The Telegraph reports:
07.23 [2015-07-30 07:23 - The most recent items are at the top of the page]
A metallic object described as six to nine feet long and three feet wide was found on a beach on the east coast of Reunion, a French island in the Indian Ocean. The object had the code number "BB670" on it.
[...] Why do officials think the object is from [missing Malaysian airliner] MH370?
[...] First, aviation experts say the object appears to be from a Boeing 777--and no other such aircraft is believed to have gone missing in the region. No Boeing 777 has ever been lost at sea.
Second, ocean experts say the object [a flaperon] is exactly where debris would have washed up from the plane's presumed crash point, several thousand miles to the east. Currents in that part of the Indian Ocean move anti-clockwise and would have carried the object northwards from the current search zone, off the coast of Western Australia, and then westwards towards Reunion.
[...] 13.21
The man who found the piece of wreckage [...] Johnny Bègue [...] is [in] charge of a team of eight people who have a contract to keep the popular beach clean in the town of Saint-Andre in the east of the tropical island.[...] the piece of a suitcase that may have been onboard flight MH370 lay unnoticed on the same beach [...] for nearly a day.
(Score: 3, Funny) by ghost on Friday July 31 2015, @01:09PM
But there are also prominent MH370 researchers that believe it followed a northern route, landed intact at Diego Garcia, or some other destination. To throw us off the trail, they planted the flaperon in the ocean where it could wash up and be found "proving" the SIO crash happened. Meanwhile, the rest of the plane is in a remote Russian airport hangar!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 31 2015, @01:44PM
Man... I need to brush up on my conspiracy theories. I have not heard that one before.
(Score: 2) by Alfred on Friday July 31 2015, @05:07PM
;-)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 31 2015, @07:48PM
Well, it seems to indicate that there was a controlled landing.
With the slats extended to maximize lift, contact with the ocean would put a lot of stress on those rather vulnerable pieces (relative to the rest of the airframe) and tear those loose.
It could indicate that the remainder of the aircraft is in 1 piece or just a few pieces, making an investigation easier, should that location be found.
Had the aircraft augured in, completely out of control, the forces on everything would be much greater and the damage to everything would be extreme, causing the debris field to be much larger and more difficult to deal with--and resulting in more pieces that might have already been beached.
-- gewg_
(Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Saturday August 01 2015, @08:08AM
Had the aircraft augured in, completely out of control, the forces on everything would be much greater and the damage to everything would be extreme
I wasn't aware you had a background in air crash investigation.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Saturday August 01 2015, @09:01AM
> Well, it seems to indicate that there was a controlled landing.
> With the slats extended to maximize lift, contact with the ocean would put a lot of stress on those rather vulnerable pieces (relative to the > rest of the airframe) and tear those loose.
the flaperon is also (primary function?) an inboard aileron, hence the name, and hence is extended for roll control at high speed as much as lift at low speed, so it shows nothing about speed of impact. sim experiments have shown that a 777 out of fuel with no one at the controls will descend in a phugoid not at excessive speed, it could therefore have impacted intact and at almost any ang
the suitcase may turn out to be more interesting IF it is from mh370 - some rumours say it shows fire damage, if so itwould be unlikely to get that in the ocean or on impact...