Article

2005-08-19 Europe

Cypriot airliner had reported electronics problem

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Posted by Steve White 2005-08-19 00:00|| || Front Page|| [2 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 A few days ago reports said Toxicology results would available Thursday (yesterday). Latest reports say by the weekend. I'll speculate they have found something and are rerunning tests and doing new tests to confirm. I'll also speculate its a deliberate poisoning. The decompression/lack of oxygen scenario has too many holes in it. Like what happened during the hour plus the plane was on autopilot? And why did people suddenly revive after an hour without oxygen?

Posted by phil_b 2005-08-19 00:22|| 2005-08-19 00:22|| Front Page Top

#2 I'd like to see the passenger list for this flight. The facts are slowly coming out, but at this point, everything looks bizarre.

Andreas Prodromou, a trained pilot standing in as cabin crew ...

Should've been able to find the radio and inform someone of what happened on board. Unless they know already.

Posted by Rafael 2005-08-19 00:56|| 2005-08-19 00:56|| Front Page Top

#3 I agree with you both.

This certainly seems like terrorism. Interesting that the East German pilot's body, and those of 2 others, still missing.

Also interesting, plane was on autopilot until it overshot the runway in Greece. Plane was taken off autopilot.

Posted by jawa` 2005-08-19 01:53|| 2005-08-19 01:53|| Front Page Top

#4 On greek news witnesses reported seeing a rocket trail heading for the airliner from one of the
F-16's my guess the greek government is trying to cover up a shoot down now

Posted by Alex 2005-08-19 01:59|| 2005-08-19 01:59|| Front Page Top

#5 This is making more sense now. I would look for this story to become more and more opaque as the time passes. Any statement by the Greek government, or probably any government, is suspect. Perhaps they can get our NTSB to provide some colorful computer animation to show journalists.

It's not so much the shoot-down that they're trying to cover (though that probably wouldn't be good for airliner shareholders), but the terrorist act itself. I do not envy the pilot. Not only will he have to bear the psychological burden of taking out the airliner, but he will never be permitted to speak the truth about it.

Posted by Rory B. Bellows 2005-08-19 03:03|| 2005-08-19 03:03|| Front Page Top

#6 Just had an idea -- where did those Israeli cruise ships divert to?

Posted by Rory B. Bellows 2005-08-19 04:04|| 2005-08-19 04:04|| Front Page Top

#7 where did those Israeli cruise ships divert to?

I believe it was Larnacka where the plane took off from. Interesting!

Posted by phil_b 2005-08-19 04:48|| 2005-08-19 04:48|| Front Page Top

#8 nice conspiracy theories, but I don't see any real proof this was a terrorist attack.

Posted by lyot 2005-08-19 07:01|| 2005-08-19 07:01|| Front Page Top

#9 ....Guys, In addition to Occam's Razor, remember Kozlowski's Electric Shaver:

"Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity."

Yes, we are rapidly becoming conditioned to seeing Islamonazi terror take more and more bizarre forms (the shoe bomb, etc.)but in this case we have:

*A plane with a documented history of decompression probs
*Pilots who were not trained to reflexively deal with decompression emergencies the way US and a few other nations pilots are
*A small charter airline running out of a nation not known for its vigilance in dealing with the businesses that operate there.

These guys had a worst-case scenario - one of those where the sim engineers would never try it because it was too far-fetched, just like the Sioux Falls DC-10 crash or the 747 that ingested volcanic ash and lost all four engines simultaneously. NEITHER of those incidents could have possibly happened - yet they did. Admittedly - especially because of the um...occasional duplicity of the Greek government, we should be carefully skeptical. But I believe that in the end, all we are dealing with is an unusual but far from impossible accident.

BTW- the shootdown theory is a very difficult one to go with. A plane - especially one the size of a 737, with redundant systems that work to keep it in the air even if the crew can't - is very tough to kill, especially with a fragmentation weapon like an AIM-9 Sidewinder (what the HAF F-6s were likely carrying)or 20mm. That is one reason the USAF F-16s that were scrambled after Flight 93 were prepared to ram it if necessary. In addition, a missile launch and detonation is a VERY spectacular event - the missile exhaust trail is more than just a thin contrail, it's HUGE - and the detonation tends to leave a distinctive 'smoke ring'. When we get a good number of witnesses who describe these events, then I will happily withdraw my position - but again, I think all we have here is an odball accident.

Mike

Posted by Mike Kozlowski 2005-08-19 07:36|| 2005-08-19 07:36|| Front Page Top

#10 Mike,

I have a different method of assumption. As I have stated the other day, this is a shoot down until I hear otherwise.

Posted by Poison Reverse 2005-08-19 10:15|| 2005-08-19 10:15|| Front Page Top

#11 Ly A Lot,

You probably don't consider 9/11 a terrorist attack. Muslims have lost all moral authority and benefit of doubt, the world over. I have a funny feeling that no amount of proof will ever satisfy you, ever!

Posted by Poison Reverse 2005-08-19 10:20|| 2005-08-19 10:20|| Front Page Top

#12 Mike K: I take the view that sometimes the simplest explanation is that there is a connection. Wouldn't sensors detect a decompression and tell the autopilot to descend to 10,000 ft, regardless of the crew's training? Why was the pilot out of the cockpit? Why did the Greek police beat up the man who said he received a text message? Why did the Greek police raid the airliner office? What about the reports concerning the air conditioning system?

On the 8th, the Israeli gov't ordered their cruise ships away from the Turkish coast. The ships On the 10th, the Turks busted the Great Eastern Islamic Raiders Front cell, led by Luia Sakra. On the 11th, CBS News (link) reported that the Turks were still "frantically searching for other suspects linked to the man... Authorities were also hunting for two squads of possible suicide bombers."

On the 14th, the plane crashed. I think it's possible some of these excaped cell members fled to Cyprus.

Posted by Rory B. Bellows 2005-08-19 13:30|| 2005-08-19 13:30|| Front Page Top

#13 Does anyone except me find it fishy that an airliner that supposedly ran out of fuel should burn after crashing?

I go with the "Suspicious activity in the cockpit earned them a missle" theory.

Posted by Redneck Jim 2005-08-19 14:29|| 2005-08-19 14:29|| Front Page Top

#14 poison reverse, you're not better then all the lunatics forwarding the 9/11 conspiracy theories.. Making assumptions is easy, but I see no evidence to support your hypothesis..

Posted by lyot 2005-08-19 14:38|| 2005-08-19 14:38|| Front Page Top

#15 One of the Bond Movies (Thunderball remake) had a scenario like this crash.
A Pilot plugged a poison gas canister into the plane's oxy supply, used an independent air bottle for himself, and flew away with the plane.
With a slight rewrite the Cyprus flight has the same basic plot, difference is that the F-16 pilot was around to see "People trying to take control of the aircraft", "The copilot slumped over the controls" and "Oxy masks dangling in the cabin area"

Looks like a clear shootdown, and probably a prevention of another 9-11 event, this time in Athens.

If anyone forgets, Athens is the Greek Capital City.

Posted by Redneck Jim 2005-08-19 15:01|| 2005-08-19 15:01|| Front Page Top

#16 After posting, I thought of a question I did not ask.

Reports say the plane was making "Constant Left Turns" (Another report said "Right Turns") indicating "Radio Out"

Question, did the plane turn toward Athens?

Coupled with the pilot's reports, that would be enough for me to order a shootdown.

Posted by Redneck Jim 2005-08-19 15:10|| 2005-08-19 15:10|| Front Page Top

#17 Ly A Lot,

After this statement, I will no longer feed the troll. Speaking of feeding, I am grilling some pork chops tonight, you want some.

Posted by Poison Reverse 2005-08-19 15:32|| 2005-08-19 15:32|| Front Page Top

#18 Mike, right now the fishy parts are:

1) The plane lost contact at 10:07am.
2) It crashed at 12:05pm.
3) Some people were still alive, though not necessarily conscious, when it crashed.

If oxygen deprivation caused the loss of radio contact, how could anyone have been alive two hours later when the plane crashed? Others here have said the cabin oxygen only lasts for about ten minutes, and people cannot live without oxygen for two hours.

I suppose it's possible (doctors?) for the cabin to have incompletely depressurized, thereby rendering the passengers unconscious, but alive for two hours after their oxygen gave out. The flight attendants would have been on separate oxygen, and therefore (theoretically) able to move about.

An update: Turkey says it received a distress signal from the plane; Greece says it (Greece) did not. The Turks ignored it after they found that the aircraft was not in Turkish airspace.

Also, I was in error the other day when I said that the plane had crashed only a few minutes before it was scheduled to land in Athens (and therefore fuel exhaustion was unlikely). It was actually scheduled to land somewhere around 10:45am.

Why did the Greek police beat up the man who said he received a text message?

Despite jokes and insinuations made by some (including me) the other day, there's not much evidence for this. He had one sharp cut above the eye; the rest of his face was unmarked.

Redneck Jim: In California in August you can start a grass fire just by looking at it funny. I expect Greece is the same.

Posted by Angie Schultz 2005-08-19 15:37|| http://darkblogules.blogspot.com]">[http://darkblogules.blogspot.com] 2005-08-19 15:37|| Front Page Top

#19 Point taken, I myself had to put out a small fire caused by simply parking my car over a unmowed weedy spot, but I'd still like to know if the fire was grass, it said the plane hit a mountainside, Pictures showed very little vegitation.

Posted by Redneck Jim 2005-08-19 16:09|| 2005-08-19 16:09|| Front Page Top

#20 I still maintain the only other crash on record that looks this was the General Zia crash and that was almost certainly deliberate poisoning. BTW, the timing is right for it to have run out of fuel. What brought it down is not the mystery. Its what happened in the 2.5 hours+ the plane was flying.

Posted by phil_b 2005-08-19 18:32|| 2005-08-19 18:32|| Front Page Top

#21 Martian Secret Service killing useless cutouts. Pretty obvious to an experienced out-of-the-jacket thinker. which Ima one.

Posted by HalfEmpty 2005-08-19 18:33|| 2005-08-19 18:33|| Front Page Top

#22 Latest, is that it wasn't CO poisoning. Testing for other substances continues. BTW, I thought with mass spectrometers you could test for every substance under the sun in minutes.

Posted by phil_b 2005-08-19 18:45|| 2005-08-19 18:45|| Front Page Top

#23 "BTW, I thought with mass spectrometers you could test for every substance under the sun in minutes."

That's only in the movies. In real life, governments have to manipulate and coverup actual results. And that takes time, years even.

Posted by Poison Reverse 2005-08-19 19:06|| 2005-08-19 19:06|| Front Page Top

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