Plane goes missing over Atlantic Ocean

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Luigi-San

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RIO DE JANEIRO - An Air France jet with 228 people on a flight to Paris vanished over the Atlantic Ocean after flying into towering thunderstorms and sending an automated message that the electrical system had failed. A vast search began Monday, but all aboard were feared killed.

Military aircraft scrambled out to the center of the Atlantic, far from the coasts of Brazil and West Africa, and France sought U.S. satellite help to find the wreckage. The first military ship wasn't expected to reach the area where the plane disappeared until Wednesday.

If there are no survivors, it would be the world's worst aviation disaster since 2001.

The official Agencia Brasil news agency on Monday quoted Brazilian Air Force spokesman Col. Jorge Amaral as saying that a commercial airplane pilot saw what appeared to be fire on the ocean near the route taken by the Air France plane.

"There is information that the pilot of a TAM aircraft saw several orange points on the ocean while flying over the region ... where the Air France plane disappeared," Amaral said, referring to the Brazilian airline TAM. "After arriving in Brazil, the pilot found out about the disappearance (of the Air France plane) and said that he thought those points on the ocean were fire."

French President Nicolas Sarkozy said the cause remains unclear and that "no hypothesis" is being excluded. Some experts dismissed speculation that lightning might have brought the plane down. But violent thunderheads reaching more than 50,000 feet high can pound planes with hail and high winds, causing structural damage if pilots can't maneuver around them.

Sarkozy said he told family members of passengers on Air France Flight 447 that prospects of finding survivors are "very small."
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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31040692/?GT1=43001
 
Yup, I heard about this yesterday. Surprised this wasn't posted sooner, actually.

Now my friend is having panic attacks because she's going to Paris in two weeks. :/

But yeah, this really is tragic, though.
 
This does not help with my fear of flying...

Unless by some miracle they're still alive out there somewhere, may they rest in peace.
 
Yea extremely sad story. Hard to believe, with all the technology we have today, that a plane could just 'disappear.' In any case my thoughts and prayers are with everyone involved, as well as their families.
 
Too far south for the Bermuda Triangle. More like the Senegal Square (it's a big square).

Really tragic stuff, though. And not looking too promising. Wreckage being found and all. I'll be VERY interested in what the investigation discovers.
 
It's terribly sad :-( I think they said it was the worst aviation disaster in 10 years?
 
Oh, of course. No, I was just quoting the BBC. Goodness knows why they don't think 9/11 counts. Maybe they meant the worst accident in 10 years?
 
Perhaps they're not counting 9\11 because it was man-made.
 
Yeah, I believe they are not counting 9/11. I think they are saying this is the worst aviation accident since November 2001 when an airliner crashed in Queens, killing 265 people.

Now I'm beginning to feel nervous. I'm supposed to be flying from Washington to Athens this summer. I really hope I don't encounter storms like this flight did.
 
PokemonHero said:
Yeah, I believe they are not counting 9/11. I think they are saying this is the worst aviation accident since November 2001 when an airliner crashed in Queens, killing 265 people.
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That's the one from 2001 that they meant, I remember that one on the news on that November day. They're not going count 9-11 cause it's man made tragedy.

And I hope I will get over my fear after all of these plane crashes, I had a fear of planes since I was 7 and I am still scared of them.
 
I heard on the news today that they found pieces of the aircraft.
 
Well, it's official. It went down. Sad. Really sad. Reminds me of the end of the Quillan Games in which the same kind of thing happens. I remember feeling sorry for the characters of the book. I never thought something like it would actually happen. All those families are in our prayers.
 
Strange event, just saddening none-the-less; from the looks of it, the plane must have went down quickly. Hopefully they'll be able to recover the black boxes so they can possibly see what went wrong....
 
In a completely non-idiotic and perfectly sensitive move, the French navy dispatched ships today to search the wreckage of the plane.

In a completely idiotic and insensitive move, considering there is heavy suspicion the plane was badly damaged due to lightning, the French Navy picked the ship "La Foudre" ("The Thunderbolt") to participate in the operations.
 
Evil Figment said:
In a completely non-idiotic and perfectly sensitive move, the French navy dispatched ships today to search the wreckage of the plane.

In a completely idiotic and insensitive move, considering there is heavy suspicion the plane was badly damaged due to lightning, the French Navy picked the ship "La Foudre" ("The Thunderbolt") to participate in the operations.
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Oh those French...
 
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