golftango wrote:

If this isn't shrapnel, I don't know what else it could be.

There are photos of the same piece from a different angle earlier in this thread that suggest pretty convincingly that those are not shrapnel holes. Specifically, this one:

V220 wrote:

These are small stones and shadows. There is another photo from the same piece under another angle.

It may well be that this was a shootdown or bomb, but the photo people keep posting isn't the evidence of that that they seem to think.

Reddevil556 wrote:

Adipocere wrote:

Some missiles are as large as the aircraft itself. Also how long would it take for a Minuteman 3 from say North Dakota to reach IKA? Would the 45 minute window from the Iranian launches to this hit account for that?

An ICBM from ND happened to hit a plane shortly after take off? That is mostly likely the least plausible theory yet. Those hinting at a US missile, there would have been other strikes throughout the country. It is far lord likely a lone missile from within Iran did this versus a lone missile from a US base.

That would also be the most lucky thing in the history of the world for Tehran. US launches nuke at Tehran and a 737 happens to get in its way.

golftango wrote:

If this isn't shrapnel, I don't know what else it could be.

Repeat & share non-sense. This how fake news / conspiracy's are born.

Same piece different angle: it's stomes & their shadows.

golftango wrote:

If this isn't shrapnel, I don't know what else it could be.

I'll go with the theory of those being stones.
Also because there seems to be very similar looking "shrapnel" on the concrete next to the plane...

IADCA wrote:

golftango wrote:

If this isn't shrapnel, I don't know what else it could be.

There are photos of the same piece from a different angle earlier in this thread that suggest pretty convincingly that those are not shrapnel holes. Specifically, this one:

V220 wrote:

These are small stones and shadows. There is another photo from the same piece under another angle.

It may well be that this was a shootdown or bomb, but the photo people keep posting isn't the evidence of that that they seem to think.

There does appear to be one shrapnel hole in the bottom image - about 2-3' under the left edge of the 5th window from the left.

T4thH wrote:

JetBuddy wrote:

T4thH wrote:

Yes, these seems to be shrapnel holes. So question is now, friendly fire by Iran guards or by US forces; I fear, these have been some over stressed Iranian guards with a manpad, who were not informed, that the civil traffic of the airport has been restarted.

Yep. Some of the pictures show shrapnel holes in the fuselage and wing section, looking very similar to those found on MH17.

I don't think a manpad did this, in the MH17 case it was a BUK-M1 which is a very powerful SAM system.

We'll probably never get the truth because I don't think Iran will share the black box with anyone, or let any foreign investigators look for themselves.

As for images of parts with holes in them, Daily Mail has quite a lot of pictures. The 2nd one from the top shows it very clearly (and no, its not the same one as in the quoted picture)

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... media.html

Yes, two pictures show shrapnel holes, but these on the linked picture are stones and shadows as already clarified. On the first picture, I have also missed it.
The small holes in the wing fits to shrapnel holes by a manpad. A BUK rocket has a much bigger warhead and produces big shrapnel holes (the warhead has a AL hull, it produces few cm Al blocks). Manpads have another shrapnel hull (often tungsten), producing small shrapnel, or small.splinters.

If a BUK hits, the jet will come down in pieces and there would be bigger and many more holes. The B737 seems to have come down in one piece (as seen in the video, it even seems to go down in flames but half controlled till to a flash after it seems to dive and crashes), so it was more likely a small manpad warhead with IR seeker, which has directly hit the hottest part, one of the the jet engines..

One of the DailyMail pictures shows the horizontal stabilizer with impact holes similar in size to the holes you ascribe to shrapnel from a manpad. The impact holes appear to have been punctured from the top of the horizontal stabilizer. In addition, the impact holes you refer to here were punctured from the burnt side of the fuselage, yet the hole on the vertical stabilizer (which is bigger) appears to have been punctured from the unburnt side of the V-stab. With that V-stab hole, I am more with Zeke that it could have been made during the impact with the ground.

Just looking at the ground around the various images, there seems to be a lot of gravel stones and other hard object. is it possible that some of these impact holes were made when the plane and its structures hit the ground?

Boeing statement: January 8, 2020 - This is a tragic event and our heartfelt thoughts are with the crew, passengers, and their families. We are in contact with our airline customer and stand by them in this difficult time. We are ready to assist in any way needed.

https://boeing.mediaroom.com/news-relea ... tem=130597

Reddevil556 wrote:

Adipocere wrote:

Some missiles are as large as the aircraft itself. Also how long would it take for a Minuteman 3 from say North Dakota to reach IKA? Would the 45 minute window from the Iranian launches to this hit account for that?

An ICBM from ND happened to hit a plane shortly after take off? That is mostly likely the least plausible theory yet. Those hinting at a US missile, there would have been other strikes throughout the country. It is far lord likely a lone missile from within Iran did this versus a lone missile from a US base.

Plus the fact that any launch out of a known nuclear silo would raise more than a few eyebrows in Moscow. That is actually one of the main reasons why ICBMs were not converted for conventional strike capability - a launch out of a Minutemann missile field could increase tensions and even lead to a counterattack by Russia, as there is no telling if the missile is armed with a conventional or nuclear warhead. Also, an entry vehicle has no terminal guidance and can neither acquire nor home in on a moving target. In fact the accuracy is about 240 m on a stationary target.

I hope the Iranian authorities include a trustworthy neutral investigative authority in it's investigation.

Lastly, I believe the US immediately claimed responsibility for IR655, no? Even if the circumstances around the shoot down were hotly contested (and still are today to some sort), did the US ever deny that they shot the plane down? Russia to this day denies any involvement in MH17.

If this was a shoot down by Iran or some other group within Iran, I would think the likelyhood was accidental. So, I would hope Iran would let the facts take the investigation where it takes them. I think it would benefit them in the long run. If some mistakes were made, people will be made scapegoats and this will become another unfortunate footnote in history. If they try to cover something up, it will be obvious (like Russia's coverup) and it will further taint Iran's reputation. A lot easier to dismiss negligence.

Of course, if this was intentional, then I understand wanting to cover it up... but I can't see a reason why it would be intentional.

Elementalism wrote:

I always thought ground based AA sites required human intervention to pick a target. Otherwise if it were fully automatic. It seems to me putting garbage in the air would cause the AA system to expend ordinance on othing before the real threats show up. And I know Aegis does have automatic firing options in the case of a massive attack. But I dont think the Iranians have anything near that capability.

One interesting thing is that in the early morning time frame of the incident there hadn't been a departure for at least 20 min (only confirmed deprature was an hour earlier) with everything after the crash cancelled.

Is this a large enough gap to call the departure unexpected?

nine4nine wrote:

-Ukraine Intl officially pulling out of Tehran and immediately retracting the first unofficial response.

Doesn't this sometimes happen with crashes though?

Let's consider a few possibilities in what I hope is a "rational"way:

1. US shoots down plane
What would happen? US would have to have been launching a missile retaliation, something which given the larger context, would seem to have to be an all or nothing scenario. If it were the case that they launched something, US either has some rogue unplanned "just shoot something" attitude that would be totally stupid and doesn't make sense, and would be totally counterproductive AND it would either be purposeful (which doesn't make sense considering spy accuracy in tracking Soliemani (butchering name I know) or total firing inaccuracy if another target was intended. Neither case makes since, but the bigger proof is Iran not blaming the US for it, something which would work in their advantage to do given the current larger situation.

2. Iran shoots down plane purposely?
For what? Some conspiracy about the Canadaians being American agents in disquise or some politcal figure on the plane? Not likely, and given the situation neither side would want to unnecessarily provoke anything. Any sort of explanation that it was a planned retaliation doesn't hold water either. Wouldn't EK, given the UAE's closer connection to Saudia Arabia/Iran's enemies if the goal was some sort of far-fetched "message" since there were no Americans on the flight and a majority were Iranian.

The only "sort-of" explanation that would "sort-of" hold would be some sort of opposition figure on the flight and it was an "all-or-nothing" "can't let this person get out with something" maneuver. But this could only be the case if political conditions just suddenly changed. I know there was an Iranian crackdown on millions of protestors that led to some arrests recently, but this is the stuff of spy novels to say that they planned something in ten minutes to take out someone in the air when it would all make more sense to take out someone on the ground or in the airport. In other words, this also seems very improbable to, the more I think of it.

3. Mechanical Accident?
Here I think we should look a little more. It's true that the 737 was just out of a scheduled maintenance operation. But I have friends employed in MRO departments for several carriers and often maintnance work can cause problems.

Do we know why the flight was delayed?

I think that's a very important question to ask with all this, and if there was some sort of trouble on the ground or a rush to fix something quickly, something could very easily have happened. Maybe you could even connect all this to the political situation. Crew/pilots/mechanics/ground servicing more stressed than usual given what had just been annonced, in a rush to get a plane out that's already late, and they miss something, skip over something.

Yes, they as the UIA president said we're great pilots, the 737 is a great plane, and I'm not blaming an intentional fault in their actions, but imagine what it would be like working in such an unstable region even more on edge than normal.

If Iran releases a report based on information from the Black Box, it should be verifiable, right? All the images from the ground have been released without censorship, and while there are theoroes on this thread about a plan to hurt Boeing and the US by another 737 crash, implying that this was all planned to make the plane look unsafe, the context makes people a bit too suspicious and it just seems like that theories also a bit far-fetched.

4. Accidental Shoot-Down
This has been commonly stated on this thread as well over the past day and I think from what we know now, we can't rule it out.

Similarly stressed military on edge, perhaps not expecting an overflight, or a rebel group which had access to military technology, (Do we really know the political situation as it is today there?) could have, as many said, saw an overflight in the dim morning hours, and fully expecting an immediate American response to the missiles launched hours before, have shot it down accidentally, especially if something happened with other people stressed for some reason (ATC/pilots/UIA dispatch)

Some people have mentioned shrapnel. Is this confirmable with the images we have? Could an aircraft explosion have caused any parts to give this appearance?

Others have mentioned a similarity in appearance to the fireball descending to that of MH17. Is that conclusive or true?

FlightRadar at the time of the incident may not have shown the delay and if there was some miscommunication that didn't tell the true flight plan, one isolated flight(there were no flights for at least 20 min before the incident) could trigger alarm bells, and other people on edge could have pulled the trigger.

All in all, we can't really say for sure, but it seems like Iran has been quite open with imagery and has not blamed anyone else in shooting it down.

50/50 some mechanical accident versus accidental shoot down seems all that can really be said.

Mostly questions, but two cents somewhere in all that...

airhansa wrote:

I was also wondering why on earth the pilots wouldn't make contact with air traffic control?

The official "views" appear to be that it was an engine fire, but surely a plane such as these ought to be able to fly on another engine alone? Furthermore it would not create a situation where the entire plane was engulfed in fire?

I think an engine fire would give the crew time to mayday and request a landing at Teheran. My guess is that the aircraft was subject to a sudden, catastrophic event of external origin. A SAM seems the most likely culprit to me. Alternatively a bomb on board.

Sad, sad event. RIP all who were onboard.

Were other flights delayed this morning? Missiles flying through the air sure seems a good reason for a delay.

The Iranians are an intelligent, educated people. I'm sure they will be looking at the debris field, metal deformation, burn marks and other evidence of a catastrophic in-flight breakup. Lacking any ability for our NTSB or Boeing teams to inspect the CVR and FDR I would expect accident sleuthing to include other possibilities-- such as Iranian passengers on the manifest. Example: Were there any Iranian nuclear scientists onboard?

XRAYretired wrote:

aden23 wrote:

No one here seems to have mentioned that 2 days ago, Iran’s president threatened to blow up a plane similar to the Lockerbie bombing.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/10686727/ ... e-coffins/

Believe something written in the SCUM? Then relate it to an a/c full of their own people over their own territory? Biggest stretch conspiracy yet, and thats going some.

The president of Iran sent the threatening tweet himself.

That’s called primary source, and is objectively the only actual evidence for cause we have about this crash right now.

Try to keep your personal conspiracy accusations out of this.

smokeybandit wrote:

Were other flights delayed this morning? Missiles flying through the air sure seems a good reason for a delay.

The following half dozen flight from IKA were cancelled after the crash flight then ops largely returned to normal.

Almost all flights throughout the night and this morning in Merhabad airport were severely disrupted or cancelled.

morrisond wrote:

IADCA wrote:

golftango wrote:

If this isn't shrapnel, I don't know what else it could be.

There are photos of the same piece from a different angle earlier in this thread that suggest pretty convincingly that those are not shrapnel holes. Specifically, this one:

V220 wrote:

These are small stones and shadows. There is another photo from the same piece under another angle.

It may well be that this was a shootdown or bomb, but the photo people keep posting isn't the evidence of that that they seem to think.

There does appear to be one shrapnel hole in the bottom image - about 2-3' under the left edge of the 5th window from the left.

There's a hole or puncture of some sort, yeah. But it's hard to say what caused it or when, especially given that there's a large and sharp piece of metal sitting on top of the fuse section we're discussing. That puncture very well could have occurred on the ground. Not a hard question to resolve in the end given that the location will likely mean most of the aircraft is fairly easily recoverable.

heyjoojoo wrote:

Dubai News is reporting that a missile took down the Ukrainian airliner.

https://theunionjournal.com/iranian-mis ... n-airport/

Among the victims were 82 Iranians, 63 Canadians, 11 Ukrainians including all nine crew, 10 Swedes, four Afghans, three Britons and three Germans, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko said. Fifteen of the dead were children.

They're just copying some random saudi twitter posts. No original content, pure speculation at this point.

xwb777 wrote:

What are those holes in the aircraft fuselage?

It appears they are projectile holes in the fuselage, verticlal stabilizer and portions of the wing. Looks suspicious to me and if you compare it to the crash reassembly of Malaysian 17 it looks similar however this is not for anyone to decide and we will have to let investigators figure things out.

SumChristianus wrote:

Elementalism wrote:

I always thought ground based AA sites required human intervention to pick a target. Otherwise if it were fully automatic. It seems to me putting garbage in the air would cause the AA system to expend ordinance on othing before the real threats show up. And I know Aegis does have automatic firing options in the case of a massive attack. But I dont think the Iranians have anything near that capability.

One interesting thing is that in the early morning time frame of the incident there hadn't been a departure for at least 20 min (only confirmed deprature was an hour earlier) with everything after the crash cancelled.

Is this a large enough gap to call the departure unexpected?

nine4nine wrote:

-Ukraine Intl officially pulling out of Tehran and immediately retracting the first unofficial response.

Doesn't this sometimes happen with crashes though?

Let's consider a few possibilities in what I hope is a "rational"way:

1. US shoots down plane
What would happen? US would have to have been launching a missile retaliation, something which given the larger context, would seem to have to be an all or nothing scenario. If it were the case that they launched something, US either has some rogue unplanned "just shoot something" attitude that would be totally stupid and doesn't make sense, and would be totally counterproductive AND it would either be purposeful (which doesn't make sense considering spy accuracy in tracking Soliemani (butchering name I know) or total firing inaccuracy if another target was intended. Neither case makes since, but the bigger proof is Iran not blaming the US for it, something which would work in their advantage to do given the current larger situation.

2. Iran shoots down plane purposely?
For what? Some conspiracy about the Canadaians being American agents in disquise or some politcal figure on the plane? Not likely, and given the situation neither side would want to unnecessarily provoke anything. Any sort of explanation that it was a planned retaliation doesn't hold water either. Wouldn't EK, given the UAE's closer connection to Saudia Arabia/Iran's enemies if the goal was some sort of far-fetched "message" since there were no Americans on the flight and a majority were Iranian.

The only "sort-of" explanation that would "sort-of" hold would be some sort of opposition figure on the flight and it was an "all-or-nothing" "can't let this person get out with something" maneuver. But this could only be the case if political conditions just suddenly changed. I know there was an Iranian crackdown on millions of protestors that led to some arrests recently, but this is the stuff of spy novels to say that they planned something in ten minutes to take out someone in the air when it would all make more sense to take out someone on the ground or in the airport. In other words, this also seems very improbable to, the more I think of it.

3. Mechanical Accident?
Here I think we should look a little more. It's true that the 737 was just out of a scheduled maintenance operation. But I have friends employed in MRO departments for several carriers and often maintnance work can cause problems.

Do we know why the flight was delayed?

I think that's a very important question to ask with all this, and if there was some sort of trouble on the ground or a rush to fix something quickly, something could very easily have happened. Maybe you could even connect all this to the political situation. Crew/pilots/mechanics/ground servicing more stressed than usual given what had just been annonced, in a rush to get a plane out that's already late, and they miss something, skip over something.

Yes, they as the UIA president said we're great pilots, the 737 is a great plane, and I'm not blaming an intentional fault in their actions, but imagine what it would be like working in such an unstable region even more on edge than normal.

If Iran releases a report based on information from the Black Box, it should be verifiable, right? All the images from the ground have been released without censorship, and while there are theoroes on this thread about a plan to hurt Boeing and the US by another 737 crash, implying that this was all planned to make the plane look unsafe, the context makes people a bit too suspicious and it just seems like that theories also a bit far-fetched.

4. Accidental Shoot-Down
This has been commonly stated on this thread as well over the past day and I think from what we know now, we can't rule it out.

Similarly stressed military on edge, perhaps not expecting an overflight, or a rebel group which had access to military technology, (Do we really know the political situation as it is today there?) could have, as many said, saw an overflight in the dim morning hours, and fully expecting an immediate American response to the missiles launched hours before, have shot it down accidentally, especially if something happened with other people stressed for some reason (ATC/pilots/UIA dispatch)

Some people have mentioned shrapnel. Is this confirmable with the images we have? Could an aircraft explosion have caused any parts to give this appearance?

Others have mentioned a similarity in appearance to the fireball descending to that of MH17. Is that conclusive or true?

FlightRadar at the time of the incident may not have shown the delay and if there was some miscommunication that didn't tell the true flight plan, one isolated flight(there were no flights for at least 20 min before the incident) could trigger alarm bells, and other people on edge could have pulled the trigger.

All in all, we can't really say for sure, but it seems like Iran has been quite open with imagery and has not blamed anyone else in shooting it down.

50/50 some mechanical accident versus accidental shoot down seems all that can really be said.

Mostly questions, but two cents somewhere in all that...

Pictures are not that forthcoming. We've got the window section of the fuselage, the VS and numerous bits of internal debris, and a piece of wing which are repeatedly shown.

Given how open the debris field is to visitors I'd expect more. Thankfully the Iranians seem to respect the dead as I've thankfully not seen any pictures of victims. Unlike the animals who posted them in Ukraine when MH17 was downed.

SumChristianus wrote:

Elementalism wrote:

I always thought ground based AA sites required human intervention to pick a target. Otherwise if it were fully automatic. It seems to me putting garbage in the air would cause the AA system to expend ordinance on othing before the real threats show up. And I know Aegis does have automatic firing options in the case of a massive attack. But I dont think the Iranians have anything near that capability.

One interesting thing is that in the early morning time frame of the incident there hadn't been a departure for at least 20 min (only confirmed deprature was an hour earlier) with everything after the crash cancelled.

Is this a large enough gap to call the departure unexpected?

nine4nine wrote:

-Ukraine Intl officially pulling out of Tehran and immediately retracting the first unofficial response.

Doesn't this sometimes happen with crashes though?

Let's consider a few possibilities in what I hope is a "rational"way:

1. US shoots down plane
What would happen? US would have to have been launching a missile retaliation, something which given the larger context, would seem to have to be an all or nothing scenario. If it were the case that they launched something, US either has some rogue unplanned "just shoot something" attitude that would be totally stupid and doesn't make sense, and would be totally counterproductive AND it would either be purposeful (which doesn't make sense considering spy accuracy in tracking Soliemani (butchering name I know) or total firing inaccuracy if another target was intended. Neither case makes since, but the bigger proof is Iran not blaming the US for it, something which would work in their advantage to do given the current larger situation.

2. Iran shoots down plane purposely?
For what? Some conspiracy about the Canadaians being American agents in disquise or some politcal figure on the plane? Not likely, and given the situation neither side would want to unnecessarily provoke anything. Any sort of explanation that it was a planned retaliation doesn't hold water either. Wouldn't EK, given the UAE's closer connection to Saudia Arabia/Iran's enemies if the goal was some sort of far-fetched "message" since there were no Americans on the flight and a majority were Iranian.

The only "sort-of" explanation that would "sort-of" hold would be some sort of opposition figure on the flight and it was an "all-or-nothing" "can't let this person get out with something" maneuver. But this could only be the case if political conditions just suddenly changed. I know there was an Iranian crackdown on millions of protestors that led to some arrests recently, but this is the stuff of spy novels to say that they planned something in ten minutes to take out someone in the air when it would all make more sense to take out someone on the ground or in the airport. In other words, this also seems very improbable to, the more I think of it.

3. Mechanical Accident?
Here I think we should look a little more. It's true that the 737 was just out of a scheduled maintenance operation. But I have friends employed in MRO departments for several carriers and often maintnance work can cause problems.

Do we know why the flight was delayed?

I think that's a very important question to ask with all this, and if there was some sort of trouble on the ground or a rush to fix something quickly, something could very easily have happened. Maybe you could even connect all this to the political situation. Crew/pilots/mechanics/ground servicing more stressed than usual given what had just been annonced, in a rush to get a plane out that's already late, and they miss something, skip over something.

Yes, they as the UIA president said we're great pilots, the 737 is a great plane, and I'm not blaming an intentional fault in their actions, but imagine what it would be like working in such an unstable region even more on edge than normal.

If Iran releases a report based on information from the Black Box, it should be verifiable, right? All the images from the ground have been released without censorship, and while there are theoroes on this thread about a plan to hurt Boeing and the US by another 737 crash, implying that this was all planned to make the plane look unsafe, the context makes people a bit too suspicious and it just seems like that theories also a bit far-fetched.

4. Accidental Shoot-Down
This has been commonly stated on this thread as well over the past day and I think from what we know now, we can't rule it out.

Similarly stressed military on edge, perhaps not expecting an overflight, or a rebel group which had access to military technology, (Do we really know the political situation as it is today there?) could have, as many said, saw an overflight in the dim morning hours, and fully expecting an immediate American response to the missiles launched hours before, have shot it down accidentally, especially if something happened with other people stressed for some reason (ATC/pilots/UIA dispatch)

Some people have mentioned shrapnel. Is this confirmable with the images we have? Could an aircraft explosion have caused any parts to give this appearance?

Others have mentioned a similarity in appearance to the fireball descending to that of MH17. Is that conclusive or true?

FlightRadar at the time of the incident may not have shown the delay and if there was some miscommunication that didn't tell the true flight plan, one isolated flight(there were no flights for at least 20 min before the incident) could trigger alarm bells, and other people on edge could have pulled the trigger.

All in all, we can't really say for sure, but it seems like Iran has been quite open with imagery and has not blamed anyone else in shooting it down.

50/50 some mechanical accident versus accidental shoot down seems all that can really be said.

Mostly questions, but two cents somewhere in all that...

Very unlikely that the US shot down its own plane. We have much better capabilities than that.

Salina Chan wrote:

Plus the fact that any launch out of a known nuclear silo would raise more than a few eyebrows in Moscow. That is actually one of the main reasons why ICBMs were not converted for conventional strike capability - a launch out of a Minutemann missile field could increase tensions and even lead to a counterattack by Russia, as there is no telling if the missile is armed with a conventional or nuclear warhead. Also, an entry vehicle has no terminal guidance and can neither acquire nor home in on a moving target. In fact the accuracy is about 240 m on a stationary target.

In Moscow? Forgetting for a minute the Russians, the Chinese, and every NATO country who'd notice such a launch immediately due to satellite monitoring ... I'm not sure you'd be able to launch a missile without anyone in the US noticing ... it's a rocket when it's going up ... big, loud, leaves a very noticeable trail behind it, visible for miles, if not tens or hundreds of miles, around.

This is the picture that shows the holes. This is not the same piece as the other photos that were likely showing rocks and debris.

But who knows. I don't think we'll get clarification anytime soon.

From the Daily Mail.



Full article:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... media.html

Do not forget that the plane was one hour behind schedule.
Most probably they took down accidentally since they did not expect a plane to show up on radar.

zhetenyi1973 wrote:

Do not forget that the plane was one hour behind schedule.
Most probably they took down accidentally since they did not expect a plane to show up on radar.

I can't imagine a random guy with a finger on a rocket launcher checking out the departure schedule from a nearby airport, unless he was waiting for a particular aircraft. I believe the doomed aircraft was subject to an external event.

BEG2IAH wrote:

zhetenyi1973 wrote:

Do not forget that the plane was one hour behind schedule.
Most probably they took down accidentally since they did not expect a plane to show up on radar.

I can't imagine a random guy with a finger on a rocket launcher checking out the departure schedule from a nearby airport, unless he was waiting for a particular aircraft. I believe the doomed aircraft was subject to an external event.

I believe the reason the US navy was Initially suspicious of the Iranair-jet was because of its late departure.

SumChristianus wrote:

Elementalism wrote:

I always thought ground based AA sites required human intervention to pick a target. Otherwise if it were fully automatic. It seems to me putting garbage in the air would cause the AA system to expend ordinance on othing before the real threats show up. And I know Aegis does have automatic firing options in the case of a massive attack. But I dont think the Iranians have anything near that capability.

One interesting thing is that in the early morning time frame of the incident there hadn't been a departure for at least 20 min (only confirmed deprature was an hour earlier) with everything after the crash cancelled.

Is this a large enough gap to call the departure unexpected?

nine4nine wrote:

-Ukraine Intl officially pulling out of Tehran and immediately retracting the first unofficial response.

Doesn't this sometimes happen with crashes though?

Let's consider a few possibilities in what I hope is a "rational"way:

1. US shoots down plane
What would happen? US would have to have been launching a missile retaliation, something which given the larger context, would seem to have to be an all or nothing scenario. If it were the case that they launched something, US either has some rogue unplanned "just shoot something" attitude that would be totally stupid and doesn't make sense, and would be totally counterproductive AND it would either be purposeful (which doesn't make sense considering spy accuracy in tracking Soliemani (butchering name I know) or total firing inaccuracy if another target was intended. Neither case makes since, but the bigger proof is Iran not blaming the US for it, something which would work in their advantage to do given the current larger situation.

2. Iran shoots down plane purposely?
For what? Some conspiracy about the Canadaians being American agents in disquise or some politcal figure on the plane? Not likely, and given the situation neither side would want to unnecessarily provoke anything. Any sort of explanation that it was a planned retaliation doesn't hold water either. Wouldn't EK, given the UAE's closer connection to Saudia Arabia/Iran's enemies if the goal was some sort of far-fetched "message" since there were no Americans on the flight and a majority were Iranian.

The only "sort-of" explanation that would "sort-of" hold would be some sort of opposition figure on the flight and it was an "all-or-nothing" "can't let this person get out with something" maneuver. But this could only be the case if political conditions just suddenly changed. I know there was an Iranian crackdown on millions of protestors that led to some arrests recently, but this is the stuff of spy novels to say that they planned something in ten minutes to take out someone in the air when it would all make more sense to take out someone on the ground or in the airport. In other words, this also seems very improbable to, the more I think of it.

3. Mechanical Accident?
Here I think we should look a little more. It's true that the 737 was just out of a scheduled maintenance operation. But I have friends employed in MRO departments for several carriers and often maintnance work can cause problems.

Do we know why the flight was delayed?

I think that's a very important question to ask with all this, and if there was some sort of trouble on the ground or a rush to fix something quickly, something could very easily have happened. Maybe you could even connect all this to the political situation. Crew/pilots/mechanics/ground servicing more stressed than usual given what had just been annonced, in a rush to get a plane out that's already late, and they miss something, skip over something.

Yes, they as the UIA president said we're great pilots, the 737 is a great plane, and I'm not blaming an intentional fault in their actions, but imagine what it would be like working in such an unstable region even more on edge than normal.

If Iran releases a report based on information from the Black Box, it should be verifiable, right? All the images from the ground have been released without censorship, and while there are theoroes on this thread about a plan to hurt Boeing and the US by another 737 crash, implying that this was all planned to make the plane look unsafe, the context makes people a bit too suspicious and it just seems like that theories also a bit far-fetched.

4. Accidental Shoot-Down
This has been commonly stated on this thread as well over the past day and I think from what we know now, we can't rule it out.

Similarly stressed military on edge, perhaps not expecting an overflight, or a rebel group which had access to military technology, (Do we really know the political situation as it is today there?) could have, as many said, saw an overflight in the dim morning hours, and fully expecting an immediate American response to the missiles launched hours before, have shot it down accidentally, especially if something happened with other people stressed for some reason (ATC/pilots/UIA dispatch)

Some people have mentioned shrapnel. Is this confirmable with the images we have? Could an aircraft explosion have caused any parts to give this appearance?

Others have mentioned a similarity in appearance to the fireball descending to that of MH17. Is that conclusive or true?

FlightRadar at the time of the incident may not have shown the delay and if there was some miscommunication that didn't tell the true flight plan, one isolated flight(there were no flights for at least 20 min before the incident) could trigger alarm bells, and other people on edge could have pulled the trigger.

All in all, we can't really say for sure, but it seems like Iran has been quite open with imagery and has not blamed anyone else in shooting it down.

50/50 some mechanical accident versus accidental shoot down seems all that can really be said.

Mostly questions, but two cents somewhere in all that...

This needs to be considered, and it could have happened with MH17 as well...

What if the ADS-B signal of the aircraft was spoofed, either by hiding it, causing the aircraft to be unidentified, or by broadcasting another signal on top of it that the missile system would recognize as a hostile?
If you do a simple google search this has been possible for several years and if you use AWACS aircraft to do it I'm sure it can be done quite easily. Knowing Iran is on a hair trigger they fire without taking the time to do much research assuming it is an inbound hostile. The ADS-B stopped broadcasting 14 km from the crash site and the plane basically went straight down. That 3-5 minute window could be when the ADS-B signal was disabled and the missile was launched.

Basically, it would be hacking. People think of hacking as their bank records being stolen, but this may be a real world application. The fact it was a Ukraine aircraft and not China/Russia/UAE is also highly suspect as any of those would have had much greater ramifications. Not unlike how the prior example of this was Malaysia which is not in a position to create too much noise about it. Also, the 0515 departure time allowed for a flight that would be in the air in total darkness increasing the chances of this outcome.

nine4nine wrote:

-No radio communication, report of tech issue or mayday and within minutes the Iranian regime calls it a “mechanical failure”.

The pilots will not call for help if the situation does not allow it. Aviate, Navigate, Communicate. Plenty of airplanes went down without a mayday call, including some engine failures.
People will say lots of stupid things in front of the press. Lots of misinformation and rumors floating around after every crash. Does that turn all of them into conspiracies?

nine4nine wrote:

-Video of the plane engulfed in flames in an uncontrolled dive. (The death roll looks eerily similar to the one on MH17 when the flight deck was riddled with shrapnel rendering the crew and aircraft uncontrollable)

The FDR recording on MH17 stopped immediately after the missile hit and there is no footage of the crash that would let you call it "similar".
Re Fire, guess what happens when your wing - full of fuel - gets sliced open by multiple metal fragments? QF32 got lucky, their fire went out after 10 minutes. AF4590 didn't have as much luck. AA383 had the luck of still being on the ground. UA232 was "lucky" that it only hit the hydraulics, not the fuel tanks.

nine4nine wrote:

-Pictures of punctures on vertical stab, horiz stab, engines and fuselage.

There are many pictures of extensive shrapnel damage after uncontained engine failures. Some jets even crashed due to that. Damage may have resulted from impact with the ground as well.

nine4nine wrote:

-Ukraine Intl officially pulling out of Tehran and immediately retracting the first unofficial response.

Pure PR; UIA can't know more than us at this point.

this was the plane
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOnrtnLPV9A

Obviously it was blown up. Burisma executives were on board, traveling under fake Canadian passports. They were in Iran conspiring with the Ayatollah and Trump to sink the Biden nomination. This is obviously not serious, but just as absurd as the other conspiracy crap in this thread. But it's catnip for trolls.

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, and RIP to the poor souls on board.

The missiles were shot at 1:45 LT and the plane departed at 05:15 am.

On the pictures I can see I this post it does not look like a crash or engine fault ...

xwb777 wrote:

The missiles were shot at 1:45 LT and the plane departed at 05:15 am.

I heard the times were much closer.

If your times are accurate then it was deeply irresponsible of UIA to operate the flight. Particularly when the following flights were cancelled and flights at the other Tehran airport were severely disrupted.

JetBuddy wrote:

This is the picture that shows the holes. This is not the same piece as the other photos that were likely showing rocks and debris.

But who knows. I don't think we'll get clarification anytime soon.

From the Daily Mail.



Full article:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... media.html

That’s the one I was on about earlier.

I think that’s the underside of the tail plane, the horizontal stabiliser and the elevator..

How that’s got holes in it I do not know, I have never seen damage there from an engine failure.

mxaxai wrote:

nine4nine wrote:

-Ukraine Intl officially pulling out of Tehran and immediately retracting the first unofficial response.

Pure PR; UIA can't know more than us at this point.

What? You seriously think the operating airline of a crashed plane can't know more than a bunch of randos on the internet? By definition - they would have a lot more detail about the passengers and cargo than is public, and they have personnel who work at the airport in Tehran and handled this flight, for example - they do know more than people on this thread. One can question whether any of what they know about the plane and its flight contains the answer here, but they most certainly do have a lot more information than the public. It's stupefyingly naive to suggest otherwise.

Blerg wrote:

Interested wrote:

MileHFL400 wrote:

Iranians suffering massive loss there.

But Canada losing more

How do 73 Canadians end up flying from Iran to Ukraine together?

By eventually connecting onto PS' Toronto flight.

This one, currently in the air. RIP to all those who missed this flight.

xwb777 wrote:

The missiles were shot at 1:45 LT and the plane departed at 05:15 am.

Please remember to provide a source when presenting facts. Thanks.

lowbank wrote:

How that’s got holes in it I do not know,

Say what? The airplane made violent impact with terrain and was completely destroyed. That might cause a hole or two.

Buyantukhaa wrote:

Miquel787 wrote:

KLM is suspending all flights to Iran and Irak today. Boeing is not allowed to examine the black boxes and Iran blaimes Boeing for the accident with the Ukrainian 737.This was on Dutch radio half an hour ago..

KLM doesn't fly to Iran or Iraq - the Tehran flights ended in September 2018. Maybe you mean they stopped overflying Iran and Iraq?

You are absolutely right..My mistake.They suspended overflying those countries.

How long after take-off did the plane crash? Also is it possible for passengers to use their mobile phones to communicate at whatever altitude the plane was at in consideration of Iranian infrastructure?

I'm trying to think of scenarios where both the pilots nor passengers wouldn't mayday for help. A fire in the right place could knock out communications for the pilots theoretically, but the fire would have had to spread lightening fast to make the plane unflyable surely? And an engine fire would never be able to knock out communications - the lack of communications is the key element here.

SQ22 wrote:

xwb777 wrote:

The missiles were shot at 1:45 LT and the plane departed at 05:15 am.

Please remember to provide a source when presenting facts. Thanks.

I can verify that the plane was scheduled for 0515 according to OAG and Flightaware backs that up. Hours after the missile attack, but exactly when they would be on high alert for a retaliatory strike with their finger on the trigger in Baghdad.

A terrible day for aviation. This, right after many articles posted about how safe flying was in 2019. No idea what may have caused this crash, but I feel bad for all the people who lost their family. If this turns out to be political in nature, we are on the brink of some heavy stuff.

xwb777 wrote:

The missiles were shot at 1:45 LT and the plane departed at 05:15 am.

Uh... the only way to know this is to see the said missiles at that time. I only saw video of 3.

According to Avherald, the initial impact and final resting location is almost a mile apart. That is not a compact debris field.

TTailedTiger wrote:

If Iran has nothing to hide, why not send the CVR and FDR to a neutral party?

Who would that be? It would have to be someone who is trusted by Iran, Ukraine, Canada, USA and France. That's a pretty tall task! Given the hostilities between Ukraine and Russia, that certainly isn't Russia.
Does Switzerland do crash investigations?

airhansa wrote:

How long after take-off did the plane crash? Also is it possible for passengers to use their mobile phones to communicate at whatever altitude the plane was at in consideration of Iranian infrastructure?

I'm trying to think of scenarios where both the pilots nor passengers wouldn't mayday for help. A fire in the right place could knock out communications for the pilots theoretically, but the fire would have had to spread lightening fast to make the plane unflyable surely? And an engine fire would never be able to knock out communications - the lack of communications is the key element here.

The last FR24 data point shows it a few ticks under 8000 feet. At that altitude you could theoretically still acquire a signal if you happened to have a nearby tower, but most or all passengers would likely have their phones in airplane mode. A fast sequence of events could easily lead to nothing from the passengers or crew, who follow "aviate, navigate, communicate" in that order. Or they could simply have been incapacitated. At that low altitude, there's a good chance you have no time for a mayday in many scenarios; for example, the Atlas 767 crash last year had no emergency call despite a physically capable flight crew and no comms failure.

MUWarriors wrote:

Let me preface this by saying I believe the most likely scenario is an accidental shoot down by Iran.

But for everyone saying “X, Y, or Z doesn’t bring down a modern aircraft,” let me remind you that stirring the fuel tanks didn’t bring down a single 747, until one day it did. No A300 had its tail break off in flight due to rudder inputs, until it did.

So yes, most likely the plane and passengers were very likely unfortunate victims in a shoot down, but don’t discount other theories about something else because “that just doesn’t happen.”

You're confusing Apollo 13 with TWA800.
Apollo 13 had a oxygen tank explode when they stirred the oxygen tank. Stirring is necessary in microgravity because natural convection doesn't work without gravity.
TWA800's ignition source was never positively identified, but one of several circuits traveling through the tank are suspected. A fuel tank explosion wasn't an unknown risk. There have been multiple incidents of aircraft on stand with unused center tanks exploding. It was a predicted event but the airlines balked at the interting costs.

heyjoojoo wrote:

xwb777 wrote:

The missiles were shot at 1:45 LT and the plane departed at 05:15 am.

Uh... the only way to know this is to see the said missiles at that time. I only saw video of 3.

Pure speculation, but it could be defense missile enabled in the fear of action after the ballistic missile strike.

eidvm wrote:

What would be the possibility that this was a USA/Western missile targeting a close by Iranian military site that instead accidentally hit an airliner, rather than the other way around?

Are there any possible target sites in the vicinity of where the aircraft was hit, assuming/speculating a possible missile strike?

If it was, Iran would have already released the radar tapes.

MatthewDB wrote:

TTailedTiger wrote:

If Iran has nothing to hide, why not send the CVR and FDR to a neutral party?

Who would that be? It would have to be someone who is trusted by Iran, Ukraine, Canada, USA and France. That's a pretty tall task! Given the hostilities between Ukraine and Russia, that certainly isn't Russia.
Does Switzerland do crash investigations?

I think France could be a candidate. They've always had close relations with Iran, and are seen as more independent geopolitically.

But if Iran suspects they shot it down themselves, I don't think they would be willing to share it with anyone.

mxaxai wrote:

nine4nine wrote:

-No radio communication, report of tech issue or mayday and within minutes the Iranian regime calls it a “mechanical failure”.

The pilots will not call for help if the situation does not allow it. Aviate, Navigate, Communicate. Plenty of airplanes went down without a mayday call, including some engine failures.
People will say lots of stupid things in front of the press. Lots of misinformation and rumors floating around after every crash. Does that turn all of them into conspiracies?

nine4nine wrote:

-Video of the plane engulfed in flames in an uncontrolled dive. (The death roll looks eerily similar to the one on MH17 when the flight deck was riddled with shrapnel rendering the crew and aircraft uncontrollable)

The FDR recording on MH17 stopped immediately after the missile hit and there is no footage of the crash that would let you call it "similar".
Re Fire, guess what happens when your wing - full of fuel - gets sliced open by multiple metal fragments? QF32 got lucky, their fire went out after 10 minutes. AF4590 didn't have as much luck. AA383 had the luck of still being on the ground. UA232 was "lucky" that it only hit the hydraulics, not the fuel tanks.

nine4nine wrote:

-Pictures of punctures on vertical stab, horiz stab, engines and fuselage.

There are many pictures of extensive shrapnel damage after uncontained engine failures. Some jets even crashed due to that. Damage may have resulted from impact with the ground as well.

nine4nine wrote:

-Ukraine Intl officially pulling out of Tehran and immediately retracting the first unofficial response.

Pure PR; UIA can't know more than us at this point.

It would be difficult to shrapnel damage from an uncontained failure on the Stabilizer unless it was a Trijet.