We dont know whether the plane stayed at a constant speed, we dont know whether its headings changed subsequently, he said. We applied the autopilot speeds - about 350 knots. We applied what we knew about the fuel and range of the aircraft to hit the series of ping information we had. Normally youd want to triangulate, often youd have GPS. But because aircraft in that region are not mandated to send out signals of their location we were working from blind, so this is very much a unique approach - the first time its been done. Mr McLoughlin believes all commercial planes should now be fitted with existing technology provided by Inmarsat and other satellite companies that would prevent prolonged searches like this unfolding in future. Every commercial aircraft could be tracked, if not tomorrow then by the end of next week, he said. Just imagine if the data had been coming off the plane for a couple of hours while it was missing. There is even an outside possibility, if it had been realised quickly enough, that interceptor jets could have been sent up to see what was going on. Many airlines choose to do it already; over the north Atlantic its mandated. It needs to be mandated everywhere and it could be delivered tomorrow. It would be a quick win that would at least make some sense of this. It sometimes takes a major tragedy to move things. We dont know whether the plane stayed at a constant speed, we dont know whether its headings changed subsequently, he said. We applied the autopilot speeds - about 350 knots. We applied what we knew about the fuel and range of the aircraft to hit the series of ping information we had. Normally youd want to triangulate, often youd have GPS. But because aircraft in that region are not mandated to send out signals of their location we were working from blind, so this is very much a unique approach - the first time its been done. Mr McLoughlin believes all commercial planes should now be fitted with existing technology provided by Inmarsat and other satellite companies that would prevent prolonged searches like this unfolding in future. Every commercial aircraft could be tracked, if not tomorrow then by the end of next week, he said. Just imagine if the data had been coming off the plane for a couple of hours while it was missing. There is even an outside possibility, if it had been realised quickly enough, that interceptor jets could have been sent up to see what was going on. Many airlines choose to do it already; over the north Atlantic its mandated. It needs to be mandated everywhere and it could be delivered tomorrow. It would be a quick win that would at least make some sense of this. It sometimes takes a major tragedy to move things.
Posted on: Mon, 24 Mar 2014 21:36:04 +0000
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