Malaysia 777 Missing

[Moon The Loon]

My utter Faith (capital "F") in Costco dropped to a "?" after seeing this guy's book highlighted in their rack:

http://www.billoreilly.com/

What Don said...

[YYCMatt]

Similitudes incroyables entre le flaperon d'un #B777 et le débris retrouvé ce matin à #LaReunion... #MH370 ? http://t.co/GDkzRLwi2h

Seems a piece of flap or similar has washed up on Reunion Island. Tweet says the similarities to a 777 part are incredible.

[blues deville]

Similitudes incroyables entre le flaperon d'un #B777 et le débris retrouvé ce matin à #LaReunion... #MH370 ? http://t.co/GDkzRLwi2h

Seems a piece of flap or similar has washed up on Reunion Island. Tweet says the similarities to a 777 part are incredible.

Should be easy to identify with a part number label somewhere on the flap section. Perhaps more debris will start to appear on other beaches soon.

[Don Hudson]

From the many theorists, this, from a mathemtician:

Now comes the latest contribution to the debate: This week, a mathematician from Texas A&M University announced that he had run data through a computer and determined it was likely the plane had plunged vertically into the ocean.

Goong Chen, using "applied mathematics, computational fluid dynamics and numerical simulations of a Boeing 777 in a classic 'water entry' problem," determined that a plane that piercing vertically into the sea would not break apart.

Simply put, a plane hitting the water at an angle would scatter its parts across the surface of the water. But one hitting at a near-vertical angle would shoot into the water with minimal damage and zoom straight to the bottom.

Never mind that the Indian Ocean is more than seven times the size of the United States -- a rather large area to search. The theory of the vertical dive, said Chen and his colleagues, explains why no debris has been found. The study was published in the April 2015 issue of Notices of the American Mathematical Society.

"...with minimal damage"; ..."zoom straight to the bottom"...!!?

I'm neither a mathematician nor an engineer but I think not.

Airplane structures are at best, light, gossamer structures. They are not built like large ships... They do not do well under such conditions as high-speed impact with water or other "solid", hard surfaces, even at low speed, (20kts and higher...).

An airplane is not strong when under forces that are not "in-line" with its streamlined design. It is strong where it counts but, (and I am imagining here, not calculating or engineering these thoughts), not under sudden, high loads which are transverse to the normal "load-paths" which the structure is designed and built to withstand.

Ever notice how the skin of a large transport responds to these kinds of loads? When examining the skin of MH17, one could see that the skin in places, (wing root, etc.), is nearly a centimeter thick, but we can also see that it wrinkles like paper and tears like aluminum foil. We already know what a high-speed direct entry into a hard surface looks like from the Germanwings event - here, angle-of-impact makes little material difference and there is little difference between rock and water at such speeds. It is surprising that a mathematician would not even intuit this, setting aside the physics equations concerning materials and energy.

The strongest section of the aircraft, the wing-box, usually remains intact in most accidents and I suspect it would in any vertical dive, but not the rest of the structure as suggested by the Texas A&M mathematician.

[DEFCON]

The piece of wreckage being shown on TV is being described as a ‘flaperon’. A good deal of the trailing edge ‘appears’ to be missing, actually burned / melted away?

What’s the likelihood of this piece of structure floating once detached from the wing structure? If it’s a sinker, I would hope that those searching will be able to narrow their focus to the area surrounding the island.

[Don Hudson]

DEFCON, I believe it's a phenolic-honeycomb sandwich structure, perhaps a mix with carbon-fiber parts, but not aluminum - so it would float and also be water-proof.

I would have expected lots of this kind of debris by now. There's almost certainly a part number on one bit of the structure or another inside.

[Woody Pusher]

Don,

From what I have been able to piece together, based on available photos and B777 flaperon schematics, in all probability it is part of an inner flaperon. Bearing that in mind, it follows the only B777 that has been reported missing anywhere near the Indian Ocean, was the aircraft performing flight MH370.

The bulk of the aircraft is therefore somewhere in the Indian Ocean.

I surmise, based on the photos showing the actuator attachments have been 'torn off', that there is a distinct possibility that the flaps were extended when it separated.

[blues deville]

I surmise, based on the photos showing the actuator attachments have been 'torn off', that there is a distinct possibility that the flaps were extended when it separated.

The Flaperon control surface responds to input from the pilot's application of roll control so it can extend well below the surrounding flap trailing edge with the flaps retracted. A last second attempt by pilot or autoflight could move/extend that flight control and make contact with the water surface before the rest of the trailing edge. So it's just as possible in my opinion that the flaps were retracted.

Either way, there is finally evidence that the aircraft did crash into the Indian Ocean.

[Super 80]

Hasn't wreckage from Yemenia Flight 626 crash washed up in recent years on the coast of Tanzania?

[blues deville]

Hasn't wreckage from Yemenia Flight 626 crash washed up in recent years on the coast of Tanzania?

Airbus A310 crash from 2009.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yemenia_Flight_626

[Woody Pusher]

So it's just as possible in my opinion that the flaps were retracted.

As the Flaperon is the only piece of the aircraft recovered since it disappeared on 8 March 2014, forensic analysis will possibly reveal the answer in the not too distant future.

[Don Hudson]

Yes, time will tell Woody. Odd thing is, if it's part of MH370, it's the only one in over a year.

I don't think its from the A310 accident north, (approach to Yemen). The design is different. This looks like the lowest part of the large inboard flap, which is in two sections, this being the lower, smaller one; the A310's flap is one entire section and very large.

Any thoughts on the kind of conditions / currents that would bring this piece to this location? I suspect after a year, reverse-engineering the location to a possible wreckage site will be tricky. I had believed that the surface winds and currents were generally eastward in that area, (south of Malaysia / west of W.A.)

[blues deville]

From this chart it's easy to see how debris might have ended up in Reunion. And the initial search area may have been correct too. Big ocean.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d5/Indian_Ocean_Gyre.png

Takeoff flaperon video (at 2:45)

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qeQGujVueaY

[Woody Pusher]

Any thoughts on the kind of conditions / currents that would bring this piece to this location? I suspect after a year, reverse-engineering the location to a possible wreckage site will be tricky. I had believed that the surface winds and currents were generally eastward in that area, (south of Malaysia / west of W.A.)

Don, the predominate winds in the South Indian Ocean are the SE trade winds, and they help develop the surface current which is generally an anticlockwise gyre from about 30S 100E. The flaperon has IMO travelled in a NW'ly direction towards the equator, then to the SW before being found off Reunion.

Blues Deville has suggested the orginal search area was probably the right one, and I'm in agreement.

[Maverick]

If the data plate is found there will be a definitive identification.

Every manufacturer records every P/N and S/N of every critical component.

Every one.

[moeman]

Some new video:

http://globalnews.ca/video/2138951/raw-aircraft-debris-possibly-belonging-to-mh370-found-on-reunion-island

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/07/29/africa/mh370-debris-investigation/index.html

[blues deville]

Some new video:http://globalnews.ca/video/2138951/raw-aircraft-debris-possibly-belonging-to-mh370-found-on-reunion-islandhttp://edition.cnn.com/2015/07/29/africa/mh370-debris-investigation/index.html

The video shows a substantial amount of barnacles attached to the flaperon. Would this not be an indication it perhaps spent some time on the ocean floor before becoming disconnected from the rest of the wing? Or can barnacles attach themselves to a floating object?

We need Kip to dock and respond.

[boestar]

Barnacles grow on boats. Hopefully the boats have not spent any time on the bottom. So yes a floating object will have them attach and grow.

As for the Vertical dive into the water theory. The breakup sequence would be totally different than that of impacting at an angle for certain. The debris "field" would be very tight and would likely drive straight to the bottom. I would suspect the wings would be torn off but that the fuselage would remain largely intact. That being said there would definately be a huge fuel slick on the surface from the fuel in the wings.

I would think that any composite honeycomb structure would float so long as it isn't weighed down by other aluminum attachments. The Flaperon would contain a lot of air in the honeycomb composite which would allow it to float even though there is significant aluminum in the construction.

There will be a data plate attached to the part which will definitively prove its origin.

[blues deville]

That being said there would definately be a huge fuel slick on the surface from the fuel in the wings.

I think it's been determined this flight ended with little or no fuel remaining.

[deicer]

After all this time, with nothing washed up or spotted on the surface, and one piece shows up?

Very suspicious to me.....

[Airband]

The video shows a substantial amount of barnacles attached to the flaperon.

Wonder if the barnacles and other organic material could provide a clue to its drift pattern if some of it could only be found in specific areas of the IO.

[Don Hudson]

boestar - re, "I would suspect the wings would be torn off but that the fuselage would remain largely intact.". The fuselage is extremely strong as Asiana proved at San Francisco but it seems to me that like all airplane structures they are not strong against direct, high impact forces such as the surface of the sea would present if entered at high speed, (say, 250kts & higher). The fuselage is ~20ft in diameter but it is almost entirely empty space except for the skin, with thicknesses varying from a few millimeters to perhaps just over a centimeter, and the ribs & stringers which provide torsional, lateral and longitudinal strength but little resistance to local, high-energy impact. I know you know this - I'm just emphasizing the "gossamer-like" nature of the structure when presented with huge, direct forces. I can't do the mathematics but we know that forces increase with the square of the speed; I suspect there is no difference between impacting water and impacting granite at that speed.

It's largely a moot point and for many terrible to ponder but if it went in essentially vertically I think the fuselage would shatter in the same manner as the Germanwings A320 and the SW111 MD11 and so would the wings.

Airband, I wondered the same thing and also wondered if the length of time the part was in the water could be determined by the growth pattern of the barnacles - here's a link to the Mirror, (UK) story: - the barnacles are "species Lepas Anatifera", (Wiki). So it has been determined that the barnacles began growing about the same time as the disappearance of MH370.

[blues deville]

Wonder if the barnacles and other organic material could provide a clue to its drift pattern if some of it could only be found in specific areas of the IO.

A news report yesterday mentioned Australia has experts ready to go and assist with that exact information. Probably the one science not used so far on any CSI episodes .

[boestar]

Don:

I would argue that the aircraft shape would minimize the impact forces in much the same way as a high diver entering the water. A diver Belly flopping has a much different outcome than a vertical entry.

The Structure of the modern aircraft like the 777 while "gossamer Like" has a very fault tolerant design which provides multiple paths for the impact forces to be dispersed. It is for this reason that I agreed that a vertical entry would have been somewhat smoother than a belly flop. I would suspect hat up to the point the wing structure and engines impacted the surface, the aircraft was mostly intact. The wing surface area would indeed present a major increase in deceleration forces to the point of separation.

It would not surprize me that the aluminum tube is mostly intact sitting at the bottom of the ocean with a debris field contained within a small area. Of course currents could well have spread the debris field over a greater distance.

[inchman]

I agree, wholeheartedly, Don. I don't think any high speed entry would result in an intact fuselage. Look what happens to radomes from a 5 kg bird at 250 kts. The structure is there primarily to handle cantilever loads and pressurization loads. If we assume that this was a "vertical dive" the speed and the forces would be astronomical. Aircraft aren't even supposed to remain fully integral through air at speeds above 400 kts.

The one thing that might come of a vertical dive is that much of the debris would be forced under water immediately and, unless it is has a significant amount of trapped air, (the other pictures I have seen of the flaperon in question do not show any "honeycomb") would probably continue to sink in it's de-constructed state, leaving little surface debris.

But, beyond the fact that this particular flaperon may have been "lucky" to have floated. I can't help wondering why a flaperon?.... was the aircraft in landing configuration and this tore off during the touchdown sequence due to it projecting below the wing?

Many questions still to be answered and this discovery has probably created more questions than it has answered.