "not" sick, it is fact, BobG always offers the best answers explaining how things are comprised of :smile:.
 
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  • #35
IwillBeGood said:
Why you say "sick", it's "not" sick, it is fact, BobG always offers the best answers explaining how things are comprised of :smile:.

Would eeewww be better?
 

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