They're going to spend 4 days trying to relocate pings? Did someone throw away the ping coordinates?

[Iwasthere]

Why can't they just go back to where they were getting the pings, FOR TWO F&%$KING HOURS, you don't just lose GPS coordinates!!! Just drop the reciever even deeper in that exact same area. Something very fishy here imo

[seveneyes]

1. It makes no sense unless the batteries died

Or the original ping locations were not documented. Incompetence or dead batteries. No other choice imo.

[Iwasthere]

2. I'm sorry but there is no chance that they forgot to document the coodinates ...

That would be beyond incompetent

[oldhippie]

8. Ever heard of thermoclines? nt

[EX500rider]

3. Well they may just have a azimuth, need 2 fixes to triangulate? n/t

[Iwasthere]

4. Yes, in order to find the plane, I agree ...

However, to simply to relocate ping why can't they travel the same route and drop recievers even deeper, triagulation not needed. They had the pings for 2 hours straight (not a few seconds), then an additional 15 minutes on another try. They don't really want to find it imo, this is crazy!!

[ManiacJoe]

9. Exactly.

> Well they may just have a azimuth, need 2 fixes to triangulate?

[digonswine]

5. Sound travels very fast under water

if you have sat underwater while a jet ski roars across the lake, you have the idea that finding out where the sound came from is not easy.
It can be half a mile away and sound like you will be run down in no time. It does not work like sound in air.
Also--there is much disturbance of a shock wave in any fluid. or something.

[Glassunion]

6. There is a lot more to this than just returning to the same location.

[Iwasthere]

12. THEY ARE TRYING TO RELOCATE THE F%$#king PING

Sorry I screamed. very basic in my opinion; Go back to where you had pings for 2 hours, You don't need experts to determine this, JESUS! If you drop the reciever deeper at the exact spot you had pings previously and , perhaps go even deeper, and cannot get the pings at that location get again then the pinger is dead. Then start mapping. I am just saying that you don't need 4 days, WHY 4 DAYS?

[Glassunion]

14. Yes, they are trying to relocate the ping.

Yes, they can go back to the same location, however that does not automatically guarantee that they will hear it.

It is not a case of lowering the ping locator. It is designed to operate as a specific depth above the sea floor. 1000 feet, any lower and it the area that it can hear grows smaller, any higher and it can miss hearing what is below it. Given perfect conditions the pinger can be heard up to a mile away. However the ocean is not a constant. There are temperature variances, salinity variances, currents and streams at all different depths. These can actually amplify the signal to where it could be heard miles away from it's actual location or mask it even though you are very close.

4 days, is their best estimate based on weather, currents and sea surface conditions. They have to tow the locator at a very slow speed (3kts) to avoid doppler shift. They are listening for a very specific frequency of sound, if they travel too fast, as they approach it, it could increase the frequency out of the range that they are listening for or vice-versa if they are traveling away. This is an arduous process, and the best analogy that I have for it, is imagine mowing a lawn the size of Houston Texas with one lawn mower. It'll take a few days.

[jberryhill]

7. Underwater acoustic expert?

I love how everyone on DU is suddenly an expert in so many complex things. Having detected a highly attenuated signal at a location in very deep ocean doesn't pinpoint the location of jack shit.

Anything that floats is long gone from the surface from where anything is resting on the bottom of a very deep ocean. I suppose they should just swim down and have a look.

Let's say you knew, within a radius of even a few miles, where a relatively small object is resting on the bottom of the Indian Ocean. Okay, what's your next move?

It's not as if the fuselage is resting intact down there, so even if you then do a sonar survey of the bottom in this 5 mile radius (i.e. about 80 square mile) area, you are looking for things maybe twenty feet large and trying to decide whether you are seeing an object, surface irregularities, or just noise.

But, yeah, head on down there with your deep seawater penetrating super vision and sort them all out.

[Cirque du So-What]

11. Thank you

for saving me the trouble

[Iwasthere]

13. Huh?

If your wife threw your wallet out the car window along the freeway would you spend 4 days searching the on ramps north and South of the location or would you go to where she threw the wallet out the windown and search. Why are they making sweeps far away from where they heard the damn pings? That is all I am asking. Nobody seems to be asking this basic question, everyone just accepts their method; 4 additional days of trying to re-establish the pings. Doesn't take an expert

[AngryAmish]

10. I doubt they heard pings

You hear what you want to hear.

[Cirque du So-What]

15. You don't 'hear' pings

Black box pings are 37.5 kHz - well above the frequency response of the human ear. The constant interval of 1 second is also a dead giveaway. Biologics? I am incredulous. Clicks from echolocating animals like porpoises and whales are much more 'broadband,' and they don't occur at exact intervals of 1 second.

[Glassunion]

16. "Hear" is a loose term. It's still a sound wave.

You just need some equipment and software to translate the sound into something the the human ear can hear.

IIRC the frequency was chosen as it is a frequency that does not occur naturally and does not adversely effect marine life.

[Cirque du So-What]

17. Yep

The fact remains, however, that pings were detected, and it wasn't a case of 'hearing what they wanted to hear.'

[Glassunion]

19. Quite true. nt

[AngryAmish]

20. prove me wrong

It will never be found.

[Reter]

18. The whole thing smells of one big massive coverup

n/t