Cypriot airlines crashes near Athens

[Ghost_Rider]

ATHENS (Reuters) - A Cypriot airliner carrying 110 people crashed north of Athens on Sunday, Greek state television reported.
State television said there was an unconfirmed report that one of the pilots of the Helios Airlines plane had collapsed with illness just before the crash.

A Greek Defence Ministry official told Reuters the airplane had crashed in the area of Kalamos, 30 km (19 miles) north of Athens.

The official said rescue services were rushing to the scene.

The plane had been accompanied by two Greek F-16 fighter jets after losing communications with the Athens control tower on its way to the Greek capital.

Source - Reuters website

Not exactly the most riveting story on the news, but one which, perhaps unitentionally, confirms the Greek paranoia since the attacks on the World Trade Centre. I'm sure we remember the case of the British plane spotters arrested for taking photos, and this story reveals the Greeks deploying F-16 fighters as a precaution oafter losing comms with the inbound jet.

Ghost

 

[Plant-Pilot]

All the stranger though as the scrambled F-16s reported that the pilot wasn't visible in the cockpit and the co-pilot appeared to be slumped in his seat. What's going on?

Reported on CNN and BBC World

 

[goatbagthedruid]

Not exactly the most riveting story on the news, but one which, perhaps unitentionally, confirms the Greek paranoia since the attacks on the World Trade Centre. I'm sure we remember the case of the British plane spotters arrested for taking photos, and this story reveals the Greeks deploying F-16 fighters as a precaution oafter losing comms with the inbound jet.

Surely a natural precaution??

 

[Plant-Pilot]

Not exactly the most riveting story on the news, but one which, perhaps unitentionally, confirms the Greek paranoia since the attacks on the World Trade Centre. I'm sure we remember the case of the British plane spotters arrested for taking photos, and this story reveals the Greeks deploying F-16 fighters as a precaution oafter losing comms with the inbound jet.

I think you'll find that the Greeks have always been very sensitive when it comes to their military establishments having been in a 'cold war' like situation along the Greek-Turkish border for the last thirty or so years. So seeing as the arrest of plane spotters has nothing to do with 911 and most countries will scramble aircraft to see what any aircraft aproaching their airspace, that is not in communication with ATC, is doing, I fail to see the point you are trying to make.

I also fail to see how the loss of an airliner with 120(ish) people on board could not be riveting news?

 

[trickywoo56]

PP - abso-bloody-lutely!

Sky news are now reporting from PPRuNe! So that's OK then.

Woo
EGKK 08R

 

[tomahawk6]

Seem's that decompression is suspected.The media reports the aircraft has had the problem before. We lost a great golfer Payne Stewart when his private jet decompressed and eventually ran out of fuel and crashed.

 

[Fraulein]

BBC News online published a similar story to what Anya's source stated.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4150312.stm

I assume one can now only wait for the examination of the Black Box, which has apparently been recovered.

 

[Ghost_Rider]

Not exactly the most riveting story on the news, but one which, perhaps unitentionally, confirms the Greek paranoia since the attacks on the World Trade Centre. I'm sure we remember the case of the British plane spotters arrested for taking photos, and this story reveals the Greeks deploying F-16 fighters as a precaution oafter losing comms with the inbound jet.

I think you'll find that the Greeks have always been very sensitive when it comes to their military establishments having been in a 'cold war' like situation along the Greek-Turkish border for the last thirty or so years. So seeing as the arrest of plane spotters has nothing to do with 911 and most countries will scramble aircraft to see what any aircraft aproaching their airspace, that is not in communication with ATC, is doing, I fail to see the point you are trying to make.

I also fail to see how the loss of an airliner with 120(ish) people on board could not be riveting news?

PP,

I concede the point ref the Greeks' sensitivity to military establishments, but to clarify my final point. I was not saying that the news was unimportant, but was referring to the fact that it was placed significantly lower on the headline page than the "Paula Radcliffe" and "Gaza/Irsaeli" stories (although that has since changed.

I certainly consider it to be an important news story, but was indulging in a little sarcasm in respect of the Reuters web site....

Apologies if that lack of clarity offended anyone, that was not the intention.

Ghost

 

[J_D]

One of the girls at work was going to get that flight to prague, but decided not to 2 weeks ago. Talk about luck!!

 

[PartTimePongo]

Guys, some exchanges deleted or edited

Once again, the media are speculating as to the cause of the crash , and no doubt drawing heavily from PPrune and certain FI journalists.

The fact is , no one knows what caused this , until the Greek AAIB findings or the black box recordings are made known.

In the interim, please try and restrict the speculation as to responsibility, for two reasons.

1. I'm sure the maintenance staff and others are going through horrors right now

2. I am afraid , though this is NOT confirmed, there may have been British casualties on this flight.

Thanks

PTP

 

[J_D]

A friend of mine is a helios pilot, he got called on standby. He was feeding us information about what was happening. Apparently when the A/C tried contacting the pilots via radio, no answer. So The pilots and passengers were passed out before the F16's got there. Its been on the Cypriot news for most of the day.

 

[PartTimePongo]

Anya, there could be a number of reasons why there were no comms. I know you are only reporting what has been said to you, but it is still speculation till we know more.

 

[J_D]

Anya , sorry , had to edit this post. The servicing on these Jets is done in the UK amongst other places I believe , and right now, I don't think we should speculate. We still don't know the reason why both Pilot's should have been incapactitated.

www.pprune.org has a whole thread on this, including lots of people who fly these aircraft for a living.

 

[Ord_Sgt]

Hey PTP this is not prune – if you want to MOD like them sign back in and moderate on prune. WTF difference is any speculation on here got to do with anything? You think the BBC are going to take shit off here and use it in regards to an air crash report? Stop being a such a pretentious twat and thinking you are some kind of moral compass for this board. Arrrrrgggghhh!!!!!

You get it right a lot of the time but some times you really are so far up your own arrse it's not true!

 

[J_D]

PTP, before a flight it is normal for a service check. I am just saying what was passed on. Please if your going to delete my post and re-write over it let me know. Over here we were informed more to what the UK was regarding this flight. Why you think we knew the crew and passengers were all passed out by the time it crashed.

 

[PartTimePongo]

Ord, I'm not being a moral compass . People got very stressed in here last night about speculation.As a result , I had to edit and delete some posts, rather than have a series of rows break out, I felt it best not to have a load of speculative guesswork going on till we knew more.

 

[Ord_Sgt]

If we want to speculate then why not, why must we wait until we find out more? What sort of comment is that? How the hell are we going to find out more if you cull anything controversial – even prune has more outspoken posts on this subject than you will allow here. As I said this is not prune, thank fcuk. I thought this was current affairs and this is a current affair so why can it not be discussed, in full?

Some kind of misplaced desire to restrict discussion about something until the authorities have ruled on it every time a slightly controversial subject is in the news is destroying the free thinking on this place.

Like I said sometimes you get it so wrong, and increasingly so.

 

[PartTimePongo]

Ord, check your PM's please...

Anya, your post was deleted because your continued speculation led to another member, with close connections in that world going absolutely (and understandably) ballistic. I am not trying to kill debate, but it was getting very very antsy in here last night. It was either edit/delete or kill the thread.

There are people on Pprune who fly and maintain these things for a living , and even they haven't pointed fingers in that direction.

 

[J_D]

Hey just repeating what the cypriot news said. Take it up with them. Sorry!

 

[jonwilly]

As a former CAA Licenced Engineer I can assure all board members theirs nothing worse, to spoil the day of all engineers when an aircraft crashes.
If it's one of yours then Bad Day. People don't talk openly, just supicious looks and quite wispers. Reputations are ruined.
I lost count of aircrew who never came back.
I found I could live with that, bad as it is, but I could never live with Widows or Orphans, their looks are awful.
john
Oh nither I or anyone I worked with was Super Mech, the man who never made a mistake. Pilots pay the ultimate price for theirs, engineers/mechs where around for the court of enquirey.