Most Expensive Aviation Search: $53 Million To Find Flight MH370

mdsolar (1045926) writes "The search and investigation into missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 is already the most expensive in aviation history, figures released to Fairfax Media suggest. The snippets of costings provide only a small snapshot but the $US50 million ($54 million) spent on the two-year probe into Air France Flight 447 — the previous record — appears to have been easily surpassed after just four weeks.... The biggest expense in the search has involved ships, satellites, planes and submarines deployed first in the South China Sea and the Malacca Straits, and then in the remote reaches of the southern Indian Ocean."

Comments

Re:But Terrizm!

[seyyah]

the only explanation that makes sense to me is okham's racer

Congratulations you are the first person ever to have misspelt Occam's Razor Okham's racer.

Re:Fire is most complex, not simplest, answer

[Billly Gates]

Assuming the first thing the pilots did wasn't turn off the communications system to try and prevent the fire from spreading.

The VERY FIRST thing you would do is alert the ground you had a problem. Not turn off all hope of getting help. There is no fire that is STOPPED by turning off a radio!

And even if it were the case the pilots were the stupidest people on earth AND acting in direct violation of aviation emergency procedures in order to take an action that would not help anyone, it STILL doesn't explain flying calming in a straight line for seven hours after with a raging fire eating at the planes controls and superstructure and fuel tanks. Sorry man, CNN's Black Hole is more likely than your Faerie Fire.

No cutting off power and your locator is the first step in a fire.

These are standard operating procedures as you need to shut it all off to find the short. Besides what is ground control going to do? You need to do a quick change course to the nearest airport while you find and shut down the damn thing before everyone dies!

Another is to try to suffocate the fire if it is a tire fire by flying at 45,000 feet. Check. Next if the crew gets oxygen afixiation the next step is to cruise at 12,000 feet if the fire is still going. Check. All good so far. ... now here is the mystery. Let's say it was a fire. The captain and crew are incapacitated from carbon monoxide. The fire would take down the whole aircraft. It would burn through the wires for the computer auto pilot and crash the plane well before 7 hours. Or the structure would fail as it would burn through the luggage and explode the fuel compartment.

Also the path is changed again in the final arc. Why? Wouldn't it logically be on the same new path and be half way between Australia and Africa if the crew did die? That is west of perth alright but WAAY farther west. What in the mathematically geometry that says it is in the search area? Distance wise why wouldn't it be on the other side of the arc southwest instead of southeast?

Also if the plane is flying lower you have more friction if it still was at 12,000 feet. So wouldn't it logically be farther north as it would run out of fuel quicker too?

most expensive?

[the_Bionic_lemming]

What would the Amelia Earhart' search cost in today's dollars when you factor in all of the historic effort?

20 years from now, if a jet goes missing, it'll be the most expensive search in history.

The same as if another massive Hurricane hits in a populated area 20 years from now It will be the most expensive in history.

Heck, if inflation keeps up, 70 years from now if a factory burns down, the cost will dwarf the famous chicago fire simply because the reporters will be intellectually dishonest and just make sure that the cost will lack any simple comparison of monetary value and effort over a period of time.