Statement from @germanwings on the French Alps crash: http://yhoo.it/1N450eH
AFP: Plane was at 5,000 feet - Alain Vidalies, minister of state for transport, said: “A distress call was registered at 10:47. The distress signal showed the plane was at 5,000 feet in an abnormal situation.”
The crash happened shortly after the distress signal, he said.
Won’t be able to make this one disappear.
Spain’s deputy PM says 45 passengers are believed to be Spanish.
SKY News: Anthony Davis, aviation journalist, told Sky News: “The log suggests (the plane) went straight down at a significant rate, up to 5,000 feet per minute at one point, which suggests it happened in a matter of seconds.
“It is unlikely the passengers on board would have known anything about this.
”As far as I am aware that the pilots did not send a typical distress call, a squawk of 770.
“They simply said emergency, emergency.”
AFP: Enormous noise - A police helicopter said the crash happened in a mountainous area called Les Trois Eveches, rising to 1,400 metres and very difficult to access.
A witness who was skiing in the area described having “heard an enormous noise”, a French television channel reported.
The French civil aviation authority said the plane disappeared from radar screens after issuing the distress call over Barcelonette, about 100 km north of the resoirt of Cannes.
Video of crash site: http://snpy.tv/1FT0Dk6
French President Francois Hollande said the 150 people on the flight included Germans, Spaniards and “probably” Turks.
SKY News: Aviation journalist Anthony Davis says the Airbus A320’s rate of descent was “unprecedented”, suggesting a “catastrophic” event of some kind.
AFP: Difficult terrain - “Land access is horrible,” Francoise Pie, a resident of nearby Seyne-les-Alpes, told AFP’s Isabel Malsang.
“I know the Estrop mountain range. It is very high mountain. It is very steep and it is terrible to access during the winter other than by air.
“I wonder if he diverted the plane so as not to crash in the valley, where people live,” Pie said.
Statement from @germanwings on the French Alps crash: http://yhoo.it/1N450eH
Paris (AFP) - No winter access - “In summer you can reach it on foot but in the winter you generally stop before getting there,” said a resident of Meolans Revel, the other side of the mountain from the crash site.
FoxNews
France reporting debris area covers about 5 acres and bodies can be seen. Area unreachable by vehicles, but is area for skiers and hikers.
FoxNews
Witnesses on ground report hearing ‘long noise’ as plane flew over.
==
Consultant: something catastrophic happened ...
Bump.
Mirages flew by - Meolans Revel local councillor Thierry Brown tells AFP’s Isabelle Malsang: “The only thing we noticed was three Mirage fighter planes flying over, at least three times, around the supposed time of the crash.
Paris (AFP) - Sky was clear - Brown adds: “Estrop Head has very steep escarpment. No access is possible except on summer hiking routes. I imagine the rescue will be done completely by helicopter. I can hear helicopters overhead at the moment.”
The sky was clear this morning, with no rain, Brown tells AFP.
Some TV talking heads area saying that the plane had an orderly descent for 10-13 minutes. Cabin pressure problem? Auto pilot and incapacitated crew? Only one distress call? Weird.
It looks like the crash occurred near Digne, a town I visited in 1966 (we pronounced it “dig knee”). It’s located at the bottom of a deep valley in rugged terrain that reminds one of California’s San Gabriel Mountains.
Paris (AFP) - Colonel Jean-Pascal Breton, head of French air force information service SIRPA Air, explains the overflights by Mirage military planes, saying they went to the area of the crash to provide radio links between the various rescue services.
“At 1,700 metres, the radio doesn’t work as the mountains block signals. To coordinate the operation you need radio links. That is what the fighter aircraft are doing. So the helicopters talk via the airborne plane,” Breton says.
Other resources will be brought in this afternoon, possibly including an AWACS (surveillance) plane, he adds.
Dai Whittingham, from the UK Flight Safety Committee, told Sky News: “I suspect (the plane) was not at that altitude for the sake of being at that altitude. You don’t fly big airliners through the alps. You just don’t.
“So something has gone on…. The crew were clearly overwhelmed by whatever was going on.”