Tuesday, April 26, 2011
When gadgets betray us?
A New Zealand chain of no-frills supermarkets had its computer turn on the lights and unlock the doors of one of its stores at the normal opening time of 8:00am on Good Friday, a holiday on which there were no employees present. Apparently someone called the police at 9:20am reporting that truckloads of groceries were being removed but several shoppers simply went to the self-scan checkout lane and proceeded in a normal fashion until one shopper happened to scan alcohol and the scanner automatically stopped functioning while it awaited managerial confirmation of the purchaser's age. It appears that some shoppers who entered the store simply left when they realized something was amiss. Apparently there were those who took advantage of the situation though and prompted the calls to the police. Police in New Zealand are of course not armed but had no trouble dealing with the situation and the store's manager intends to take no action during a period of time in which he trusts the various shoppers will voluntarily do the right thing by coming in and paying for their groceries now that the store is open and properly staffed.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Luke Mitchell
Yeah folks, more bad news from the courts for Luke Mitchell. His appeal to have the Cadder decision regarding a suspects right to counsel during police questioning was denied.
You all remember Luke Mitchell don't you. Arrested for the murder of his 14 year old girlfriend despite his dna not being at the crime scene and there being no forensic evidence linking him to the scene at all. He was observed shortly after the murder sitting on a fence in a calm manner and bearing no scratches, blood or disarranged clothing.
Yet, three males whose DNA is either on, in or inconveniently close to the corpse were never arrested or even questioned as suspects despite their attempts to alter their appearance, the scratches they bore following the murder and the ever-changing stories they related.
Luke Mitchell was promptly booted out of school, termed a Satanist for some scribbling on his schoolbook that was a quotation from the best selling video game at the time, depicted as a devotee of the Black Dahlia murder despite the fact that he had never heard of it.
Life with minimum confinement of twenty years. And as they say in UK prisons, the guards are constantly seeing to it that he is "shaking it rough" which means doing what in the USA would be referred to as very hard time.
While the UK tabloids carry the usual mouthings about the over one hundred thousand pounds the appeals have cost there does not seem to be any comparison of that amount to a forensic tarp which might have covered the body on rainy night and thus preserved forensic evidence.
You all remember Luke Mitchell don't you. Arrested for the murder of his 14 year old girlfriend despite his dna not being at the crime scene and there being no forensic evidence linking him to the scene at all. He was observed shortly after the murder sitting on a fence in a calm manner and bearing no scratches, blood or disarranged clothing.
Yet, three males whose DNA is either on, in or inconveniently close to the corpse were never arrested or even questioned as suspects despite their attempts to alter their appearance, the scratches they bore following the murder and the ever-changing stories they related.
Luke Mitchell was promptly booted out of school, termed a Satanist for some scribbling on his schoolbook that was a quotation from the best selling video game at the time, depicted as a devotee of the Black Dahlia murder despite the fact that he had never heard of it.
Life with minimum confinement of twenty years. And as they say in UK prisons, the guards are constantly seeing to it that he is "shaking it rough" which means doing what in the USA would be referred to as very hard time.
While the UK tabloids carry the usual mouthings about the over one hundred thousand pounds the appeals have cost there does not seem to be any comparison of that amount to a forensic tarp which might have covered the body on rainy night and thus preserved forensic evidence.
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Owen Rooney. Canada. Grand Forks, BC
I will be posting shortly on the situation involving the Rooney Family and the events of August 2010 following the Shambala Music Festival and the disappearance of Owen Rooney from Grand Forks, British Columbia, Canada after having received a vicious beating in nearby Christina Lake, BC.
Addendum:
I've posted before about the ever-present tension between the authorities conducting a search and the family members of those who are missing. This is common and understandable. John Ramsey wanted the roads and airports closed. One Texas family wanted to venture into rugged territory and do it so prematurely that any scent clues would be destroyed before searchers and search dogs arrived. In the United States, it is usually the county sheriff who is charged with balancing the safety of the searchers with the likelihood of the mission's success.
I've posted about the natural desire of family members to seek an alternative that allows them an emotionally acceptable situation. In my analysis of the Fifth Estate segment on Owen Rooney I contrasted the Fifth Estate's award winning segment on Eric Wilson from decades earlier. The former cop who was extremely blunt with the Wilson family was indeed on the right track. He was not tactful but neither was he prone to give false assurances or instill a false hope.
In the Fifth Estate segment Sharon Rooney is quoted as saying "when we've done all that we can do". It would seem that the family is likely to soon acknowledge that they have reached that point. The Horsemen have not been totally inactive but their focus has been relatively local. We wish them good luck, but they will earn no rousing cheers on this case. The cheers will go to the close-knit loving family and the friends of Owen Rooney.
Addendum:
I've posted before about the ever-present tension between the authorities conducting a search and the family members of those who are missing. This is common and understandable. John Ramsey wanted the roads and airports closed. One Texas family wanted to venture into rugged territory and do it so prematurely that any scent clues would be destroyed before searchers and search dogs arrived. In the United States, it is usually the county sheriff who is charged with balancing the safety of the searchers with the likelihood of the mission's success.
I've posted about the natural desire of family members to seek an alternative that allows them an emotionally acceptable situation. In my analysis of the Fifth Estate segment on Owen Rooney I contrasted the Fifth Estate's award winning segment on Eric Wilson from decades earlier. The former cop who was extremely blunt with the Wilson family was indeed on the right track. He was not tactful but neither was he prone to give false assurances or instill a false hope.
In the Fifth Estate segment Sharon Rooney is quoted as saying "when we've done all that we can do". It would seem that the family is likely to soon acknowledge that they have reached that point. The Horsemen have not been totally inactive but their focus has been relatively local. We wish them good luck, but they will earn no rousing cheers on this case. The cheers will go to the close-knit loving family and the friends of Owen Rooney.
Nicole Ryan: Bad Cases Make Good Laws?
I will prepare a more detailed post shortly but I just want to mention that I will indeed be posting a comment on the Nicole Ryan appeal in Canada.
The law often allows the use of deadly force when it is necessary and escape from the home is impossible. Usually any escape route must be taken, not merely a desired or convenient one. Usually the law only looks at the possibility of a physical escape from immediate danger and does not concern itself with the ultimate success of such an escape. This means that a Battered Wife defense may be claimed only if physical escape was not possible. The fact that such escape would be futile due to the persistent malfeasance of the local police and welfare personnel is not usually an acceptable defense to the use of deadly force in the home.
A good many of the facts are in dispute and as is often the case the truth probably lies somewhere in between the assertions of the parties involved. The trial judge expanded the concept of Battered Wife defense to apply to a situation wherein a wife could make the decision based on her knowledge that an effective escape was not available to her even if she was aware that a temporary but futile escape was available to her.
The law often allows the use of deadly force when it is necessary and escape from the home is impossible. Usually any escape route must be taken, not merely a desired or convenient one. Usually the law only looks at the possibility of a physical escape from immediate danger and does not concern itself with the ultimate success of such an escape. This means that a Battered Wife defense may be claimed only if physical escape was not possible. The fact that such escape would be futile due to the persistent malfeasance of the local police and welfare personnel is not usually an acceptable defense to the use of deadly force in the home.
A good many of the facts are in dispute and as is often the case the truth probably lies somewhere in between the assertions of the parties involved. The trial judge expanded the concept of Battered Wife defense to apply to a situation wherein a wife could make the decision based on her knowledge that an effective escape was not available to her even if she was aware that a temporary but futile escape was available to her.
Saturday, April 16, 2011
AF447 Search: Phase 5.
The FDR was found but only the chasis was located the Data Memory Module was not attached and is thought to have separated at impact. There are some other crashes wherein this separation has taken place. 04/27/11.
..................................................
The final phase of the search for the "black boxes" will be getting underway. The Alucia considered its mission complete and departed the area on April 9th. Any delay in getting the successor search vessel on scene was due to the high level of breaks in submarine cables after recent seismic activity.
The debris field is very close to the Last Known Position despite all the earlier reliance on mathematical modeling of winds and currents.
The tail section has been located. It is thought that this presently contains the FDR and CVR that would normally be found there. Recovery of the black boxes is highly probable, recovery of information from them is less certain but there is a generally high expectation that data will be recovered. Its not yet known just why the ultrasonic pingers were not detected during earlier searches.
So it becomes the usual: wait and see.
Addendum: I've been informed that the initial attempt will be tomorrow April 22nd. BEA representative is aboard even a psychologist to deal with ships crew who have difficulties dealing with the images.
..................................................
The final phase of the search for the "black boxes" will be getting underway. The Alucia considered its mission complete and departed the area on April 9th. Any delay in getting the successor search vessel on scene was due to the high level of breaks in submarine cables after recent seismic activity.
The debris field is very close to the Last Known Position despite all the earlier reliance on mathematical modeling of winds and currents.
The tail section has been located. It is thought that this presently contains the FDR and CVR that would normally be found there. Recovery of the black boxes is highly probable, recovery of information from them is less certain but there is a generally high expectation that data will be recovered. Its not yet known just why the ultrasonic pingers were not detected during earlier searches.
So it becomes the usual: wait and see.
Addendum: I've been informed that the initial attempt will be tomorrow April 22nd. BEA representative is aboard even a psychologist to deal with ships crew who have difficulties dealing with the images.
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Packer guilty: 1 Felony, 2 Misdemeanors.
Former security guard and sole suspect in the Brock Husted murder case in Ventura County was tried in a closed courtroom due to the chief witness suffering from extreme agoraphobia. The jury convicted him of one felony and two misdemeanors. The felony conviction will have an effect on his sentencing after his trial on three murder counts for the murder of Mr. and Mrs. Husted and the viable fetus.
It is thought that the crime was a spur of the moment robbery after he drank beer down on the beach but was trapped by the incoming tide and was escaping via the private staircase through the gated community of expensive houses. Packer's DNA was found on a motorcycle helmet's faceplate left at the scene but there was no match in the database at the time.
It seems all his crimes have been impulsive behavior and were often accompanied by alcohol consumption. He didn't learn his lesson on the more minor offenses. Perhaps he has learned now but its too late for the Husteds.
It is thought that the crime was a spur of the moment robbery after he drank beer down on the beach but was trapped by the incoming tide and was escaping via the private staircase through the gated community of expensive houses. Packer's DNA was found on a motorcycle helmet's faceplate left at the scene but there was no match in the database at the time.
It seems all his crimes have been impulsive behavior and were often accompanied by alcohol consumption. He didn't learn his lesson on the more minor offenses. Perhaps he has learned now but its too late for the Husteds.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
AF447 and the One Legged Stool
I have long been a believer in the one-legged stool theory of aviation safety. Now, I know have very few readers but since some are not in the USA let me set forth with some particularity what a one-legged stool is. Most stools have three legs and are therefore quite stable when someone sits on them. A stool with one leg allows a person to sit on it and rest just as much but does require that he remain alert. Drifting off to sleep on a three legged stool can be easy. Drifting off to sleep while on a one legged stool is just as simple but has obvious consequences: you fall and that wakes you up.
One consequence of the ultra reliability of any electrical system is that monitoring it becomes so very boring. The aircraft systems are reliable. If something fails, there is a primary backup, if that fails there is a secondary backup, etc. It is so very boring. The Fly By Wire takes this even one step further and declares that the computers are so reliable that they should even be able to override pilot input since pilots are less reliable. Only in Alternate Law Mode does the computer surrender control of the airplane to the pilot and even that is done piecemeal with only certain systems surrendered to pilot control during the various Alternate Law modes.
But what about the Pilot's mode? Pilots have various modes too. Alert, drowsy, asleep, "in the loop", "out of the loop", etc. Qantas used to force pilots to work out a position report using pen and paper rather than simply pressing a button. This would keep the pilots mentally in the loop should trouble occur. We all know that on long flights there are a variety of breaks some of which are mandatory and some of which are optional.
Physical presence on the flight deck is one thing. Mental presence is another. A pilot who is sleeping in the cockpit or merely dozing there requires some time to get back into the loop.
Some have alleged that failure to deviate around weather indicates a dozing flight crew. All we can really say is that we have no indication that the pilots were in their seats and alert. We have some indications that fatigue may have overcome a sole occupant of the cockpit. While we can think that a pilot would not nap as the plane was penetrating the convergence zone it is possible and he might have asked to be roused and the pilot who was to have him awakened fell asleep.
Dealing with suddenly being dumped into Alternate Law Mode is difficult when the pilot is awake and fully aware of his situation. If a stall developed we all wonder why but mostly we wonder why was there no reaction to it. After all, by the third lesson student pilots are practicing stalls and having it drummed into them to lower the nose instantly and add power instantly. Nothing about that changes as one progresses from student pilot in a Cessna 172 to the left-seat of a multi-engined airliner. What changes is the excitement. A student pilot on his third lesson is "in the loop". He has full situational awareness. The professional pilot in an airliner has thousands of hours of sitting there punching buttons into a computer that does the flying. Its boring. We need to bring back that one-legged stool. Keep the pilots from getting complacent.
We all wonder how the airframe could become involved in a deep stall but the question that also must be addressed is how did it all begin. If it takes too long to wake up and gain situational awareness, a brief nap can be fatal. Airline pilots really do not practice stalls. They practice approaches to stalls. Once the airspeed deteriorated and a stall started to develop action can be taken. Once a stall is fully developed and the plane is in a deep stall wherein control surfaces are functionally ineffective there is far less that can be done and the pilot is in unknown territory. It is possible the pilot woke up to a nightmare. Often an instructor will have a student practice suddenly being required to select an emergency landing zone and make the approach to a landing in some pasture rather than on an airport runway. The practice usually ends just above the farmer's field but a good instructor will sometimes actually have a student make such a landing. A recently awakened pilot might not have been able to cope with a deep stall because he had only been given simulator time for an approach to a stall. There is no Emergency Checklist for a deep stall. You either know what to do or you don't. It either works or it doesn't. There is no time to do aught but act. If there was a double flame-out (doubtful) differential thrust could not be used.
One consequence of the ultra reliability of any electrical system is that monitoring it becomes so very boring. The aircraft systems are reliable. If something fails, there is a primary backup, if that fails there is a secondary backup, etc. It is so very boring. The Fly By Wire takes this even one step further and declares that the computers are so reliable that they should even be able to override pilot input since pilots are less reliable. Only in Alternate Law Mode does the computer surrender control of the airplane to the pilot and even that is done piecemeal with only certain systems surrendered to pilot control during the various Alternate Law modes.
But what about the Pilot's mode? Pilots have various modes too. Alert, drowsy, asleep, "in the loop", "out of the loop", etc. Qantas used to force pilots to work out a position report using pen and paper rather than simply pressing a button. This would keep the pilots mentally in the loop should trouble occur. We all know that on long flights there are a variety of breaks some of which are mandatory and some of which are optional.
Physical presence on the flight deck is one thing. Mental presence is another. A pilot who is sleeping in the cockpit or merely dozing there requires some time to get back into the loop.
Some have alleged that failure to deviate around weather indicates a dozing flight crew. All we can really say is that we have no indication that the pilots were in their seats and alert. We have some indications that fatigue may have overcome a sole occupant of the cockpit. While we can think that a pilot would not nap as the plane was penetrating the convergence zone it is possible and he might have asked to be roused and the pilot who was to have him awakened fell asleep.
Dealing with suddenly being dumped into Alternate Law Mode is difficult when the pilot is awake and fully aware of his situation. If a stall developed we all wonder why but mostly we wonder why was there no reaction to it. After all, by the third lesson student pilots are practicing stalls and having it drummed into them to lower the nose instantly and add power instantly. Nothing about that changes as one progresses from student pilot in a Cessna 172 to the left-seat of a multi-engined airliner. What changes is the excitement. A student pilot on his third lesson is "in the loop". He has full situational awareness. The professional pilot in an airliner has thousands of hours of sitting there punching buttons into a computer that does the flying. Its boring. We need to bring back that one-legged stool. Keep the pilots from getting complacent.
We all wonder how the airframe could become involved in a deep stall but the question that also must be addressed is how did it all begin. If it takes too long to wake up and gain situational awareness, a brief nap can be fatal. Airline pilots really do not practice stalls. They practice approaches to stalls. Once the airspeed deteriorated and a stall started to develop action can be taken. Once a stall is fully developed and the plane is in a deep stall wherein control surfaces are functionally ineffective there is far less that can be done and the pilot is in unknown territory. It is possible the pilot woke up to a nightmare. Often an instructor will have a student practice suddenly being required to select an emergency landing zone and make the approach to a landing in some pasture rather than on an airport runway. The practice usually ends just above the farmer's field but a good instructor will sometimes actually have a student make such a landing. A recently awakened pilot might not have been able to cope with a deep stall because he had only been given simulator time for an approach to a stall. There is no Emergency Checklist for a deep stall. You either know what to do or you don't. It either works or it doesn't. There is no time to do aught but act. If there was a double flame-out (doubtful) differential thrust could not be used.
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Undercarriage lowered on AF447?
Even though Phase 4 is still underway and the FDR and CVR have not been located, it seems the suspense is growing. A very small debris field, high vertical descent component suspected. Did the crew fixate on a problem and not realize they were in a gentle descent? Or did they attempt to increase drag by lowering the undercarriage? Why would they attempt such a thing? I just can't wait for the Flight Data Recorder to be recovered and analyzed, though I don't know how complete the information would be. Its possible that the data was changing so rapidly the recording of averages will be deceptive.
It just doesn't seem reasonable that the pilots would descend all the way from Level 35 to sea level without realizing they were descending, no matter how fixated on some other item they might have been. Also during any such gentle descent, the lateral travel from the LKP would be greater no matter what the direction of that travel was, even if they did a 180 whether it be intentionally or by happenstance. Being dumped into Alternate Law mode suddenly and losing so many instruments without warning may have overloaded the crews ability to cope with sensory input, but the plane would travel in some direction even if they lost engines.
I had thought a deep stall but this appears to be so very unlikely since it is not known how to put that plane into a deep stall and yet have it strike the water in a mainly downward direction consistent with a flat spin. So perhaps the answer is simply that there was no flat spin. Yet extending the undercarriage would indicate pilot attention and desperation. It would also indicate an over speed condition, not an under speed condition, though it is possible that a desperate crew could have extended the gear even if the airspeed was minimal simply as an attempt to lower the nose to re-stablish laminar flow over the wing and gain an attitude wherein an engine re-start might take place. However, I do think that only impact forces affected the main landing gear and the main landing gear doors. I doubt there was any inflight attempt to lower the landing gear.
Some are focusing on WX and pilot induced oscillations leading to a loss of longitudinal dynamic stability so that the plane was tail heavy and both engines had flamed out. No control surfaces effective, no way to restart, not much flight from LKP, high vertical component, low horizontal one. Not a good situation to be in at all and certainly not at night while inside a thunderstorm. Of course the problem is that other aircraft flew pretty much the same track not long before and not long after AF447 and had no problems at that flight level. So while its hard to imagine longitudinal stability problems its sort of harder to imagine anything else.
If the initial data from the iced pitot tube resulted in the throttles being retarded sufficiently to induce an underspeed stall and that stall progressed to a fully stalled situation with the nose down sixty degrees and neither the wings nor the horizontal stabilizer generating lift it is possible that leading edge vortexes impinged on the vertical stabilizer. Such vortexes when combined with commanded inputs from a desperate flight crew could result in a catastrophic failure at altitude but I would expect the fuselage to impact in a more vertical rather than horizontal attitude. So it seems that the vertical stabilizer did indeed remain attached until impact.
At impact the transmission would cease but the intermittent interruptions in the ACARS transmissions and unavailability of the signal is thought by some to have been caused by the antenna being occluded by an inverted fuselage but this is undetermined.
It just doesn't seem reasonable that the pilots would descend all the way from Level 35 to sea level without realizing they were descending, no matter how fixated on some other item they might have been. Also during any such gentle descent, the lateral travel from the LKP would be greater no matter what the direction of that travel was, even if they did a 180 whether it be intentionally or by happenstance. Being dumped into Alternate Law mode suddenly and losing so many instruments without warning may have overloaded the crews ability to cope with sensory input, but the plane would travel in some direction even if they lost engines.
I had thought a deep stall but this appears to be so very unlikely since it is not known how to put that plane into a deep stall and yet have it strike the water in a mainly downward direction consistent with a flat spin. So perhaps the answer is simply that there was no flat spin. Yet extending the undercarriage would indicate pilot attention and desperation. It would also indicate an over speed condition, not an under speed condition, though it is possible that a desperate crew could have extended the gear even if the airspeed was minimal simply as an attempt to lower the nose to re-stablish laminar flow over the wing and gain an attitude wherein an engine re-start might take place. However, I do think that only impact forces affected the main landing gear and the main landing gear doors. I doubt there was any inflight attempt to lower the landing gear.
Some are focusing on WX and pilot induced oscillations leading to a loss of longitudinal dynamic stability so that the plane was tail heavy and both engines had flamed out. No control surfaces effective, no way to restart, not much flight from LKP, high vertical component, low horizontal one. Not a good situation to be in at all and certainly not at night while inside a thunderstorm. Of course the problem is that other aircraft flew pretty much the same track not long before and not long after AF447 and had no problems at that flight level. So while its hard to imagine longitudinal stability problems its sort of harder to imagine anything else.
If the initial data from the iced pitot tube resulted in the throttles being retarded sufficiently to induce an underspeed stall and that stall progressed to a fully stalled situation with the nose down sixty degrees and neither the wings nor the horizontal stabilizer generating lift it is possible that leading edge vortexes impinged on the vertical stabilizer. Such vortexes when combined with commanded inputs from a desperate flight crew could result in a catastrophic failure at altitude but I would expect the fuselage to impact in a more vertical rather than horizontal attitude. So it seems that the vertical stabilizer did indeed remain attached until impact.
At impact the transmission would cease but the intermittent interruptions in the ACARS transmissions and unavailability of the signal is thought by some to have been caused by the antenna being occluded by an inverted fuselage but this is undetermined.
Friday, April 1, 2011
The Indian Ocean, Insurance and Insanity.
As is obvious from recent headlines and from a great many items that the press are voluntarily refusing to publicize, the situation in the Indian Ocean is severe and extensive.
Most insurance companies have cancelled their coverage which made things difficult for the various yachts in the Blue Water Rally. Some of those yachts elected to follow differing routes including returning to Asia despite adverse weather conditions. Many of the yacht owners decided to ship their yachts from the Maldives to Turkey but the subsequent bankruptcy of a shipping company has complicated matters for those yacht owners.
The Thailand To Turkey convoy originally consisting of about thirty yachts was unable to obtain any escort services from the EUFOR or any other naval authorities in the region. The convoy leader is said to have experienced great frustration in dealing with the naval forces who are clearly only interested in protecting high value commercial shipping. It is of course highly improper for the naval vessels in the area to insist that pleasure yachts repeatedly identify themselves and their exact latitude and longitude on VHF frequencies known to be monitored by pirate vessels. The various members of the convoy reported that there is absolutely no cooperation between the naval vessels of various countries participating in EUFOR.
The details of the route chosen by the convoy are being kept secret even though the convoy has now reached comparatively safer waters.
Most insurance companies have cancelled their coverage which made things difficult for the various yachts in the Blue Water Rally. Some of those yachts elected to follow differing routes including returning to Asia despite adverse weather conditions. Many of the yacht owners decided to ship their yachts from the Maldives to Turkey but the subsequent bankruptcy of a shipping company has complicated matters for those yacht owners.
The Thailand To Turkey convoy originally consisting of about thirty yachts was unable to obtain any escort services from the EUFOR or any other naval authorities in the region. The convoy leader is said to have experienced great frustration in dealing with the naval forces who are clearly only interested in protecting high value commercial shipping. It is of course highly improper for the naval vessels in the area to insist that pleasure yachts repeatedly identify themselves and their exact latitude and longitude on VHF frequencies known to be monitored by pirate vessels. The various members of the convoy reported that there is absolutely no cooperation between the naval vessels of various countries participating in EUFOR.
The details of the route chosen by the convoy are being kept secret even though the convoy has now reached comparatively safer waters.
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