Air France Jet Is Missing, Hope Is Beginning To Fade

[almostfamous]

Mon Jun 01, 2009 2:13 pm

Air France Flight 447 has disappeared over the Atlantic Ocean. The flight was carrying 228 people from Rio de Janeiro to Paris ran into a tower of thunderstorms. It is believed that the area the plane could have gone down is vast, in the middle of the very deep Atlantic Ocean between Brazil and the coast of Africa. Both Brazil's and the French military's are searching for the plane in the ocean near the Cape Verde Islands off the West African coast.

Quote:

Air France's manager in Rio de Janeiro, Jorge Assuncao, told reporters that the two biggest groups of nationalities aboard were Brazilian and French, with 58 and 61 people aboard, respectively. Among the other passengers on the flight were two Americans, five British, 26 Germans and nine Chinese.

Air France Flight 447, a four-year-old Airbus A330, left Rio on Sunday night with 216 passengers and 12 crew members on board, said company spokeswoman Brigitte Barrand. MSNBC

The plane had crossed through a thunderous zone and it reported electrical failure and loss of cabin air pressure.

Quote:

Tropical thunderstorms ... can tower up to 50,000 feet. At the altitude it was flying, it's possible that the Air France plane flew directly into the most charged part of the storm — the top," Henry Margusity, senior meteorologist for AccuWeather.com, told The Associated Press.

This is such a sad story.

Mon Jun 01, 2009 2:21 pm

Wow, this sounds very similar to how the show Lost started out!

[almostfamous]

Tue Jun 02, 2009 11:06 am

I know scary huh, only I don't think there are any islands around where this plane is believed to have crashed. Today they are reporting that they have spotted some debris but they cannot confirm yet if it belonged to flight 447. Searchers found an airplane seat, an orange life vest, small white fragments, an oil drum and signs of oil and kerosene about 700 kilometers (435 miles) northeast of the Fernando de Noronha archipelago. They have sent boats out to collect the debris and see if it did belong to flight 447. I also read that the missing Air France plane has built in homing devices such as "pingers" which are underwater locator beacons attached to flight data and cockpit voice recorders, can transmit signals from as deep as 14,000 feet. The Atlantic Ocean is about 12,0000 feet deep so the military will have to go in there with listening devices to locate and this could take up to a week.

Quote:

"What they're going to have to do now is some reverse engineering, find out the location of this debris. Then they're going to have to figure out what the tide speed was. It's been around now for 28 hours. Now they're going to have to back up that course probably several hundred miles to the actual area of the wreckage," Feith said.

[almostfamous]

Tue Jun 02, 2009 11:09 am

The plane carried 216 passengers -- 126 men, 82 women, seven children and a baby -- and 12 crew members, Air France said.

[almostfamous]

Tue Jun 02, 2009 11:17 am

The New York Times has released a partial list of those aboard the ill fated flight.

1.) Eirch Heine - President of Admistration Council of ThyssenKrupp-Companhia Siderurgica do Atlantico(CSA)

2.) Luis Roberto Anastacio - President Michelin South America

3.) Antonio Guerios - IT Director Michelin

4.) Christin Pieraerts - Employee Michelin

5.) Dr. Roberto Correa Chem - Plastic Surgeon - Director of Skin Bank and Chief of Plastic Surgery Service of Porto Alegre Hospital.(Porto Alegre is a City in the South of Brazil)

6.) Vera Chem (Wife of Dr. Chem)

7.) Leticia Chem (daughter of Dr. Chem - International Roaming manager of OI Phone Company

8.) Deise Possamai

9.) Marcelo Parente - Chief of Staff of Rio de Janeiro Mayor.

10.) Leonardo Veloso Dardengo - Oceanographer

11.) Pedro Luiz de Orleans e Braganca - Prince - Descendant of Don Pedro II Brazilian Emperor 1822-1831

12.) Rino Zandonai - Director of the Trentini Nel Mondo Onlus Association - Italy

13.) Giambattista Lenzi - Regional Conselor of Trentino Alto Adige - Italy

14.) Gianni Zortea - Mayor, Canal San Bovo - Italy

15.) Silvio Barbato - Conductor Rio Municipal Theater.

Michael Harris, 60, and his wife, Anne, 54 The two Americans onboard. Michael Harris was a geologist in Rio de Janeiro for Devon Energy, the largest U.S.-based independent natural gas and oil producer, according to a company spokesman.

[almostfamous]

Tue Jun 02, 2009 11:11 pm

Brazilian Navy divers are rushing to begin the grim job of pulling up the debris from flight 447 in the Atlantic Ocean.

"Four navy ships with recovery equipment and a tanker were headed to a 3-mile (5 km) strip of water strewn with airplane seats, an orange buoy, wiring, hunks of metal and jet fuel stains about 745 miles (1,200 km) northeast of the coastal city of Recife"

Wed Jun 03, 2009 5:11 am

Reason number 1,486,238 why I'm afraid to fly.

[almostfamous]

Sat Jun 06, 2009 11:10 am

Two bodies have been found from the doomed flight. One of them was confirmed to be a passenger on the flight that crashed Monday. Also found was a backpack and a leather briefcase containing an airplane ticket with a reservation code, which Air France verified belonged to a passenger on the jet.

Sat Jun 06, 2009 9:22 pm

There's rumors floating around that a meteorite may be to blame for the crash.

[almostfamous]

Mon Jun 08, 2009 9:58 am

I haven't heard that one yet.

Tue Jun 09, 2009 6:14 am

Meteor Theory -- http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmi ... rance-447/

Wouldn't it be a pisser if it was some sort of new undetectable North Korean missle that brought it down ?