News and theories about the missing Malaysian plane

exactly correct Terry,

Do not get me wrong, air travel is very safe, one of the safest forms of travel in human history in fact, and one of the cheapest per passenger mile as well. Even in the last 20 years the incidence of commercial air fatalities has dropped some 300 percent or more. Consider the volume of people traveling by air today, and it is truly is an amazing accomplishment considering how many people and complex machinery are involved in the process. A plane going down is always news worthy because it is such a big dramatic event, usually involving several hundred fatalities. This only happens once every few years, yet the 40 people a day that die in car accidents in the US alone only makes local news.

 

Very true Petros.

That is why remarks such as "The plane should have been fitted with this or it should have been fitted with that," (this and thats are very important on planes) are ignorant of the rarity of such an incident, and the cost of installing equipment that will never be used.

Of course equipment on planes are old fashioned, that's because they work. Heaven forbid when geeks get a free run on what technology goes in planes.

Boeing 747s running on Windows7, if as many planes crash as much as my computer does one of the busiest business in the world would be the Black Box Recovery Inc.

And when they play it back, the last entry would be, "please send your problems to Windows and we will see if we can find a solution."

Poida

 

Very true Petros about the safety of air travel. Of course, when a plane goes down it gets a lot of attention, so does a train wreck. Yet such deaths are no more tragic than deaths in a traffic accident or house fire, and far less prevalent.

It's the sheer instantaneous magnitude of such disasters that gets attention, we empathise with the helplessness of the victims, and the pendulum swings of hope and despair that one feels for the families as each media announcement contradicts the last in this particular case.

There seems to be a sense that not much can be done or needs to be done about the toll of road deaths. Humans relate best to the unusual and dramatic when there is human suffering; "ordinary" human suffering doesn't get our attention easily.

 

Nearly 90 people die every day in the United States alone as a result of road vehicle accidents. Little notice is taken except in the local media. But don't we all die alone, really?

 

Hoyt,
Nice post.
Single vehicle, single occupant are common, alone as you say.
But, not me, I'll be sure to have at least a dozen go with me.
I hate doing things alone, really.
God's speed man.

 

I think there is an illusion of not just familiarity, but that you are in control of your car so you trust it more, you feel safe in it. In a commercial aircraft you are not in control, everything about it you have no option. Shut up, sit down, stay in your seat, wear that belt, and you have never even met the pilot, the guy that holds your life in his hands, nor all the other hands that built it, maintain it, put fuel in it, that directs its flight path. That is not true with your car.

And I am quit certain that when ever there is news of an airplane crash, most people are thinking what it was like for all those on board, knowing they are all doomed before the actual end comes, and everyone is helpless do to anything about it. There is the drama, and hence, the news worthiness of it.

 

I think that TV show " Air Crash Investigation ", which is extremely popular, has made the world full of amateur air crash "experts", and people want to know what the story is in this case.

 

In an aircraft I do have the reassurance that, most flights at least, the pilot, fuel handler, ground and air controller and so forth have some training. I don't really want to know that that warm fuzzy feeling isn't worth a dime.

In a car I don't really have that feeling about the 18 wheeler driving too close behind me, the young kid tearing by in the fast lane out on his first drive with a bunch of his buddies cheering him on, the mother I am passing trying to get her toddler's safety belt back on, the businessman in his big limo dressing down some remote employee on the cell phone or the city bus in front that may suddenly change lanes leaving a stalled car right in front of me and no place to go (had that happen).

For that matter I wonder whether I was fully attentive to my driving when I was trying to get my hi-tech radio back on station after my finger brushed a button on the steering wheel which can change the channel, the band or the source. car radios no-longer have the nice simple rotary controls one can use without taking ones' eyes off the road.

reminds me of a sick joke:-

When I go I want to die peacfully in my sleep like my grampa not screaming in terror like the other people in his car.

(I tjik I read that in this forum . . . )

 

What was meant here is that there are more possibilities to investigate than when a not normal deliberately action prior to the accident can be excluded.

 

Normal is when there is no accident. When there is an accident it normally starts by accident and not with a deliberately action prior to the accident.

A ‘‘normal’’ accident I describe as an accident with no not normal deliberately action prior to the accident.

‘‘Normal’’ is placed between quotation marks to indicate some irony about the usage of that word here.

See: Quotation mark, Irony ---> Scare quotes

 

BTW, we still don't know if there was an accident or what ever happened was all by deliberately action.

 

Angelique,
I "accidentally" read your posts and have concluded they are not "normal".
Why do you suppose the media attention has disappeared now too?

 

Some how a Goose got by my Prop and through the Wing Strut gap without taking me out of the air.
That would be a normal accident.
Now on the other hand...the guy on the Ground, shooting at the Goose, might have taken me out of the Air, and that would not be a "normal" accident.

 

I thought a normal accident was one that happened at right angle or 90 degrees.

 

Like a Baggage Cart crashing into the Concession Stand?