Germanwings A320 crashed in France :(

[Galsia]

Compared to some air crashes, that looks survivable to me. RIP to all those on board.

[Le TVR]

KTF said:

Le TVR said:

DGAC says that there was no Mayday, it was an automatic distress alert triggered at 5000 ft when contact was lost. So no contact from flightdeck....

5000ft is 'ground' level for the mountain.

I think they are implying that the alert was triggered by ATC loosing contact rather than anything from the aircraft. And yes the crash site is around 5000 ft.

[cptsideways]

NAS said:

http://www.aa.com.tr/fr/headlines/482968--un-avion...

Apparently, these are pictures from the site.

I'm no expert but that part of it fell flat horizontal to the ground, straight down, so stalled at the point of impact. However where is the rest of fuselage & tailplane?

[confused_buyer]

The BBC presenter solved the mystery:

"So, it seems that something catestrophic happened which they couldn't resolve".

No need to spend money on an investigation now.

[AlexIT]

The picture above is tagged on the website as "archive", so possibly not from this actual accident

[h0b0]

kapiteinlangzaam said:

A morbidly interesting picture.

Wings still attatched, fuselage mainly in one piece etc.

Certainly suggests they impacted the ground roughly aligned with the terrain and perhaps not all that quickly, rather than nose-first at 500mph.

Still utterly non-survivable though.

That appears to be an unrelated 2007 incident

ETA - Atlasjet Flight 4203 (KK4203) was a scheduled domestic flight from Istanbul's Atatürk Airport to Isparta Süleyman Demirel Airport in Isparta, Turkey. On November 30, 2007 it crashed outside the town of Keçiborlu, 18 km (11 mi) from Isparta at around 01:36 EET (23:36 UTC on November 29).[2] The flight took off from Istanbul at 00:50 EET with 57 people on board

Edited by h0b0 on Tuesday 24th March 12:08

[Boydie88]

That picture isn't of this incident.

[dazwalsh]

Certainly a strange crash, as in no mayday called, plane drops out of the sky, clear weather.

[truck71]

cptsideways said:

I'm no expert but that part of it fell flat horizontal to the ground, straight down, so stalled at the point of impact. However where is the rest of fuselage & tailplane?

Tail is to the left of the photo, possibly has spun round on impact.

[h0b0]

kapiteinlangzaam said:

h0b0 said:

That appears to be an unrelated 2007 incident

Which incident, so I can remove the photo if needs-be...

Just edited my post above. Atlasjet Flight 4203 (KK4203) was a scheduled domestic flight from Istanbul's Atatürk Airport to Isparta Süleyman Demirel Airport in Isparta, Turkey. On November 30, 2007 it crashed outside the town of Keçiborlu, 18 km (11 mi) from Isparta at around 01:36 EET (23:36 UTC on November 29).[2] The flight took off from Istanbul at 00:50 EET with 57 people on board

[Boydie88]

dazwalsh said:

Certainly a strange crash, as in no mayday called, plane drops out of the sky, clear weather.

There was a distress call, wasn't there?

[Abbott]

Boydie88 said:

That picture isn't of this incident.

At 2000m I would expect there to to be more snow.
It clearly says Archive at the top of pic.

What is the point of a news agency putting up a pic like that?

[Le TVR]

Boydie88 said:

There was a distress call, wasn't there?

DGAC says no. It was an ATC generated alert.

Gendarmerie helicopters who located the crash site talked of debris and bodies on the mountainside. Quickly followed by the ministerial comment that survivors were extremely unlikely.

[Cheese Mechanic]

Seems a bit strange, if it literally did just fall out the sky without a mayday.

Any instance of any kind of structural failure on these aircraft?

[NAS]

I got the pic/link from the FAZ, which is normally a reliable source, but they have indeed deleted it from their live-ticker.

[Gandahar]

Abbott said:

Boydie88 said:

That picture isn't of this incident.

At 2000m I would expect there to to be more snow.
It clearly says Archive at the top of pic.

What is the point of a news agency putting up a pic like that?

It does say archives on the picture, perhaps a clue?

But yes, what's the point showing that?

Interesting descent profile. Not a dive but not a normal descent. Plane did not deviate from the flight path.

Weather was ok, and at cruising height so I doubt an upset or the crew lost control.

Perhaps fire so rapid descent
Or decompression so rapid descent
Structural failure so leading to nose down attitude that could not be corrected.

Of the 3 I'd think the last is more likely as the plane was so old.

[joema]

I've been through the area where it apparently came down , roughly the col d'allos. It's pretty rugged and certainly no flat area so it doesn't look good for survivors at all.

Hopefully it happens quickly for all those involved, rip

[airbusA346]

From Airlive.net Twitter

"Here is a photo from helicopter of the crash area /France2 journalists"

[Asterix]

http://avherald.com/h?article=483a5651&opt=0

Interesting info here - apparently it leveled out at 6,800ft for a minute then hit mountains.

[Silver993tt]

Driller said:

Colleagues of my wife who works at Paris Control say their colleagues at Aix-en-Provence ( the control centre in question) have said the aircraft descended from FL380 to FL60 without any mayday call.

"According to sources quoted by AFP news agency. plane had issued a distress call at 10:47 (09:47 GMT)."