Engine Data Reveals That Flight 370 Flew On For Hours After It "Disappeared"

Advocatus Diaboli writes "Aviation investigators and national security officials believe the plane flew for a total of five hours based on data automatically downloaded and sent to the ground from the Boeing Co. 777's engines as part of a routine maintenance and monitoring program. As part of its maintenance agreements, Malaysia Airlines transmits its engine data live to Rolls-Royce for analysis. The system compiles data from inside the 777's two Trent 800 engines and transmits snapshots of performance, as well as the altitude and speed of the jet. Those snippets are compiled and transmitted in 30-minute increments, said one person familiar with the system." Update: 03/14 11:41 GMT by S : The WSJ has since updated its report to say the data was from the plane's satellite-communication system. However, Malaysian authorities have denied both scenarios, saying neither Boeing nor Rolls-Royce received data past 1:07am (the flight initially disappeared off radar at 1:30am).

Comments

Already denied

[Anonymous Coward]

... by malaysian officials: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/13/malaysian-officials-deny-flight-mh370-missing-plane-flew-hours

Re:Already denied

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, apparently the source of this information was credible enough that the United States Navy, on its own initiative, is sending a ship to the Indian Ocean.

There's clearly a ton of misinformation out there. But which is more likely--you're misinformed, or the U.S. Navy is misinformed?

Re:Already denied

[nobuddy]

Having dealt with the Navy for a decade..... I'd say it's 50-50

Re:Already denied

[ColdWetDog]

You can't make a triangle out of a single point.

Back to Intro Geometry with you!

Re:Already denied

[icebike]

Actually, I'd like to know where you got the information on the exact equipment on board this plane?

What is being denied is that Malaysian Airlines subscribed to this monitoring program, not that it was not so equipped (*).
The latest reports is that the radios are there and ping the satellites even when they are not going to transmit data.

U.S. officials said earlier that they have an "indication" the missing Malaysia Airlines jetliner may have crashed in the Indian Ocean and is moving the USS Kidd to the area to begin searching.
It's not clear what the indication was, but senior administration officials told ABC News the missing Malaysian flight continued to "ping" a satellite on an hourly basis after it lost contact with radar. The Boeing 777 jetliners are equipped with what is called the Airplane Health Management system in which they ping a satellite every hour. The number of pings would indicate how long the plane stayed aloft.

(Sort of like a cell phone with an expired sim still talks to the towers).

This is coming from the white house.
You will remember YEARS AGO when the Russians shot down a commercial airliner, that the NSA pulled recorded conversations between the Russian pilots and their base, WEEKS after the incident, embarrassing the Russians.
The US probably has more data on this indecent than they are willing to reveal at this time.

*This makes sense, because the airlines can turn the feature on by simple writing a check.
Boeing builds it into the fleet on the hopes of selling the service.

 

Re:Already denied

[MouseR]

Speaking of which, Malaysia simply needs to request #NSA for the black box backup.

Re:Already denied

[flyingsquid]

The big question is, how the HELL is it possible to lose an entire commercial aircraft in 2014? I've seen some articles to the effect that it's difficult to cover the entire earth with enough radars to track planes over the ocean. OK, sure, but that's the obsolete ACARS system. That's why we have satellite communications. For $150 you can buy a portable GPS beacon from Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Spot-Sat... and then there's a subscription fee which is maybe $100/year. Basically, for $250 your kayak trip sends GPS updates every 5 minutes so it can't be lost at sea, it just seems bizarre that a commercial aircraft carrying 200 people wouldn't have even that minimal sort of tracking ability. And there are companies building similar technology for aircraft- basically, streaming the black-box data in real time over satellite networks. It would be expensive to implement, but how many millions of dollars have been spent on ships and helicopters for the rescue effort?

Napkin time

[Anonymous Coward]

~500 mph * 5 hours = 2500 mile radius = 19.6 million square miles.

That's about 10% of the surface of the planet. They're going to need some sort of heading information; you can permanently hide a 777 in that much ocean/mountain/jungle/etc.

Anyone know if the radar hits were meaningful yet?

Correction: Signal NOT from the engine monitors

[gnunick]

(From TFA):

Corrections & Amplifications

U.S. investigators suspect Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 flew for hours past the time it reached its last confirmed location, based on an analysis of signals sent through the plane's satellite-communication link designed to automatically transmit the status of onboard systems, according to people familiar with the matter. An earlier version of this article and an accompanying graphic incorrectly said investigators based their suspicions on signals from monitoring systems embedded in the plane's Rolls-Royce PLC engines and described that process.

It wasn't the engines sending data

[JoeyRox]

It was the SATCOM system of the plane itself, which has the capability of transmitting health and positional data of the entire plane's system for analysis by third-party service and maintenance providers. Airliners have the option to purchase service plans for that but Malaysia Airlines chose to only purchase a separate plane related to data the engine's themselves can transmit (from Rolls Royce, the engine's manufacturer).

Even though Malaysian Airlines didn't have an online service monitoring plan for this specific plane, the plane still performs periodic searches/connections to satellite data communication providers - akin to an unregistered cell phone searching and connecting to a cell tower but without licensed service. This periodic connection occurs approx once every hour on the plane, and by counting the number of attempts (4), authorities believe the plane was either flying or in-tact for at least 4 hours from the last secondary radar ping.

Re:It wasn't the engines sending data

[InvalidError]

I would be a little surprised if the engine monitoring and satellite link circuitry would be on battery backup since it is unlikely engines and passengers would have much use for satellite link after the plane hits water. For the satellite link to work, the antenna would also need to remain above water since submersion adds horrible attenuation to radio signals. Additionally, cabin electronics aren't water-tight so submersion in ocean water would ruin them in fairly short order.

Re:It wasn't the engines sending data

[Anonymous Coward]

The 777's two NiCad batteries have enough juice to power the essentials for about a maximum of 5 minutes in a complete electrical failure, which is simply unheard of on the 777. If you need the ship's batteries, you are far beyond being well and truly fucked. The airplane has 7 sources of electrical power. These include two engine driven 120KVA alternators, one 90KVA APU alternator, two 20KVA engine driven backup generators, an pnuematically driven generator, and a ram air turbine. There are also a permanent magnet alternator on each engine to power the FADECs. In addition, each flight control actuator has its own battery pack.

Re:It wasn't the engines sending data

[Above]

OP has it right, but we can add more information. I've been following the discussion over at www.airliners.net where some people know more about this plane's electronics.

First some back story. The SATCOM system is sort of like your cable modem, or more accurately a cell data stick for a laptop. It's a sort of modem that knows how to connect to the satellites. Like a unprovisioned cell phone it still reaches out and says "can I have service", and then gets no answer. ACARS is an application that runs on another computer in the plane. It's sort of like a "twitter feed" for a plane. Short messages can be placed on it and routed off to other places. Boeing offers a service where the plane reports its health back to boeing using this application. Rolls Royce offers a service where the engines report back to them using this service. Pilots can even send short text messages over the service back to their HQ. The GPS system can send a message with its position. ACARS knows how to transmit over HF, VHF, and SATCOM. It also goes through a cleaning house (think twitter again) who routes the individual messages to the right party.

Mayalsia Airlines apparently bought the "limited" package of monitoring. As such ACARS was programmed to send no information to Boeing, and only limited information to Rolls Royce. Compare with the Air France crash in the Atlantic where they subscribed to the "full" suite of monitoring and 29 messages were generated. Further, Mayalsia apparently didn't pay for SATCOM airtime, instead letting it report over HF and VHF. If it was far enough out over water these methods would not be within reach of the radios.

However, the plane still had a SATCOM system on it (comes standard), and it was still like an unprovisioned cell phone saying "can I have service", apparently once per hour. Further the satellites in orbit have directional antennas that cover a particular section of the ground. It appears in this case ACARS was disabled (either intentionally, a small switch in the cockpit) or via failure (fire, or whatever).

The key detail is that while ACARS and many other functions can be turned off from the cockpit, the only circuit breaker for the SATCOM systems are NOT in the cockpit according to experts. It would require going to the electronics room on the plane which is not easy to reach in flight, and more importantly would not be possible to reach if a individual had taken over the plane.

So the stories line up. Boeing received no messages as the plane was not programmed to send them any. Rolls Royce received two during the normal part of flight, and then nothing as the system was turned off or disabled. However that SATCOM modem apparently continued, once per hour, to look for service. I guess the US authorities were able to talk to the satellite provider and get logs of it making those requests, and perhaps even narrowing it down to a specific antenna on the satellite.

On power; the experts say the plane has ~30 minutes of battery in the case of total electrical failure. In flight it also has a ram air turbine (think mini-windmill) that can generate enough power. If it did a "miracle on the hudson" style landing in water and it somehow stayed afloat (being under water even 1' makes the sat signal too week) batteries would only last ~30 minutes.

One of the most bizarre incidents ever recorded. The outcome of this is going to be very interesting.

Re:Here's What Will Happen

[Le Marteau]

The United States was founded on a conspiracy. Literally.

That the people are being conditioned to automatically consider anything labeled a "conspiracy" automatically laughable says a lot about the degeneration of the U.S.

Re:Combined with the ringing phones ?

[blackiner]

Was this actually Oceanic flight 815?

Re:Turns out, no.

[multi io]

Authorities quickly debunked this story this AM.

Denied, not debunked. Big difference.

Re:Here's What Will Happen

[Goody]

It's when a theory is implausible and the "critical thinkers" spend years obsessed with beating a dead horse they get labeled conspiracy nut tinfoil hat wearing wackos, like the 911 truthers, the we-didn't-go-to-the-moon people, or the nutbags who are still asking for Obama's birth certificate. Critical thinking is fine and welcome in this country. Obsessing about implausible made up scenarios driven by agendas or outrage isn't.

What about radar?

[Brainguy]

Something I don't understand is how the plane disappeared from radar yet kept flying. Switching off a transponder does not make a plane disappear from radar, it just means there is a blip on the radar without the data a transponder provides. The fact that no one is bringing this up leads me to believe I'm missing something big here, because as far as I know the only way that plane could have disappeared completely from radar was if it disintegrated.

Re:What about radar?

[Dolphinzilla]

Actually air traffic control radars ARE radars, the transponder merely fills in the ID data (as a beacon as you said). Aircraft without transponders show up as unidentified targets with a heading, range, and speed. Transponders work are farther ranges because there is only a one way free space loss to the aircraft, when relying only on a radar "echo" the loss is both directions

Re:What about radar?

[Rich0]

Not quite correct. The situation is quite a bit more complex than that.

ATC obtains information about aircraft in the area in a number of ways.

One is primary radar - which is in fact radar. It generally has a limited range - maybe 50 miles or so. Usually civilian equipment cannot detect altitude either, and of course it picks up noise from birds and weather and such.

The more useful source of data is secondary radar, which relies on transponders. The transponders generate a pulse when they are interrogated - the aircraft doesn't need to know its own location for this to work - the ground station works it out from the time to receive the reply. The transponder can encode a code to identify the aircraft, and it can also encode the altitude (or at least what the plane thinks its altitude is).

The more recent development is ADS-B via UAT and ES. These involve the aircraft broadcasting its position as determined by GPS. It can be sent out as part of the transponder reply, or it can be sent out without any need for secondary radar at all, potentially even being picked up by satellite.

So, radar is used to track aircraft, but with its limited range civilian radar would not detect an airliner out at sea unless it had a cooperative transponder. Even with a transponder range is only 100 miles or so. You can get much longer ranges with military radar, especially if it is airborne. However, stumbling on one of those would require luck, and a military aircraft probably wouldn't be on the lookout for rogue airliners.

Re:What about radar?

[mbeckman]

AK Marc: I'm a licensed pilot, aircraft mechanic, and avionics technician, and have worked on FAA radar systems. What you say is completely untrue. Aviation surveillance radar worldwide is RADAR with capital letters. There is no WiFi involved, no AP, nothing like you describe. The system was designed in the 1960s and, except for some incremental enhancements, has been largely unchanged since then.

It consists of a ground based antenna system that transmits sweeping RF energy beams that bounce off metal objects such as aircraft (and occasionally flocks of birds) and reflect back to the antenna. The radar electronics complex processes digitized radar data streams from multiple antennas and generates a synthesized image, which appears on controller screens. Controllers can see this basic radar "blip" if they choose, although generally it's displayed as a faint background trace to keep the screen uncluttered.

The transponder system works by sending a coded signal that rides on the radar energy beam. When the beam paints an aircraft, the on-board transponder receiver decodes this as an "interrogation".

In its most basic form, called Mode C, the aircraft answers the interrogation with a data packet containing the a four-digit code assigned by a controller to the aircraft (which the pilot typically sets manually after receiving the "squawk" code verbally from the controller), and the aircraft pressure altitude. In the more recent Mode S, this packet contains additional data, such as the GPS location, airspeed, etc. Aircraft can overhear each others' Mode S replies and use that information to build an internal model of occupied airspace; this process is the foundation of the Terminal Collision Avoidance System (TCAS).

The transponder data gets painted on the controller's integrated radar display to make it easier to track targets. This is called "narrowband" mode because a this system can filter out a lot of clutter, leaving the controller with only verified targets to track. But if the narrowband system fails, which happens on occasion, controllers are all trained to revert to an old manual system using paper markers that they stick to their screens to track aircraft.

All commercial aircraft and many general aviation aircraft use Mode S today, and thus we collect quite a lot of data about flights in progress. In the Malaysian case, the aircraft was in radar coverage, receiving interrogations and responding, when they lost contact with it. Although the actual radar data hasn't been revealed, the sense of what has been shown so far is that the raw radar return, or echo, as well as the transponder Mode C, stopped simultaneously. It's possible that the controllers were not displaying non-transponder returns on their screens, so it may turn out that there was a raw signal for some time. That's the big question that, once answered, will indicate whether there was a deliberate action to turn off the transponder or a cataclysm turned it off. People can turn off transponders, but they cannot turn off raw radar signatures.

The real puzzle

[Advocatus Diaboli]

Evidently the aircraft had enough power to run the pinging transmitter for over 4 hours after the transponder went dead (or was turned off). This implies that the aircraft also had enough power and structural integrity for at least some of its communication systems to work. But the experienced pilots did not make even one distress call or issue a single distress code. Why not? What prevented them from doing it?

No alien abduction theories?!

[panda2005]

Come on guys, it's been DAYS already! How come aliens still not in the picture???

Don't know what to believe anymore

[Thanosius]

As someone else has already mentioned, this has been denied by Malaysian officials. Just like China has now said that those satellite images which were supposed to show plane debris did in fact not show debris, but indeed, said satellite images were "released by mistake". Just like that admiral of the Vietnamese Navy saying they had lost radar contact with the plain just over the Gulf of Thailand, but apparently it was just incorrect information (another mistake).

It seems clear that no-one knows where the fuck that plane is, but due to the pressure to find something, ANYTHING to satisfy the media as well as political pressure (not to mention relatives of those missing), anything that could be seen as a clue is pushed out as something important before it's even checked or verified.

At least it can be assumed that those on the flight must be well and truly dead by now, if only because the alternative would be more horrifying...

Some overlooked facts suggest a new theory

[Anonymous Coward]

Ignoring all the speculation for a bit, let me present a few completely irrefutable facts that point to a different theory of what happened to the plane.

Fact 1: There are many active volcanoes in this region of the world.

Fact 2: There were virgins on the airplane.

Fact 3: The Great Old Ones have not arisen to destroy us all.

We should thank them for ensuring the continued existence of the human race.

Re:Combined with the ringing phones ?

[mschuyler]

The phones weren't "ringing." the ring tone the relatives heard was supplied by Central Office Equipment to give the illusion that the phones were "ringing." That's what happens when someone picks up the phone and you say, "But it hadn't started ringing yet." Yes, it had. It's just that your simulation-ring hadn't reached you yet--two different tones. Think about it. There is only a single cable pair that hooks up a typical phone. How could you possibly "hear it ring"?

The cell network mimics the POTS network. It's just part of the "aural interface" phones have used for over a hundred years.

ABC News: Comm systems shut down separately

[Beeftopia]

"Two U.S. officials tell ABC News the U.S. believes that the shutdown of two communication systems happened separately on Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. One source said this indicates the plane did not come out of the sky because of a catastrophic failure.

The data reporting system, they believe, was shut down at 1:07 a.m. The transponder -- which transmits location and altitude -- shut down at 1:21 a.m."

-- ABC News, Thursday March 13, 2014

Curiouser and curiouser.

Why is everybody so hung up on terrorist?

[hamster_nz]

My money is on something like what heppend to flght ZU 522 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H...

Monitoring module only functions when engine is on

[Anonymous Coward]

The on board engine monitoring module is only *ON* when the engine is turned on.

When the engine is off, the transmission module goes to sleeping mode, relies on it's tiny battery backup on keeping the date/time current.

Saying that the module keeps on transmitting AFTER the plane has broken up is not only inaccurate, it's downright irresponsible !

Re: Combined with the ringing phones ?

[Miamicanes]

One bit of info that *might* be of interest... cell phone towers beacon to announce their presence to phones, but individual phones actually *poll* towers every few seconds. The reply from the tower lets them know when there's an incoming call, deliver SMS & voicemail notifications, etc. In theory, at least, if the mobile phone of any passenger came within range of a cell tower it was allowed to poll, there's probably a log of it somewhere.

That said, if the jet was at cruising altitude, the likelihood of a phone on board *doing* that is almost nil, because tower antennas are generally aimed downwards... partly, to minimize interference from airborne mobile phones that could otherwise splatter noise over a 40-100 mile radius (the line of sight when your transmitter is 5+ miles up in the air).

Re:Combined with the ringing phones ?

[aphelion_rock]

The aircraft is currently parked on a remote jungle runway in Sumatra taking Grand Theft Auto to a whole new level..

Re: Combined with the ringing phones ?

[Nethead]

On original POTS circuits the ring tone was actually the 25Hz signal sent to the phone with the phone's bell coils supplying some of the ringback harmonics along with a ring generator. With a good ear you could estimate how many phone sets were ringing. The audio path was already set-up while the phone rang. If the called party was too near an AM broadcast transmitter you might even hers some of the program between rings. The off-hook condition on the called party just disconnected the ring generator at the CO and started any billing equipment.

Of course this all ended with the last of the Stroger and crossbar offices.

What we know so far ...

[kbahey]

This is what we know so far, a good summary ...