# Malaysian Air Flight 17 shot down over Ukraine



## Paulus (Jul 17, 2014)

280 passengers, 15 crew on board. Reports are that it was shot down by an insurgent Buk missile system.


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## fairviewroad (Jul 17, 2014)

Reports that it was "shot down" are HIGHLY speculative at this point and seems to be based on comments from a Ukrainian government official who may or may not have any evidence to support his claim. It's clear that the plane experienced a catastrophic crash-landing.

Anything beyond that is pure speculation as of this writing.


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## Paulus (Jul 17, 2014)

fairviewroad said:


> Reports that it was "shot down" are HIGHLY speculative at this point and seems to be based on comments from a Ukrainian government official
> 
> who may or may not have any evidence to support his claim. It's clear that the plane experienced a catastrophic crash-landing.
> 
> Anything beyond that is pure speculation as of this writing.


Catastrophic failure over a war zone with no prior anomalies? Insurgent claims of shooting down an An-26 and using the smoke of MH17 as proof just prior to reports of losing contact with MH17? Air traffic dispatchers working that area reporting on twitter that the plane was shot down? The odds are strongly in favor of it having in fact been shot down.


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## SarahZ (Jul 17, 2014)

"Odds are" means it is not fact yet; therefore, the title of the thread is inappropriate. The only truth at this point is that it crashed.


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## fairviewroad (Jul 17, 2014)

SarahZ said:


> "Odds are" means it is not fact yet; therefore, the title of the thread is inappropriate. The only truth at this point is that it crashed.


This.


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## Ryan (Jul 17, 2014)

Yeah, it's just a little premature to be making any factual statements just yet.


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## rickycourtney (Jul 17, 2014)

I think Brian Williams just put it best when he said that there are a lot of puzzle pieces out there right now and the ones we have all seem to fit together this way (the plane was shot down) but we're not quite sure if it's the right answer.


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## Bob Dylan (Jul 17, 2014)

Ditto! I'm waiting for a Reliable source to verify it like BBC or CBC! (Not American Cable Networks!)!

If it Bleeds it Leads is, sadly, the new Mantra for our News Organizations!


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## rickycourtney (Jul 17, 2014)

jimhudson said:


> Ditto! I'm waiting for a Reliable source to verify it like BBC or CBC! (Not American Cable Networks!)!
> 
> If it Bleeds it Leads is, sadly, the new Mantra for our News Organizations!


Ouch Jim. As a TV news producer... that's a bit of a burn.

I was actually watching the special report from NBC News this morning (not MSNBC). I agree that in the days to come the cable networks will probably jump off the deep end with what they perceive to be their need to pack 24 hours with information on these stories... but right now is where the media does well.

For the record even the BBC is discussing the possibility that the plane was shot down:



> "A Malaysian airliner carrying 295 people crashes in the east Ukraine conflict zone on a flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, amid allegations of a missile attack."


PS: I've heard the "if it bleeds, it leads" comment a million times... but I'm pretty sure you would never watch the news if my lead story was a waterskiing squirrel and the story about the deadly plane crash ran at 10 minutes past the hour.


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## fairviewroad (Jul 17, 2014)

Regardless of what caused this disaster, it's worth mentioning again that apparently 295 people lost their lives. There will be a lot of grief in Amsterdam, Kuala Lumpur and elsewhere today.


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## SarahZ (Jul 17, 2014)

fairviewroad said:


> Regardless of what caused this disaster, it's worth mentioning again that apparently 295 people lost their lives. There will be a lot of grief in Amsterdam, Kuala Lumpur and elsewhere today.


It's things like this that make me wish there were more things like waterskiing squirrels on the news, as Ricky mentioned.  This is so sad, regardless of what caused it.


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## caravanman (Jul 17, 2014)

What are the odds that TWO Malaysian planes in a row crash...?

Ed,


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## Paulus (Jul 17, 2014)

caravanman said:


> What are the odds that TWO Malaysian planes in a row crash...?
> 
> Ed,


Korean Air lost 8 in a decade didn't they?


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## Paulus (Jul 17, 2014)

Ukrainian Security Service has released a radio intercept of rebels talking about the plane

Translation (not from me)



> Bezler - "We just hit an airplane. The group "Minyora." It fell on Enakievo.
> 
> Geranin - "Airplanes? Where - airplanes?"
> 
> ...


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## tp49 (Jul 17, 2014)

jimhudson said:


> Ditto! I'm waiting for a Reliable source to verify it like BBC or CBC! (Not American Cable Networks!)!
> 
> If it Bleeds it Leads is, sadly, the new Mantra for our News Organizations!


BBC, Channel News Asia, The Telegraph and even Russia Today have been discussing the likelihood that the plane was shot down. Right now everyone in the region will play the blame game until some semblance of the truth finally makes its way out.


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## tp49 (Jul 17, 2014)

Vice-President Biden just publicly stated that the plane was "shot down. Shot out of the sky." I don't think even given his history of sticking his foot in his mouth that he would say that without the requisite information and clearance to do so.


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## Green Maned Lion (Jul 17, 2014)

I have a feeling the Ukranians did it to draw us into the anti-Russian side of things. I pray to god this doesn't result in a world war.


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## Bob Dylan (Jul 17, 2014)

No offense to the AU Members that are in the New Biz ( we have several ) but far too many squirrels water skiing stories are run as " news"!

I wish that this kind of entertainment and " news lite" culd be kept on the tabloid, talk and video clip shows that are so prevelant now days, but ratings and profits rule and the corporate owned media doesn't want good, they want it fast and cheap and me too since all the competition does it that way!!!

Watching kids and animals doing stunts on videos,chefs cooking up hot new dishes and so called celebrities going into rehab isn't News, its mindless pap for people who get their news from talk radio, the internet and from know nothings that are featured on Rupert Murdoch's Comedy and Fiction Networks!


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## SarahZ (Jul 17, 2014)

Green Maned Lion said:


> I have a feeling the Ukranians did it to draw us into the anti-Russian side of things. I pray to god this doesn't result in a world war.


My first thought, upon hearing there were Americans on-board, was, "Lusitania."


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## fairviewroad (Jul 17, 2014)

tp49 said:


> Vice-President Biden just publicly stated that the plane was "shot down. Shot out of the sky." I don't think even given his history of sticking his foot in his mouth that he would say that without the requisite information and clearance to do so.


Yes, it does now appear far more likely that the plane was brought down by a missile. I don't think anyone on this thread disputed that it was a strong possibility, only that the thread title seemed a bit too definitive at the time. Nevertheless, it now seems like a reasonably accurate way to describe the event.


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## Shawn Ryu (Jul 17, 2014)

Paulus said:


> caravanman said:
> 
> 
> > What are the odds that TWO Malaysian planes in a row crash...?
> ...


Something like that, and they got punished severe;y by US authorities, and now they have a FAA standard procedures and are perfectly safe to fly with.

I am not sure if this one should be blamed on Malaysian Airline itself if indeed it has been shot down. Planes fly over Ukraine all the time.


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## Ryan (Jul 17, 2014)

Shawn Ryu said:


> Planes fly over Ukraine all the time.


Actually, the FAA and ICAO have previously warned folks to not overfly the area for this reason.


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## fairviewroad (Jul 17, 2014)

Green Maned Lion said:


> I have a feeling the Ukranians did it to draw us into the anti-Russian side of things. I pray to god this doesn't result in a world war.


I too hope this does not result in a world war. But none of the previous cases of civilian airliners being shot down resulted in world wars.

In fact, the Soviets even killed a US Congressman on board KAL007 in 1983. If that didn't start a world war, well....but of course, every

situation is different.


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## caravanman (Jul 17, 2014)

Just seems amazingly bad luck for two such events, no fault implied, to happen to one airline.

As to world wars, there are major conflicts, many people dying all over the world, every day.

I wonder (not) who will be launching a ground offensive while eyes are on Ukraine and not the middle east...?

Ed.


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## Just-Thinking-51 (Jul 17, 2014)

jimhudson said:


> If it Bleeds it Leads is, sadly, the new Mantra for our News Organizations!


Nothing new about this line. Back in 1987 it was part of a TV news course that I was taking. Only new thing is the 24-7 new media. Got to fill the air time with something.


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## BrianPR3 (Jul 17, 2014)

i would say if it is russian missles or aircraft, ban their airlines from flying to US airports (was done before)


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## Texan Eagle (Jul 17, 2014)

BrianPR3 said:


> i would say if it is russian missles or aircraft, ban their airlines from flying to US airports (was done before)


Yeah, that will totally show them!

The airplane shot down did not belong to a Russian airline

The aircraft was had not originated nor was destined to a US airport

Russian airlines fly a grand total of probably less than 10 flights a day to the US (Aeroflot 2 to JFK, 1 to LAX, TransAero 1 to JFK, 1 to LAX and 1 or 2 per week flights to MIA and WAS). Stopping those is not going to achieve anything except inconveniencing a few hundred travelers who have no stakes in the conflict.


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## XHRTSP (Jul 17, 2014)

Green Maned Lion said:


> I have a feeling the Ukranians did it to draw us into the anti-Russian side of things. I pray to god this doesn't result in a world war.


The separatist were bragging about the shootdown on social media before they realized what they did.


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## Swadian Hardcore (Jul 17, 2014)

Two Malaysia Airlines 777 crashed in quick succession, I'm thinking that airline will have financial trouble soon, and might lose ridership due to public fear in general.


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## Paulus (Jul 17, 2014)

Here's the radio intercept again but with a better translation



Swadian Hardcore said:


> Two Malaysia Airlines 777 crashed in quick succession, I'm thinking that airline will have financial trouble soon, and might lose ridership due to public fear in general.


Wasn't it already in financial trouble after MH370?


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## Swadian Hardcore (Jul 17, 2014)

Paulus said:


> Here's the radio intercept again but with a better translation
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I don't know, I'm not really following MH right now, but if they were already in financial trouble, now we're looking at triple financial trouble.


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## Anderson (Jul 18, 2014)

Malaysian Airlines is mostly state-owned. The three biggest shareholders are a subsidiary of Malaysia's sovereign wealth fund (52%), the fund itself (17.33%), and the Employees Provident Fund (10.72%). The third is a Finance Ministry-controlled pension system. The three control about 80% between them; though a minority is held by non-government entities, the airline is for all intents and purposes state-owned...which means that I sense a bailout coming.


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## cirdan (Jul 18, 2014)

SarahZ said:


> Green Maned Lion said:
> 
> 
> > I have a feeling the Ukranians did it to draw us into the anti-Russian side of things. I pray to god this doesn't result in a world war.
> ...


In contrast to back then, the world has become much more internationalized. Pick up 100 random people off the street in Amsterdam or Kuala Lumpur and the odds are you'll have at least 10 nationalities.


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## cirdan (Jul 18, 2014)

Shawn Ryu said:


> Paulus said:
> 
> 
> > caravanman said:
> ...


Sure, but it's still a war zone. There are also planes that fly over Syria and Afghanistan every day. Some manager at Malaysian took a gamble and said, we'll save some fuel and go the short route and if that increases the risk to our passengers, so be it.

Now they have to face the consequences.


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## tp49 (Jul 18, 2014)

cirdan said:


> Shawn Ryu said:
> 
> 
> > Paulus said:
> ...


Hogwash. It's not just an arbitrary decision made by some manager at Malaysian. The aircraft was flying on a normal air route flown by numerous other commercial aircraft every day between Europe and South Asia. ICAO listed the rote as safe to fly. There was a Singapore Airlines flight and an Air India flight within 25 kilometers of the Malaysian flight at the time of the incident and it could have been either of those or even in addition to MA017. Lufthansa, British Airways, KLM, the aforementioned Singapore and a multitude of other carriers also were using that airspace and now have announced they will not anymore. The no-fly restriction at that time was over the Crimea peninsula and the NOTAM for the area of the incident was that aircraft shouldn't fly below either 28,000 or 30,000 feet and this flight was above that though now Eurocontrol in their infinite wisdom closed the airspace over eastern Ukraine. IMHO this one is not the fault of the Malaysian pilots.


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## caravanman (Jul 18, 2014)

Boys with toys, eh? Give a semi trained bunch of seperatists weapons and they become terrorists who start shooting civilians... Russian weapons in Ukraine, US weapons in Syria and Iraq, European weapons in Africa...

History is written by the victors, so often the real truths behind events never emerge..

ed


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## Braniff747SP (Jul 19, 2014)

People are in a fritz because MH17 was operating over a war zone.

Half the planet _is _a war zone. Airplanes have been flying over Afghanistan and Iraq for the last decade without issue. Thousands of airplanes (including Japanese and Korean registered aircraft) fly over North Korea every year.

The shooting down of a commercial airliner is an extremely rare event--when it happens, it rarely happens in so-called war zones. Before Thursday, no body knew--or would have thought--that the rebels (or, for that matter, the Ukrainians) had the ability--let alone the want--to shoot down a foreign airliner at cruise altitude.

MH, SQ, and the other airlines operating in that airspace were in compliance with both the law and any standard of common sense. Hindsight is 20/20, and we can't fault an airline for flying their airplane in what was assumed to be a safe and prudent manner. While some automatically draw other impressions because of the name 'Malaysia', MH is not some dingbat operation.


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## jis (Jul 20, 2014)

For those grossly uninformed who think it was just Malaysian flying that route .... That route above 32,000' was an Eurocontrol and FAA approved route that the likes of United and Delta regularly flew to South Asia specially when flying the southerly eastward route. Indeed I flew that route (actually slightly to the south as I recall since we probably got a direct routing) on United to Delhi last December. What changed is that somehow surface to air missiles capable of hitting targets way above 32,000' landed up in the hands of people who were not supposed to have them.

Now of course the exercise of posterior covering begins. First step is to ask for irrefutable proof while as much evidence as possible is destroyed as quickly as possible. We have seen this sequence unfold many times in the past. Both of the five sides in any conflict unfortunately indulge in such.

Sent from my iPhone using Amtrak Forum


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## Swadian Hardcore (Jul 20, 2014)

The thing is, who in Ukraine would want to shoot down a Malaysian plane with a lot of Dutch people? Whoever shot it down probably made a big mistake.


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## Texan Eagle (Jul 20, 2014)

Swadian Hardcore said:


> The thing is, who in Ukraine would want to shoot down a Malaysian plane with a lot of Dutch people? Whoever shot it down probably made a big mistake.


The big mistake was arming untrained rebels/terrorists/freedom-fighters (whatever you want to call them) with deadly weapons that requires a lot of maturity and restraint to use. I am pretty sure their intention was not to specifically down a Malaysian plane with Dutch people, rather "oh look, I spot a plane... could be Ukraine's? Does anyone here know to ID it? No? Well, never mind... we have this fancy missiles that can hit it... fire!"

...and only when the debris came down on the ground, realized "Oh damn, this is not what we wanted"


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## Devil's Advocate (Jul 20, 2014)

jis said:


> For those grossly uninformed who think it was just Malaysian flying that route...


It's true that MH wasn't breaking any laws or disobeying any regulations. That being said there was nothing preventing MH from playing it safe by completely avoiding conflict zones anyway as per their own flight plans and routing directives. If I were working in operations at a company under as much pressure as MH I'd probably play it safer than most of my competitors. No need to risk yet another huge embarrassment so soon after the last one.


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## jis (Jul 20, 2014)

The beauty of 20/20 hindsight based armchair quarterbacking 

Sent from my iPhone using Amtrak Forum


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## Swadian Hardcore (Jul 20, 2014)

Murphy's Law?


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## Devil's Advocate (Jul 21, 2014)

jis said:


> The beauty of 20/20 hindsight based armchair quarterbacking. Sent from my iPhone using Amtrak Forum


The Ukraine government had lost multiple aircraft in the preceding days. I was not following the story closely but if I had I would not think 20/20 hindsight was required to see that as a potential problem for commercial flights as well. I'm also curious which tactical measurement would indicate that FL320 is dangerous while FL330 is safe? It would seem if you could reach one you could probably reach the other. It's one thing to fly into or out of Ukraine itself as a calculated risk of which passengers are already aware. Passengers flying between Europe and Australia are unlikely to be aware they're flying over an active war zone. If we don't want to ban flights over war zones then how about forcing airlines to notify passengers that their flight is scheduled to be routed over an area where other aircraft have been downed before they board? If a passenger decides to fly anyway then so be it, but if they choose to play it safe with their own life they receive a free transfer to another route or a full refund. That way everyone gets to take on the level of risk they find acceptable for their needs.


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## jis (Jul 21, 2014)

That is a good idea. It's execution though may face interesting issues.

An article on the history of aircraft shot down intentionally or unintentionally other than in combat (mostly).

http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/page/world/how-high-can-a-missile-reach/1195/


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## Swadian Hardcore (Jul 21, 2014)

That is a good idea.


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## Swadian Hardcore (Jul 21, 2014)

Crash victims' bodies are reportedly being put on this refrigerated train: http://media.themalaysianinsider.com/assets/uploads/articles/mh17-bodies-refrigerator-train-2-reuters-200714.JPG.


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