MH370

[TrekEX8]

It’s not that unusual to top up the crew oxygen before departure. I’d have thought once every month or so would be about right?
The tech log entry of ‘nil defects’ would have been entered by the inbound crew. There appears to be another entry (software update?) after the oxygen top up, so wouldn’t have thought the oxygen request came from the crew.
Nothing looks out of the ordinary to me.

[MarkwG]

youngsyr said:

MarkwG said:

Yes I read that too: what I meant is that the report doesn't seem to draw any conclusions on it: if anything, the statement that the airlines common practice is to service the system, even if above minimum, shows what happened wasn't a one off. The change in the notes makes perfect sense if there's nothing to hide; the engineer not recalling who requested, not unusual if it's common practice.

One explanation is that it was just a routine part of the servicing.

Another is that the captain specifically requested it, knowing that he would be relying on the oxygen in that tank to carry out his plan.

There is no conclusive proof either way, but what would add weight either way is to understand how often this is done - Green Dot Aviation stated that it is twice per year. With the previous top up being performed two months earlier, this would indicate that it was out of routine.

So where does Green Dot get that information from? With the best will in the world, that's a YT site producing videos for public consumption, they don't have access to the resources an accident investigation team does. There's too many assumptions to convince me of anything: it may not have been that captain that made the request, as one example. An as yet undiagnosed incipient leak in the oxygen supply another.

Occams Razor is often brought forward to support some pretty wild ideas, however Occams Razor simply states if you have two competing ideas to explain the same phenomenon, you should prefer the simpler one. The simpler is that it's not out of the ordinary at all, hence why no-one reacted to it at the time. It's reasonably Ok to speculate, although the relatives of the death may have a different perspective, but that isn't evidence, or proof.

[Siko]

MarkwG said:

Occams Razor is often brought forward to support some pretty wild ideas, however Occams Razor simply states if you have two competing ideas to explain the same phenomenon, you should prefer the simpler one. The simpler is that it's not out of the ordinary at all, hence why no-one reacted to it at the time. It's reasonably Ok to speculate, although the relatives of the death may have a different perspective, but that isn't evidence, or proof.

That's a fair point - going briefly OT if you remember the Mull of Kintyre Chinook crash, the main evidence against the pilots was based on the actual weather and a couple of radar returns from Aldergrove's radar showing them at low level and high speed heading into very poor weather. In all honesty I think that was probably the right finding, but it was purely theroetical (Occam's Razor) and very badly received by us crews at the time and especially so given the many issue with the Chinoook's flight control software. In fact it was the only occasion in my 17 year career when the miitary air accident investigation team came out to the various bases to present why they found the pilots guilty, which instantly made us all suspicious that they were being 'hung'. After that the military system changed from a blame culture (eg pilot x did this, therefore he was negligent) to a better, more open one, so maybe some good came out of it after all.

[hidetheelephants]

Why does this thread exist; is there something wrong with the 400 page one here, complete with speculation it might be on the moon?

[dvs_dave]

hidetheelephants said:

Why does this thread exist; is there something wrong with the 400 page one here, complete with speculation it might be on the moon?

It can’t be ruled out as “we just don’t know”. This isn’t the time or place for “speculation and conjecture”. Inexplicable concern for “reputation” and “innocence until proven guilty” pig headedness is where it’s at.