UPDATED 5/21/16: Egyptian authorities have released photos of MS804 debris recovered from the ocean. Here’s a cropped version of one of them:
The size, the shape of the edges, the amount of exposed honeycomb and even the presence of fasteners is quite reminiscent of MH370 debris found in the western Indian Ocean, especially “No Step.” Of course, marine fouling is absent.
UPDATE 5/20/16: CNN has posted a screengrab showing ACARS error messages just before MS804 crashed:
As you can see in the diagram below, there is a lavatory directly behind the captain’s seat. If there is thick smoke in there, it could penetrate down into the avionics bay below:
Gerry Soejatman points out: “It appears that aircraft may have had an in-flight fire and if so, the aircraft maneuvers could be due to Smoke Removal Emergency Procedures, which involves descending the aircraft to 10,000 feet and also opening the cockpit window.”
A reader interprets the ACARS messages:
00:26 ANT-ICE R WINDOW; a fault is in either the right sliding window or fixed window (not the windshield).
00:26 R SLIDING WINDOW SENSOR; the right window heat control unit detects a problem with the sliding window sensor circuit.
00:26 SMOKE LAVATORY SMOKE; smoke detected in the lavatory.
00:27 AVIONICS SMOKE; smoke is detected in the Avionics bay.
00:28 R FIXED WINDOW SENSOR; the right window heat control unit detects a problem with the fixed window sensor circuit.
00:29 AUTO FLT FCU 2 FAULT; autopilot flight control unit (Mode control panel) channel 2 is faulted. Channel 1 still OK so no big deal.
00:29 F/CTL SEC 3 FAULT; the number 3 spoiler elevator computer is faulted. Number 1 and 2 still OK.If a bomb has gone off near the forward toilet the blast may have damaged the right window heating somehow. There would be a short delay until the toilet smoke detector goes off.
ORIGINAL POST, 5/19/2016:
At timing of writing, 6.15am Eastern Daylight Time, Egyptian and Greek military boats and planes are still hunting for a missing airliner, Egyptair Flight 804, which disappeared over the Mediterranean Sea at approximately 2.30am local time. The plane was three and a half hours into a scheduled flight from Paris, France to Cairo, Egypt.
Airbus has put out a statement which reads, in part:
The aircraft involved, registered under SU-GCC was MSN (Manufacturer Serial Number) 2088 delivered to Egyptair from the production line in November 2003. The aircraft had accumulated approximately 48,000 flight hours. It was powered by IAE engines. At this time no further factual information is available.
Here’s a screenshot of the ADS-B data reported by FlightAware. Note that this data is considered highly unreliable–but at the moment it’s all I’ve got:
Open in a separate tab to see full resolution. Note that the disappearance is sudden — the ADS-B doesn’t show any descent profile. This would be consistent with a catastrophic loss of electrical power (as perhaps due do a bomb or missile strike) or to someone deliberately turning off the electronic forms of communication, as was done in MH370. Below is a plot of the plane’s last known location.
Worth pointing out that the weather at the time was fair, suggesting that the incident was not weather-related, like AirAsia 8501 or Air France 447. I find it interesting that the disappearance took place right after the plane crossed from one Flight Information Region (FIR) to another–that is to say, when transferring from one air traffic control zone to another. MH370 disappeared under similar circumstances (also in fair weather in the middle of the night.) I would be very interested to see the ATC transcripts–in particular, to know if the plane signed off with the Greek controllers and failed to contact Egyptian ones.
The Mediterranean is a heavily-traveled body of water, both by sea and by air. It is heavily monitored. One can only presume that at the time it vanished from secondary radar screens it was being tracked by primary (military) radar as well. What’s more, based on historical precedent, when planes get into trouble at altitude like this, they tend to come down very close to their last known position. At the exact moment I write this, no debris has been found, but given the good weather conditions and the very small area to search, we should expect wreckage to start turning up very soon.
The Independent notes, “In March, an EgyptAir plane flying from Alexandria to Cairo was hijacked and forced to land in Cyprus by a man wearing what authorities said was a fake suicide belt. He was arrested after giving himself up.” In air crash circles, the name Egyptair is synonymous with EgyptAir 900, which crashed off Nantucket when one of the junior pilots deliberately steered into the ocean. At this point, both terror and suicide remain possible causes in the current incident.
UPDATE 7am EDT: The Guardian has just published this timeline, put out by Greece’s civil aviation department:
02:24: EgyptAir flight 804 from Paris to Cairo enters Greek airspace, air traffic controller permissions it for the remainder of its course.
02:48: The flight is transferred to the next air traffic control sector and is cleared for exit from Greek airspace. “The pilot was in good spirits and thanked the controller in Greek.”
03:27: Athens air traffic control tries to contact the aircraft to convey information on the switch of communications and control from Athens to Cairo air traffic. In spite of repeated calls, the aircraft does not respond, whereupon the air traffic controller calls the distress frequency, without a response from the aircraft.
03:29: It is above the exit point (from Greek airspace).
03:29:40: The aircraft signal is lost, approximately 7 nautical miles south/southeast of the KUMBI point, within Cairo FIR.
Immediately the assistance of radars of the Hellenic Air Force is requested to detect the target, without result.03:45: The processes of search and rescue are initiated, simultaneously informing the Flight Information Region of Cairo.
It seems, then, that unlike MH370, the flight crew here did not sign off with ATC before leaving their airspace.
@Jeff@all
Incidents like this stress the system, and the discipline of the parties involved. Following strict protocol, and not caving in to the demands for info is the proper thing to do.
A metaphor from my own experience is when a major wildfire (the Mill fire) was threatening my ranch. Had three CalFire pumpers parked on my property when a wild boar strolled up obviously injured and suffering. I stepped inside and grabbed a high powered rifle, and was going to put it out of its misery. One of the CalFire guys said that was a bad idea despite the fact that I had an unobstructed view of the pig and beyond. There was a ridiculously small chance a round might catch a firefighter a mile away. Huh?
So he called his chief who called his chief who called the incident commander. The IC told one of his people who told one of his people to call fish and game. Shortly a fish game guy showed up and shot the pig. That is how things happen in a properly structured emergency response. You follow a tightly defined chain of command, and things happen without chaos or making things worse. Seems awkward, but it is absolutely essential.
MS804:
A Greek Merchant Navy captain reported seeing a “flame in the sky” around 130 nautical miles south of Greek island Karpathos.
MH370:
An oil rig worker saw jet ‘on fire’ in the South China Sea.
I think they need to wait for definite proof that recovered debris, even bodies are from MS804. There have been sinking of refugee boats around Greece and it’s islands recently. This could include debris such life vests and other things that float, not recovered in those tragedies.
@DennisW
Good point – count the extra day, it becomes 804. And I believe some cultures do count like this (informally).
@Carla @Marc
Now the Greek say it isn’t debris from a plane and now Egypt says it is…
A Greek Merchant Navy captain reported seeing a “flame in the sky…”
Yep. Deja-vous!
@Carla:
Before even any debris was discovered, French President François Hollande already confirmed that the plane had crashed…
A distress signal was detected at 4:26 a.m. — about two hours after the jet vanished — in the general vicinity where it disappeared, Adel said.
2 hours afterwards?
From Reuters:
EgyptAir vice president says #MS804 wreckage has not been found: ‘We stand corrected’ – CNN
U.S. sees no sign of explosion aboard EgyptAir flight in review of imagery: officials.
http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/18/middleeast/egyptair-flight-disappears/index.html
Distress signal reported on CNN…topic almost at the end of the report.
@Sajid
Not sure about cultural differences, but if you count the numbers between 1 and N, you get N. If you count the intervals between 1 and N, you get N-1.
Having said that, I am reminded of a personal axiom – anytime you can reduce the number of things in your life from N to N-1, it is a good thing – an age related epiphany.
@okcken
MS804:
“A distress signal was detected at 4:26 a.m. — about two hours after the jet vanished — in the general vicinity where it disappeared, Adel said.”
MH370:
The China Times reported on 8th March that MH370 made a distress call that they would make an immediate landing because the “cabin faced disintegration.”
https://peoplestrustmalaysia.wordpress.com/2014/05/07/mh370-sos-distress-call-was-sent-from-the-plane-china-times/
@Gretchen, Thanks, glad to hear it!
Marc – remember also Uighurs claimed credit for MH370 and got ignored. I think the comments of the FSB will turn out to be correct.
The apparent sharp turns and rapid decent indications, disappearance at hand-off/transition time and space are so troubling. Is there a weakness or flaw in ATM systems that need to be looked at more closely?
MS804
The news services are grabbing at anything they can report.
The speculation on what happened to MS804 is all over the map.
Trump tweets it was a terrorist attack then claims it was a bomb; and then says; if you don’t believe that; you’re stupid. Paraphrased….
Greeks quickly find debris from the flight; well maybe not; piece of wood and some normal debris in the messy Mediterranean Sea.
Lost radar contact at 2:29:40. Was that transponder signal, data signal, basic radar signal?
http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/18/middleeast/egyptair-flight-disappears/index.html
US military sources saw heat signatures from area indicating an explosion; later; well maybe not; they did not see an explosion using satellites.
No unusual cargo on airplane; reported. Too early to determine; I think. Maybe battery fire; just saying.
777 Pilot – Expert speculated on CNN; (because happy pilot reported on radio) Slow leak in the aircraft fuselage could led to hypoxia (happy pilot) and semi unconscious pilots who take it off autopilot, lose control, make turns 90 degrees and 360 degrees and crash into the sea. Plane flew on for minutes after last attempt at contact. I’ve taken high altitude training – anything is possible.
Could be; Pilot leaves cockpit to go to bathroom; Copilot decides to crash airplane. Done before.
Expert on MSNBC said A320 is a composite airplane. Not; Primary structure is Aluminum. Vert Tail is Composites.
They are all talking heads. As of Thursday 5/19/16 nothing can be ruled out or in. Nothing.
Just saying……
@Ken
Maybe we are just all sensitized by the MH370 episode. I know my view of what I read on the Net and hear on broadcasts has forever been changed by my involvement with MH370. It will take years of expensive therapy to get back to “normal”.
The aircraft was on it’s fifth flight of the day, having flown from Asmara, Eritrea to Cairo; a roundtrip Cairo-Tunis-Cairo; Cairo to Paris; and then Paris to Cairo. This presents opportunity to bypass what could be assumed to be more rigorous security in Paris.
If it was a bomb, however, why wait so long into the flight to detonate it? This would only increase the chance of discovery, while in not much more than another 15 minutes they would have notified the passengers to prepare for the descent into Cairo.
IS launched a captured SAM from Libya? The org is supposedly getting more active in the political vacuum of a mess that is Libya.
Just noodling things a bit in the absence of additional news. It’s either this or numerology.
I’m troubled by so much: Too many coincidences; why did this happen in the middle of the night, at the edge of a controlled airspace that is in the radar shadow, over an ocean, and the Secondary Surveillance Systems turned off (or debilitated if one follows the current primary theory). The 804 days since MH370 is also odd, but I’m choosing to ignore that for now. And it may be unfortunate that it happens to be a Muslim crew, and there are massive areas to the south that seem to be among the least able to monitor airspace over land outside the Antarctic. Why does it feel as if there are people trying to exploit vulnerabilities in the airspace system? While I do not want to stir up fears of conspiracy theories, I only hope that the proper authorities recognize the urgency of at least considering the possible – if there was the intent to steal an aircraft, it would seem to me that this is the most important thing to make sure absolutely did not happen before almost anything else, search and rescue at the point of lost contact, being priority 1 of course. In other words, I think the stakes are high enough to chase a plausible wild goose or two with military grade information. After all, if we could be slow, confused, and simply unbelieving during 911, with the greatest monitoring and communications equipment on the planet, one must realize it is possible we could be behind the curve in this region, given the lack of resources and multiple conflicting parties. This may be a world significant issue. Or the wreckage may show up soon as this really isn’t that large of a water body in a fairly heavily traveled sea and I can forget all the above. Why can’t we end the ridiculous jurisdictional microphone plays? Prayers for the passengers and crew.
@Rand
My guess is a SAM would have left a signature the US could identify. No claims of responsibility are a bit puzzling relative to an act of terrorism. The usual suspects are not known to waste much time.
It is quite possible that Donald is wrong on this one or it was another case of San Bernardino where someone was “converted”, but acting on their own authority.
Another theory… Perhaps there was a confrontation of some sort between the pilots and unknown person intent on causing the plane to crash. Could explain the the 13 minute delay in timing. Also, what would bullets do to the plane at that altitude? There have been several reported instances of people getting past security with firearms on them. Or the gun could have been put there by airline staff. Just speculating…. Also a long time mh370 lurker
@Ross, when planes go missing over water it’s normal for it to take a couple of days–this happened in both Air France 447 and AirAsia 8501, in both cases it was known pretty precisely where the last known position was. But until wreckage turns up, thinks do seem pretty eerie. And of course in the back of our minds we can’t help but wonder if a day will turn into a week, into a month, into a year–and we’ve got another MH370 on our hands. I don’t think it will, but it’s hard not to have a niggling doubt.
I too am a long time lurker/reader, please don’t post Everything on how to take control of a plane, someone like Trond could have been an Isis type creeper looking for info! Praying for all the lives possibly lost in yet another tragedy!
Speculating here… Wasn’t the story of the fire in the sky explained as “Russian space junk?”
If it was, is it not possible for several objects to be traveling together, having started out as a single piece and then broken up in the upper atmosphere? A space junk shower?
If so, maybe the plane was hit more than once, and the account by the Merchant Navy is also accurate. The plane’s movements are consistent with evasive manuevering, aren’t they?
Of course we still have a problem of missing debris, at least for now.
And it could have been the PNF flipping FAC circuit breakers, causing the turn and descent and subsequent loss of the aircraft- who’d have thought?
Patience dear grasshopper.
Could it be that it experienced a situation similar to the one below but didnt get lucky:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas_Flight_72
Debris not confirmed I read. No debris still.
Confusion and conflicting statements.
It seems the plane flew on at least 13min. after the transponders signal and pilot contact was lost.
That’s a huge area at a speed of ~450knots in which the plane could have crashed.
Will Inmarsat have data on the end part of the flight?
Could well be interesting in relation to the end-flight of MH370 for comparison imo.
Re: MH370, found the following excerpt of the B-777 AMM for an AIMS-1 system:
==========================================
AIMS -AIMS CABINET COMPONENT LOCATIONS
EFFECTIVITY BEJ ALL 31-41-00
Page 23
D633W101-BEJ Jan 05/2002
AIMS -INPUT POWER INTERFACES
General
Each AIMS cabinet receives power through four circuit breakers in the overhead circuit breaker panel. Each AIMS cabinet also receives power through one hot battery bus circuit breaker in the standby power management panel.
The left AIMS cabinet gets electrical power from the 28v dc capt flight instrument bus, the 28v dc F/O flight instrument bus, and the hot battery bus. The right AIMS cabinet gets electrical power from the 28v dc left bus, the 28v dc right bus, and the hot battery bus.
The electrical power goes through a power filter on the back of the AIMS cabinet and then goes to the backplane power bus. The backplane power bus supplies power to the eight LRMs in the cabinet.
==========================================
If so, then even in the absence of all primary power (APU + IDG-L + IDG-R) and backup power (PMG L + PMG R), both AIMS cabinets would continue to draw power from the Main Battery with something like 80-Amp-Hours of energy store, capable of supplying the core DC buses at ~12A for ~7 hours.
Logically, the only way to depower the AIMS cabinets quickly — so as to wipe out the stored Flight ID “MAS370” so as to deny the same to the SDU during the ghost-flight phase — is to flip their CBs. Many suggest that the Transponders were switched off, too. This would suggest, that somebody was pulling out CBs for everything from XPDRs to AIMS… and then gradually pushing them back in, over the course of the next hour or so.
Pulling all CBs and then re-inserting them one-by-one over a protracted period is SOP for troubleshooting electricals following an electrical short of some sort. Plausibly, the SDU was viewed as one of the least flight-critical systems to restore, and so was left to almost last, its CBs not being re-engaged for slightly over an hour.
Conversely, you would think that the AIMS cabinets would be one of the first systems to restore during a trouble-shooting procedure. So, those of you with detailed knowledge of B-777 FD CB panel layouts, could probably visualize this suggested scenario…
Where would you start on the over-head CB panel ?
If, after an hour, of re-engaging CBs and waiting a few moments to confirm no fumes & fires, you finally reach the SDU’s CBs…
then where might you be, after a few minutes more ?? What might have been the next few CBs to re-engage ???
If you accept that a FMT occurred about 2:30-2:40am, minutes after the SDU was re-engaged, then those few remaining systems would be prime suspects for causing the ensuing ghost-flight phase.
Note, the flight-data supplied to the SDU derives from systems surely restored well before the SDU. If so, the SDU was restored with other systems already functioning, which might allow the same to reboot far faster than the 1:00 or 2:40 suggested for a complete systems reboot.
This disappearance realy starts looking a lot like the vanishing of MH370:
-Pilot-contact lost just before the FIR boundery.
-Transponder-contact lost just after it.
-After going dark(I still guess)primary radar detects a sharp turn to the left, a total 20.000ft descent, a 360 turn to the right and loss of (primary?)radar contact when the plane was at 10.000ft.
After this??
The coincidences are at least remarkable and could imo potentialy contribute in the understanding of what could have happened to MH370.
An illustrating grafhic on the Dutch news:
http://nos.nl/artikel/2106064-zoektocht-naar-airbus-egyptair-gaat-door.html
I went to look at the satellite images of the mediterranean on EOSDIS, just out of curiosity, and it seems that the whole area has been blacked out when you zoom in.
This is pretty unusual IME. I’m not certain why – glitch or something else.
I wondered whether Weathergraphics has anything on the region for the time frame. Will take a look.
I suspect nothing will be drummed up unless this becomes another ‘mystery’ situation.
@Erik Nelson,
From the FI:
“The main battery can power the standby system for a minimum of 10 minutes.”
OZ
@Jeff Wise.
In this BBC news-article:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-36339291
The Greek defence minister states that information of the last part of the flight came from the Greek airforce operation centre (near end of article).
So do I have to assume this information came from primary radar after loss of contact with transponder/secundary radar?
@ Marc Before even any debris was discovered, French President François Hollande already confirmed that the plane had crashed…
Yes, good catch, that caught my attention too.. Strange behaviour. Also striking similarity with MH370
Does he have the same info as the US about an explosion -which they currently do not have anymore ofcourse-?
@Erik I like your thinking. Good questions and I hope you get some answers.
BTW, a cursory review of the range of SAM systems makes it highly unlikely that MS804 was hit by a land-based missile.
The 31 Oct flight of Metrojet 9268 disintegrated 23 minutes after takeoff from Sharm el-Sheikh International Airport, with the authorities having concluded to a very high degree of probability that the aircraft was most likely the brought down by a bomb.
The Telegraph reported on 7 Nov that Ansar Beit al-Maqdis (ABM), Sinai Province or Supporters of Jerusalem, claimed responsibility in a four-minute long statement circulating on social media a day after the bombing.
Then four days later, the group released an audio tape, purportedly read out by the group’s spokesman Abu Osama al-Masri claiming: “We are the ones who brought it down.”
After the incident, US intelligence agencies reported hearing of chatter regarding “something big” before the plane went down.
The late-in-flight timing for the destruction of MS804: perhaps it was meant as a “show” for new recruits in Egypt? This is, in fact, how this form of social pathology is oriented.
May 19 marks the 100-year anniversary of the signing of the Sykes-Picot Agreement, which partitioned the Ottoman Empire in the wake of WW I. From wiki: “The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) claims one of the goals of its insurgency is to reverse the effects of the Sykes–Picot Agreement.”
Perhaps this was a bombing. Hopefully, we won’t see any more fireworks.
The area is now visible on the NASA website – it looks like it may have been a loading glitch.
Just out of interest, any speculation as to the fuel range of MS804?
Tomnod might be useful right now. I’ve tweeted them asking about it.
Sykes-Picot Agreement, 100th anniversary: I did a cursory search regarding whether there has been any reporting on aviation security having happened to pick up/gone on heightened alert re the fact that May 19 might present as a bit of a “hazardous anniversary”: I wasn’t able to find anything. I find this rather – ridiculous.
I have yet to see anyone in the mainstream press picking up on this. We studied the Sykes-Picot Agreement at UCLA when I was a “kid”; it was a no brainer that conflict in the Levant and Iraq can be directly attributed to all those random lines in the sand drawn by average white guys.
The odds that this was a bombing have just been drastically increased, in my humble opinion. I’m not really one for cultural relativism in such circumstances, but it appears clear that we in the west clearly have a learning problem.
Come to think of it there is one vast difference between this incident and that of 370.
Malaysian disappeared near the start of the flight. It had still a large amount of fuel on board with which to do whatever it wanted, really – this gave it a huge range.
MS804 was close to landing. How far could it realistically have gone, with a relatively small amount of fuel on board?
I doubt it could have got all that far. Though depending on motives it may not have needed to.
So following from that, I’m supposing that if it was ‘disappeared’ deliberately, the intended alternative destination wasn’t very far away from LKP.
It appears that debris has now been found by Egypt military. 5:08 is the time on that statement. Debris and personal belongings. I recall that MH370 had so many false declarations of debris being spotted, which turned out to be untrue.
News reports confirm debris and passenger belonging found.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-36339614
@Rand: “Sykes-Picot Agreement, 100th anniversary”
Yesterday’s local French newspaper ‘La Montagne’ ran a short article on page 32, mentioning a recent ISIS (Daesh) video “The end of Sykes-Picot”.
@Gysbreght Thanks. If you are a regular reader of La Montagne, perhaps you could note if the same journalist writes a piece relating MS804 to Sykes-Picot? Anyway, if I thought of it, I’m sure that others have picked up on it by now.
No More Fireworks.
my condolences to all the victims relatives, sad when there is nothing else to do or imagine, at least
OT: THE BIG ukrainian plane (someting to be proud of, sure, since soviet era though) carying big 120ton czech generator from Pilsen to australian miners, landing at Perth airport
https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/wa/a/31602453/king-of-the-sky-worlds-biggest-plane-lands-in-perth/
@Victor
Obviously it takes some time. But they already found body parts and luggages.
”The Egyptian search mission has reportedly found a body part, seats and suitcases from EgyptAir Flight 804, hours after other debris was spotted 290km north of Alexandria. President Sisi and the airline have offered their condolences to families of the victims. ”
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/egyptair-flight-ms804-crash-greek-defence-minister-says-body-part-seats-and-suitcases-from-missing-a7039341.html
The Greek defence minister says a body part has been found in the search for EgyptAir flight MS804.
Panos Kammenos said a body part, two seats and suitcases were being recovered by the Egyptian military.
@DennisW
“my view of what I read on the Net and hear on broadcasts has forever been changed”
mine too, but in fact, it loaded me with positivity, at least for global happenings;
sad things happen though
@Warren
To get back to MH370 for a moment. I think the ATSB accept the best way to use the remaining resources is to proceed outwards from the 7th arc. the good thing is that bathymetry can continue even when the weather is too rough for towfish work. I get the impression they are hoping it might show up as backscatter on the bathymetry. Definitely worth a try at this stage I the game. Martin Dolan is saying that the search will probably end in early August.
Item from The Enquirer:
Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) head Martin Dolan said there was no indication the zone would be extended.
“We have some way to go and our best bet is that we will complete that search late July, early August, depending on unforeseen circumstances,” Dolan told The Australian newspaper, referring to rough weather.
“The technical capability is there to continue the search but the resources to do it is a matter for government,” he said.
Hopes of finding the Boeing 777 which vanished on March 8, 2014, with 239 people on board, are receding.
“At this point there is a diminishing level of confidence that we will find the aircraft,” Dolan admitted.
“There will be a lot of disappointment if we don’t find it.
@IR1907 said, “Obviously it takes some time. But they already found body parts and luggages.”
My point was only that the initial reports about debris were wrong. We are in agreement that recent history such as QZ8501 shows that it may take a day or more to find debris even with radar data giving clues about the crash location.
Correction of ATC ‘gap’ is made by the Greek.
Not a 12min. gap but a 2.40min. gap between last attempt to contact pilots and vanishing from radar.
http://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-africa-36328976
So apparantly the plane plunged down from 37Kft to 10Kft in 2.4min. and no flight of 12min. accured after vanishing from radar.
Similarities between MH370 seem to fade away.
Flight data from Flightradar24 with files;
https://www.flightradar24.com/blog/contact-lost-with-egyptair-flight-804/