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China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737 crashes in Guangxi region with 132 on board

If it's a nose-down crash on a 737, the first thing that comes to mind is rudder problems. The 737 was known in the 1990s to have 'rudder hard-overs', which were caused by fragments getting into the mechanisms that enabled the rudders to move. The issue was apparently fixed by Boeing back in the early 2000s, so I'd be surprised if that's what turned out to be the cause unless there was just some super bad maintenance. China's aviation authority has improved a lot over the decades - one of the safest countries in which to fly, though that wasn't always the case. China also has pretty good investigators, and they will likely ask the NTSB for support since it's an American aircraft.

God bless the souls who perished. That must have been a horrible final few moments.
 
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multivita-man said:
If it's a nose-down crash on a 737, the first thing that comes to mind is rudder problems. The 737 was known in the 1990s to have 'rudder hard-overs', which were caused by fragments getting into the mechanisms that enabled the rudders to move. The issue was apparently fixed by Boeing back in the early 2000s, so I'd be surprised if that's what turned out to be the cause unless there was just some super bad maintenance. China's aviation authority has improved a lot over the decades - one of the safest countries in which to fly, though that wasn't always the case. China also has pretty good investigators, and they will likely ask the NTSB for support since it's an American aircraft.

God bless the souls who perished. That must have been a horrible final few moments.
Click to expand...
Airframe in question was less then seven years old so a 30-year-old problem is unlikely.

Seeing the video, my first reaction is an intentional act by a pilot. Airplanes don't just fall straight down out of the sky.
 
multivita-man said:
If it's a nose-down crash on a 737, the first thing that comes to mind is rudder problems. The 737 was known in the 1990s to have 'rudder hard-overs', which were caused by fragments getting into the mechanisms that enabled the rudders to move. The issue was apparently fixed by Boeing back in the early 2000s, so I'd be surprised if that's what turned out to be the cause unless there was just some super bad maintenance. China's aviation authority has improved a lot over the decades - one of the safest countries in which to fly, though that wasn't always the case. China also has pretty good investigators, and they will likely ask the NTSB for support since it's an American aircraft.

God bless the souls who perished. That must have been a horrible final few moments.
Click to expand...
That was my first thought, though the -800 has never had any issues that I know of with that. USAir had a crash like that with a -300 in Pittsburgh.
 
Moon said:
Beijing — A China Eastern passenger jet carrying 132 people crashed in southern China on Monday, aviation authorities said. China's state-run media said the crash led to a fire on a mountain and an unknown number of casualties.

The Boeing 737-800 from Kunming city to the southern hub of Guangzhou "lost airborne contact over Wuzhou" city in the Guangxi region, the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) said in an online announcement.

“At present, it has been confirmed that this flight has crashed," the CAAC said, adding that it had activated its emergency response and "dispatched a working group to the scene." The plane was carrying 123 passengers and 9 flight crew members, the CAAC said. An earlier state media report had said there were 133 people on board.”

www.cbsnews.com

China Eastern Airlines confirms fatalities after Boeing 737 crashes in Guangxi region with 132 on board

The China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737 came down in a steep dive in a rural area near the city of Wuzhou, causing a "mountain fire" and an unknown number of deaths.
www.cbsnews.com www.cbsnews.com

—————

Major accidents like this are always heartbreaking. From the pictures I saw in the news this morning it doesn’t look like there were any survivors.

According to the local Seattle news this aircraft has been flying with China Eastern for more than 6 years and was delivered in June 2015. Boeing’s stock was down 6% this morning.
Click to expand...
This has to be an attempt to cover up the Wuhan Virus that they released...
 
Thats too bad.
The only thing I can say is by the way that jet was traveling straight down, it was probably very quick and painless way to go.
I hope it was.
Condolences to all concerned.
 
multivita-man said:
If it's a nose-down crash on a 737, the first thing that comes to mind is rudder problems. The 737 was known in the 1990s to have 'rudder hard-overs', which were caused by fragments getting into the mechanisms that enabled the rudders to move. The issue was apparently fixed by Boeing back in the early 2000s, so I'd be surprised if that's what turned out to be the cause unless there was just some super bad maintenance. China's aviation authority has improved a lot over the decades - one of the safest countries in which to fly, though that wasn't always the case. China also has pretty good investigators, and they will likely ask the NTSB for support since it's an American aircraft.

God bless the souls who perished. That must have been a horrible final few moments.
Click to expand...

That's where I was going as well.... apparently it leveled out at about 8,000 feet before it plunged again.
 
Grizzly Adams said:
Airframe in question was less then seven years old so a 30-year-old problem is unlikely.

Seeing the video, my first reaction is an intentional act by a pilot. Airplanes don't just fall straight down out of the sky.
Click to expand...
I agree - planes don't just fall straight down out of the sky, but I don't see what intentional act by a pilot could cause it to go down that way.

Here's the information I've seen & heard so far:

The plane was at the point where it begins the landing phase when something went very wrong; I heard this on a TV report.

The plane had been flying normally at a ground speed of just over 520 MPH at a steady altitude of around 29 thousand feet, then it immediately started to lose altitude extremely fast. Here's a video showing what's like a GPS map from a source called flightradar24 of the flight:



I don't know how accurate the flight data from flightradar24 is, but it seems like the plane turned into a falling rock in an instant. As far as I understand about aircraft technology, a fixed wing aircraft like the Boeing 737 can't go from flying at a ground speed of over 520 MPH at a steady altitude at one moment, to dropping like a rock the next moment. As far as I know, it would take some effort by the pilots just to change the altitude and speed by much at all. What happened doesn't seem like it was something that could be the result of pushing a button, flipping a switch, slamming on a brake, roll/pitch/yaw input, thrust reverse activation, etc. - at least as far as I know, anyways.

My guess is some sort of weird structural failure happened & to be more specific, my guess is that the wings disappeared - they might have just snapped off, not the horizontal or vertical stabilizers, but the main wings with the engines mounted on them. I'm not sure why they would've just disappeared or snapped off & the fact that whatever happened, happened right when they were about to start the landing phase makes me think that the process of beginning it might have triggered something, maybe some sort of chain reaction. I'm also guessing that some sort of maintenance procedure was messed up, perhaps something involving repair to some part of the plane's structure (although this doesn't feel that plausible to me).

The reason I think something happened to the wings to cause them to disappear is because that's the only way that I know of that a plane can go from flying fast at a steady altitude to dropping like a rock in an instant. Here's an example of a C-130 that literally had its wings snap off as it's flying & you can see that it's going from flying normally like a fixed wing aircraft should, to going straight into a free fall:

 
Last edited:
neil said:
I agree - planes don't just fall straight down out of the sky, but I don't see what intentional act by a pilot could cause it to go down that way.

Here's the information I've seen & heard so far:

The plane was at the point where it begins the landing phase when something went very wrong; I heard this on a TV report.

The plane had been flying normally at a ground speed of just over 520 MPH at a steady altitude of around 29 thousand feet, then it immediately started to lose altitude extremely fast. Here's a video showing what's like a GPS map from a source called flightradar24 of the flight:



I don't know how accurate the flight data from flightradar24 is, but it seems like the plane turned into a falling rock in an instant. As far as I understand about aircraft technology, a fixed wing aircraft like the Boeing 737 can't go from flying at a ground speed of over 520 MPH at a steady altitude at one moment, to dropping like a rock the next moment. As far as I know, it would take some effort by the pilots just to change the altitude and speed by much at all. What happened doesn't seem like it was something that could be the result of pushing a button, flipping a switch, slamming on a brake, roll/pitch/yaw input, thrust reverse activation, etc. - at least as far as I know, anyways.

My guess is some sort of weird structural failure happened & to be more specific, my guess is that the wings disappeared - they might have just snapped off, not the horizontal or vertical stabilizers, but the main wings with the engines mounted on them. I'm not sure why they would've just disappeared or snapped off & the fact that whatever happened, happened right when they were about to start the landing phase makes me think that the process of beginning it might have triggered something, maybe some sort of chain reaction. I'm also guessing that some sort of maintenance procedure was messed up, perhaps something involving repair to some part of the plane's structure (although this doesn't feel that plausible to me).

The reason I think something happened to the wings to cause them to disappear is because that's the only way that I know of that a plane can go from flying fast at a steady altitude to dropping like a rock in an instant. Here's an example of a C-130 that literally had its wings snap off as it's flying & you can see that it's going from flying normally like a fixed wing aircraft should, to going straight into a free fall:

Click to expand...

Yes, that C130 was probably over-stressed with the weight of water on board. The airframe would also be pretty old by that time, and maybe not in first-class condition.
 
PeacefulWarrior said:
Thats too bad.
The only thing I can say is by the way that jet was traveling straight down, it was probably very quick and painless way to go.
I hope it was.
Condolences to all concerned.
Click to expand...
It the moments before impact would be the absolutely terrifying for those onboard.
 
snakestretcher said:
Here:
Click to expand...


It's hard to tell from the grainy video but the plane seems to be missing wings and a tail, as if it were a missile. The g force could cause wings to snap if it was hard enough, but if that's what happened, then that points toward an intentional act by a pilot, reminiscent of the Egypt Air crash in 1999.

But again, lots of unknowns.

The rudder hard-over doesn't seem likely because Boeing addressed that issues after the 737-300, which itself was retrofitted with new components. The 737-800 is probably the best, most trouble-free version of the 737 manufactured to date, which makes it imperative that we find out exactly what happened.
 
jonny5 said:
This is a political debate forum. You posted in breaking news which requires original content to spur debate about the topic. Whats the debate?

II - All Opening Post threads posted in *BN* must have:


• Your own unique content to spur discussion
Click to expand...

Jesus ****ing Christ.
 
multivita-man said:
If it's a nose-down crash on a 737, the first thing that comes to mind is rudder problems. The 737 was known in the 1990s to have 'rudder hard-overs', which were caused by fragments getting into the mechanisms that enabled the rudders to move. The issue was apparently fixed by Boeing back in the early 2000s, so I'd be surprised if that's what turned out to be the cause unless there was just some super bad maintenance. China's aviation authority has improved a lot over the decades - one of the safest countries in which to fly, though that wasn't always the case. China also has pretty good investigators, and they will likely ask the NTSB for support since it's an American aircraft.

God bless the souls who perished. That must have been a horrible final few moments.
Click to expand...
Actually was a PCU valve malfunction. FAA made Boeing replace all of the PCU's in the 737 fleet. It would be very unlikely to be this. Also, I think all of those happened at lower altitudes during landing or approach. Not sure if a faulty rudder would have the same flight profile as this one did...

PCU=Power Control Unit. A couple of hydraulic valves that control the rudder movements.
 
tres borrachos said:
So this is a very strange and terribly sad story.
Click to expand...
There were a couple of times when I was in the military that we thought we were about to hit the ground and I know how scary that was. I can’t even imagine the terror those passengers felt as that plane nosedived into the mountains.
 
Bubber said:
Actually was a PCU valve malfunction. FAA made Boeing replace all of the PCU's in the 737 fleet. It would be very unlikely to be this. Also, I think all of those happened at lower altitudes during landing or approach. Not sure if a faulty rudder would have the same flight profile as this one did...

PCU=Power Control Unit. A couple of hydraulic valves that control the rudder movements.
Click to expand...

Correct - I had forgotten what the name of that component was, but that's exactly what it was. And you're right, the uncontrollable failures were on approach. There were incidents in mid-flight, but the fatal ones were on descent. I seem to recall that after the United and USAir crashes, pilots began training on how to recover from rudder hard-overs, but in the two fatal events, the pilots probably had no idea what was happening and they were simply too close to the ground.
 
Moon said:
There were a couple of times when I was in the military that we thought we were about to hit the ground and I know how scary that was. I can’t even imagine the terror those passengers felt as that plane nosedived into the mountains.
Click to expand...

I saw the clips on the news last night of it falling. I had the same feeling you did. I can't imagine the terror those poor people experienced. It was horrific. They knew what was coming.

It reminded me of 9/11 in that the people on Flight 11 had no idea what was coming, whereas the people on Flight 175 knew exactly what was coming.

It's very tragic.
 
neil said:
I agree - planes don't just fall straight down out of the sky, but I don't see what intentional act by a pilot could cause it to go down that way.

Here's the information I've seen & heard so far:

The plane was at the point where it begins the landing phase when something went very wrong; I heard this on a TV report.

The plane had been flying normally at a ground speed of just over 520 MPH at a steady altitude of around 29 thousand feet, then it immediately started to lose altitude extremely fast. Here's a video showing what's like a GPS map from a source called flightradar24 of the flight:



I don't know how accurate the flight data from flightradar24 is, but it seems like the plane turned into a falling rock in an instant. As far as I understand about aircraft technology, a fixed wing aircraft like the Boeing 737 can't go from flying at a ground speed of over 520 MPH at a steady altitude at one moment, to dropping like a rock the next moment. As far as I know, it would take some effort by the pilots just to change the altitude and speed by much at all. What happened doesn't seem like it was something that could be the result of pushing a button, flipping a switch, slamming on a brake, roll/pitch/yaw input, thrust reverse activation, etc. - at least as far as I know, anyways.

My guess is some sort of weird structural failure happened & to be more specific, my guess is that the wings disappeared - they might have just snapped off, not the horizontal or vertical stabilizers, but the main wings with the engines mounted on them. I'm not sure why they would've just disappeared or snapped off & the fact that whatever happened, happened right when they were about to start the landing phase makes me think that the process of beginning it might have triggered something, maybe some sort of chain reaction. I'm also guessing that some sort of maintenance procedure was messed up, perhaps something involving repair to some part of the plane's structure (although this doesn't feel that plausible to me).

The reason I think something happened to the wings to cause them to disappear is because that's the only way that I know of that a plane can go from flying fast at a steady altitude to dropping like a rock in an instant. Here's an example of a C-130 that literally had its wings snap off as it's flying & you can see that it's going from flying normally like a fixed wing aircraft should, to going straight into a free fall:

Click to expand...


Not sure the C-130 is a good comparison. That was an airtanker used on wildfires. Those aircraft go through extreme stress when dropping retardant.
If I remember correctly the cause was micro cracks that were not discovered during inspections. Cracks formed from many flight hours doing retardant drops.

If the crash was not a mechanical problem, it could have been a pilot wanting to kill themselves.
 
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