roaringmouse

More likely China, they have more interest in this.

The Bloke

No doubt if they have the USN will most likely have one of their boats shadowing anyway......not that either would actually admit that they did hear anything from the pinger by a sub, as it would not be classified to admit they had them there in the first place......

GarryP

Seems as if the investigators think that that partial 'ping' data at 00:19 UTC might be down to the engines running out of fuel, therefore the electrical power going down. As the satcom gets undervolts on its supply, they think it can 'chirp'.

If so then it would narrow things even further - 8 mins after the last ping position, on the same track. Question still is can the plane glide on autopilot, but assuming not, that could mark the spot where the aircraft went in.

koalakim

It will glide a bit depending on the settings of the altitude to speed but it's better if you still have the pilots at the controls, which of course we still don't know. I think Helios carried on for a bit before it crashed. There was a Air Canada 767 which ran out of fuel but luckily the pilot was a glider and applied those skills to landing the 767!

Hope they find something out soon, whatever it is.

bcworld

Air Transat A330?

Dorothy

No I think she was referring to AC143. Gimli Glider incident from '83

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimli_Glider

GarryP

Thing is, if the reason for the chirp was the engines stopping, so the electrical power stopped - do the autopilot and control surfaces have backup power to keep them operating? My guess says yes, but it's probably limited.

And in any case my other guess is that the autopilot, when presented with no engine power probably throws up it's hands and says "your job pilot" - so if he's long dead there will be no control input and the thing will stall and crash pretty quick.

roaringmouse

So it seems that a Chinese ship has picked up a signal at the correct frequency for a "black" box. Whether or not the signal is from a "black" box of MH370 is a different question.

sj oldfield

I have just read a news article stating that the plane could have landed on Diego Garcia Island and apparently an american passenger sent a text message advising that he was being held hostage???
Your thoughts Garry??

Dorothy

Link?

GarryP

My, but that's a nice crop of b*ll*cks someone has there.

Let me guess, they are being held next door to Lord Lucan and Elvis; and across the hall from Shergar, and John F Kennedy ?

sj oldfield

It was mobile.news.com.au/travel

GarryP

Ahh, well there's your problem. news.com.au isn't a news site, it's a murdoch gossip site targeted on selling things for those who give them money. If they tell you it's Wednesday, you need to check it.

bcworld

News.com.au has been writing dumbass, fantasy stories about MH370 for weeks now. Is Maddie on Diego Garcia with them too? Just put it on your ignore list.

Dorothy

Ah, well then it must be true because news.com.au is an official source for this type of information.

Have the family of this man actually confirmed that he texted them to say he's being held hostage?

It must be pretty awful for those people to not only not know what happened to their loved one but now to have stupid internet rumours about him supposedly texting them.