Air Asia A320 Lost between Indonesia and Singapore

[phumy]

Getting this on BBC at the moment;

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-30614627

PPRUNE are saying that it might have deviated off course due to bad weather but is now long overdue its arrival time at Singapore.

[phumy]

For those of you on twitter here is a link to a picture of the weather radar at the time;

https://twitter.com/thatjohn/status/54906359708765...

I live on Java, Indonesia and have seen some big rain in the last 3 or 4 days with heavy thunder storms too.

[phumy]

Seems I posted in the wrong forum area..sorry

[sneijder]

phumy said:

Seems I posted in the wrong forum area..sorry

It'd be good to keep this gong though from an aviation viewpoint. Air Asia being a budget airline, folk will start jumping to conclusions or assume there's a wormhole etc.

It does seem like bad news already though.

http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/1164818-belitung-i...

http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/articl...

[Eric Mc]

Not good news for Mr Fernandez either who's already got many problems to deal with.

[Crush]

Talk of a successful emergency landing in East Belitung

http://news.detik.com/read/2014/12/28/144850/27883...

Not sure how reliable the source is though

[red_slr]

This radar plot shows it was going very slowly at FL363, around 350kt GS.
At that FL its not leaving much room for error - even more so when its in a climb to FL380.

Also some interesting info re the loss of contact. Radar contact lost 06:17 local but initial alert not raised until 07:08 and full emergency at 07:55.

Given the AC was due at destination at just after 07:00 local I have to say I think that's quite a delay.

[Simpo Two]

Not being up on the lingo is FL380 Angels 38?

[Eric Mc]

38,000 feet - which is fairly high for an A320 with 160 on board.

[djc206]

Without knowing the upper winds it's hard to judge how relevant the GS is. If you go on flight radar you'll see that we here in the south of England have ~100kt northerlies today so a lot of the aircraft routeing up from Spain/Portugal are flying similar speeds at similar levels. That's not unusual.

[Eric Mc]

GS?

[ecsrobin]

red_slr said:

This radar plot shows it was going very slowly at FL363, around 350kt GS.
At that FL its not leaving much room for error - even more so when its in a climb to FL380.

Also some interesting info re the loss of contact. Radar contact lost 06:17 local but initial alert not raised until 07:08 and full emergency at 07:55.

Given the AC was due at destination at just after 07:00 local I have to say I think that's quite a delay.

Well an aircraft is only overdue when it has exceeded its notified endurance. The fact that it will have diversion fuel 07:55 sounds about right.

[djc206]

groundspeed

Sorry I'll stop abbreviating or at least put stuff in brackets!

[Eric Mc]

It's easy to lapse into "job related lingo" if you use it every day. Most of us on this forum will be familiar with some aviation related acronyms - but not all.

[croyde]

Crush said:

Talk of a successful emergency landing in East Belitung

http://news.detik.com/read/2014/12/28/144850/27883...

Not sure how reliable the source is though

Is there an English version of that story?

[V41LEY]

sneijder said:

It'd be good to keep this gong though from an aviation viewpoint. Air Asia being a budget airline, folk will start jumping to conclusions or assume there's a wormhole etc.

I've flown extensively around that region with Air Asia. Budget airline but does what is says on the tin and has good routes for quick getaways. Very heavy electrical storms in this area at this time of year are a factor. Luckily never got hit in a really big one. Prayers to all concerned. Let's just hope they find 'something' what with the recent experiences there.

[Yertis]

Eric Mc said:

GS?

Come on Eric, even I could work that one out.

[Mojocvh]

Yertis said:

Eric Mc said:

GS?

Come on Eric, even I could work that one out.

Screwdriver.

[BroadWay81]

Hello, exactly how would a commercial aircraft go down in stormy weather, if this is the case?

[MintSprint]

BroadWay81 said:

Hello, exactly how would a commercial aircraft go down in stormy weather, if this is the case?

Pretty much vertically, I think. With a big splash at the end.