Malaysian plane crashes on Ukraine-Russia border - live

[Albert Doyle]

In July 1988 the USS Vincennes accidentally shot down an Iranian commercial jetliner.

[Magda Hassan]

I have NO idea if it is true, but a NEW factor has been injected now. RT is claiming they have evidence that just before it was brought down the MAL plane significantly deviated from its planned course - something that would be very odd and somewhat hard to believe, in fact.

Yes, I have heard this too. Who would have been behind that request?

I know when I was flying around Asia when the Vietnam war was happening we didn't fly over the area. All our planes were diverted around the conflict. I have no idea why any planes would be flying over any hot conflict areas anywhere in the world. It endangers their passengers lives and their very expensive inventory and their reputation is shit if things go wrong. If Malaysian airlines was indeed avoiding the area as they should and some one currently unknown directed them over the conflict this will be most instructive. Who has control of that airspace? Ukraine.

Though from Carlos in the other thread he states that this was interior ministry workings not defence ministry. Seems there is little co-ordination happening in the new government and it might actually be hanging by a thread. I would tend to agree with that looking today at the Ukraine government websites too which are still in a shambles and many haven't been updated since March when that government was in charge.

[Magda Hassan]

18 Jul 2014 - 11:28am

'It's astonishing': Expert says MH17 shouldn't have flown over Ukraine

A leading aviation expert says Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 shouldn't have been flying anywhere near Ukraine.

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[TD="class: td-field_author"] By Santilla Chingaipe

Source World News Radio
18 Jul 2014 - 11:28 AM UPDATED 1 HOUR AGO



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A leading aviation expert says Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 shouldn't have been flying anywhere near Ukraine to begin with.
Flight MH17 was carrying 298 people, including 27 Australians, from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur when it crashed in rebel-held east Ukraine.
Professor Geoff Dell is an accident investigation and safety specialist from Central Queensland University.
He told SBS that the accident could have been avoided.
"You just wouldn't put your plane.. and your customers at risk," he said.



"The whole of Europe is a spidersweb of air routes that you can choose from, and you don't need to put yourself risk."
"Especially on a long flight like that."
"There are alternatives and you take them."
Authorities in Europe and United States advised airlines not to pass over the region in April but Professor Dell says it's unlikely the crash will change the way these warnings are managed.
"The system is robust," he said.
"It wasn't because the information wasn't available, it seems to me it wasn't heeded. Or if it was heeded, it seems they made some really bad decisions."
"You're kind of playing a russian roulette game if you don't respond to (warnings) constructively."
"You take a risk averse approach, you take the intelligence, you make decisions about altering your operation so it just isn't a problem."







http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2014/...er-ukraine

[Peter Lemkin]

All the 'best' rumors are right here- with many hyperlinks to the original sources. Something for everyone......and so many [some quite far fetched] that I'll not move any of them over here yet - until the fog of war clears some - if it does. Slightly more anti-Russian posts on that site, likely due to it being 1)an English-language site, and 2) many commercial pilots are former military pilots. However, all sides are covered and fingers pointed at everyone.

One point someone made is likely true. MAL is finished. The relatives of the dead will bring a lawsuit against MAL for allowing the plane to fly there, that will surely bankrupt it completely....they will likely seek bankruptcy even before the suit is initiated. It is only a matter of time before there is a second lawsuit on their first airliner loss.

[Paul Rigby]

Supposedly, the Ukrainian government has intercepted the conversation between the militia members and Russian authorities.

[video=youtube_share;28MrASx-RiM]http://youtu.be/28MrASx-RiM[/video]

[Paul Rigby]

Wonderful post from Zerohedge:

"And yet, something here smells very fishy...

First, the Russian version of the clip which was released in parallel, and shown below, there is a major discrepancy in the time stamp, with the English-dubbed version showing the conversation between Major and Grek taking place at 5:11 pm and 5:32 pm, while the original one has it at 4:33 pm, 5:14 pm and 5:32 pm."

Read more:

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-07-17...ight-mh-17

[Magda Hassan]

Was Flight MH-17 Diverted Over Restricted Airspace?

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/17/2014 20:55 -0400

• Boeing
  

While there are various questions that have already emerged from what was supposed to be Ukraine's "slam dunk" proof confirming Russian rebel involvement in today's MH-17 tragedy, perhaps one just as gaping question emerges when one looks at what is clearly an outlier flight path in today's final, and tragic, departure of the Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777.
Perhaps the best visualization of what the issue is, comes from Vagelis Karmiros who has collated all the recent MH-17 flight paths as tracked by Flightaware and shows that while all ten most recent paths pass safely well south of the Donetsk region, and cross the zone above the Sea of Azov, it was only today's tragic flight that passed straight overhead Donetsk.


Why is the diversion from the traditional flight path and passage over the highlighted zone a concern? Because as the following map from the WSJ shows this is precisely where the restricted airspace is.


So perhaps before coming to "certain" conclusion about the involvement of this rebel or that, the key questions one should ask before casting blame, is why did the pilot divert from his usual flight plan, why did he fly above restricted airspace, and just what, if any instructions, did Kiev air control give the pilot in the minutes before the tragic explosion?
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-07-17...d-airspace

[David Guyatt]

Great find Magda - seems a pretty significant moment by moment account to me.

And Malaysian Airlines again --- must be a coincidence.

Beyond that the usual western propaganda machine is in full swing again. Yuk.

[Magda Hassan]

Kiev claims they had no BUK surface-to-air systems in the area yet here they are on June 5

[David Guyatt]

Well, someone is asking the obvious question posed by Zero Hedge anyway:

Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 crash: Why was a passenger plane flying over a conflict zone in Ukraine?



Loss of flight MH17 shows that the confidence in the immunity of passenger planes in conflict zones was tragically misplaced

SIMON CALDER

TRAVEL CORRESPONDENT

Thursday 17 July 2014

The Boeing 777 downed in Ukraine with the loss of 295 passengers was flying just 1,000 feet above a "no-fly" zone covering the troubled region, The Independent has learned.

Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was on a routine flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur when it crashed, apparently after being hit by a missile.
The jet was travelling east across Ukraine along an airway designated A87. Eurocontrol, the co-ordination centre for air-traffic control in Europe, said: "This route had been closed by the Ukrainian authorities from ground to flight level 320 [32,000 feet] but was open at the level at which the aircraft was flying." The plane was flying at the lowest permitted altitude over the area, flight level 330 [33,000 feet], when it disappeared from the radar.
Since the crash, all the airspace of eastern Ukraine has been closed to civil aircraft until further notice. Flight plans submitted by pilots are automatically checked against closed areas of airspace. Eurocontrol said: "All flight plans that are filed using these routes are now being rejected."
In pictures: Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 crash
As the security situation in Ukraine deteriorated in April, the US Federal Aviation Administration issued a warning to American pilots and airlines operating in the region. The "Notam" (Notice to Airmen) ordered "Exercise extreme caution due to the continuing potential for instability".
Nevertheless, civil aviation continued to fly over the conflict zone, along airways that normally carry thousands of passengers on dozens of flights each day.
Since the news broke, many passengers have expressed astonishment that commercial flights should be routed over a conflict zone such as eastern Ukraine. One traveller, Nicholas Eeley, said: "I cannot believe that civilian aircraft blithely overfly active battle zones. How bad does it have to get to order a fly-round?"

The upper floor of Schiphol Airport is closed for media and reserved for family and relatives of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17
Passenger planes have long been presumed to be safe from most conflicts, for the practical reason that the weapons typically used on the ground are far too primitive to reach an aircraft flying six miles high. The combatants in Ukraine have been thought unlikely to have the kind of sophisticated weaponry that could reach a target at such an altitude.
Tony Wheeler, the founder of the travel guide publisher Lonely Planet, recently blogged about a Qantas flight from Dubai to Heathrow over northern Iraq: "Azwya, and Mosul, which we flew close by, have both been flashpoints for the Isis takeover of parts of Iraq in recent weeks. It's remarkable how peaceful everything looks from 40,000 feet."
The loss of flight MH17 shows that supposed immunity of passenger planes to terrestrial conflict may have been tragically misplaced.
Airlines are naturally predisposed to fly the most direct route between two points, subject to weather patterns, and on many routes from Europe to Asia that involves transiting eastern Ukraine.
The aviation expert, Chris Yates, said: "It beggars belief that a large passenger aircraft could be brought down in this way."
"There have to be questions asked of the European safety authorities and why they didn't route aircraft further north."
Civil aircraft constantly "squawk" - transmit their identity and flight information to notify air-traffic controllers and other pilots. Technology available to anyone with a smartphone allows aircraft easily to be tracked - with real-time details of airline, flight number, heading and altitude provided.
Airlines moved quickly to reassure passengers that other passenger flights will not be at risk. British Airways said: "Our flights are not using Ukrainian airspace, with the exception of our once a day service between Heathrow and Kiev. We are keeping those services under review, but Kiev is several hundred kilometres from the incident site." BA's early evening flights from Heathrow to Hong Kong and Singapore departed, respectively, one hour and 30 minutes late, but it is not known if they were delayed as a consequence of the Ukraine disaster.

People walk amongst the debris, at the crash site of a passenger plane in Ukraine (AP)
Virgin Atlantic said that a number of its flight paths will be adjusted to circumvent the region where the crash took place. The airline serves destinations in China and India with flights that often traverse Ukraine.
Air France, Lufthansa, Aeroflot and Turkish Airlines have also said they will divert aircraft around Ukrainian airspace.
READ MORE:
'NINE BRITONS AND 80 CHILDREN' FEARED DEAD IN CRASH
UKRAINE REVELS DENY 'SHOOTING DOWN' JET
UKRAINE TO LAUNCH INVESTIGATION INTO CRASH
HOW DOES THIS COMPARE WITH PREVIOUS PLANE DISASTERS?
OBAMA: THIS IS A 'TERRIBLE TRAGEDY'
LOSS OF THE TWO BOEING 777 PLANES ARE 'UNLIKELY TO BE LINKED'

Previous events involving shootings-down of large passenger planes, with the loss of hundreds of lives, have been the result of mistakes or misadventure. In 1983, a Boeing 747 - flight KE007 from Anchorage to Seoul belonging to Korean Airlines - was shot down by a Soviet fighter after the plane strayed into restricted airspace. Five years later, Iran Air flight 655, an Airbus A300 from Tehran to Dubai, was shot down by an American warship in the Gulf. The Lockerbie bombing, later in 1988, has been claimed to be a response to the downing.
For any airline to lose two passenger aircraft within a few months is extremely rare. For a pair of catastrophes to occur when the planes are cruising normally at high altitude is unprecedented.

Airport security personnel look at the flight information board in the departure hall, at Kuala Lumpur International Airport, where flight MH17 was flying to
Malaysia Airlines was already suffering commercially as a result of the loss of MH370. The destruction of MH17 is likely also to have severe consequences, even if the airline itself is found to be blameless.
Passengers booked to fly on Malaysia Airlines, or any other long-haul carrier, who no longer wish to travel, have little option but to cancel and lose some or all of the fare. "Disinclination to travel" is not regarded as grounds for airlines to relax their conditions on cancellation, nor for claims to be made on travel insurance.