WWTBAM Bored

The Washington Post has a good graphic on how deep in the ocean (they think) the "black boxes" are from the Malaysian Air flight that disappeared about a month ago.

http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/page/w ... oblem/931/

This definitely gives a good scale of things. And it makes one wonder how they'll ever get them back up again (and how the pressures of the deep might have affected them).

Amazingly, they have recovered some footage of the landing from the black box:

I know I sound like a broken record.

$199 for OnStar for a full year. $320,000,000 with 200 people flying over oceans, at night.

Seems like a good idea to me.

Does OnStar work from two miles beneath the ocean, 1,000 miles from the nearest land?

MarleysGh0st wrote:Does OnStar work from two miles beneath the ocean, 1,000 miles from the nearest land?

I'll bet the Professor could pick up the distress signal...

lb13

I find it remarkable that a whale can get down to nearly 10,000 feet!

If they can locate it there may still be some difficulty getting to the black box if it is still tangled in the debris of the aircraft which is likely being compacted to some degree by the pressure at this depth. Not to mention potentially being buried in the muddy ooze at the bottom.

tanstaafl2 wrote:If they can locate it there may still be some difficulty getting to the black box if it is still tangled in the debris of the aircraft which is likely being compacted to some degree by the pressure at this depth.

One of the things I've found fascinating with deep sea oceanography (found by things like Alvin or, to go waaay back, the Aluminaut) was how some things crush and some things don't in the briny deep. Basically, if it's a sealed vessel (like an unopened beer can or an intact submarine), it'll crush. If it's not, like a boat, it'll pretty much stay intact until it hits bottom. I would expect this jet would have had a hull breach upon impact (if not before), so it might be as intact as it was when it hit the surface.

SpacemanSpiff wrote:

tanstaafl2 wrote:If they can locate it there may still be some difficulty getting to the black box if it is still tangled in the debris of the aircraft which is likely being compacted to some degree by the pressure at this depth.

One of the things I've found fascinating with deep sea oceanography (found by things like Alvin or, to go waaay back, the Aluminaut) was how some things crush and some things don't in the briny deep. Basically, if it's a sealed vessel (like an unopened beer can or an intact submarine), it'll crush. If it's not, like a boat, it'll pretty much stay intact until it hits bottom. I would expect this jet would have had a hull breach upon impact (if not before), so it might be as intact as it was when it hit the surface.

That's because a breach allows pressure to equalize.

I'd expect the black box to be designed to remain sealed, but the existence of the pings implies that it's retained some sort of physical integrity. --Bob

I wonder what would happen to a squirrel that far under the sea...

lb13

littlebeast13 wrote:I wonder what would happen to a squirrel that far under the sea...

lb13

It would be compressed smaller than an acorn.

And found it!

Bob Juch wrote:

littlebeast13 wrote:I wonder what would happen to a squirrel that far under the sea...

lb13

It would be compressed smaller than an acorn.

And found it!

If that is a depiction of the recovery effort then the color of the black box is wrong!

littlebeast13 wrote:I wonder what would happen to a squirrel that far under the sea...

lb13

Much like this, only wetter.