Boeing 737 Crash in China 2022_03_21

[wingnutzster]

From a twitter share ….
9633E33A-64E4-41E0-B5A0-990582B47311.jpeg
The crash site will offer very little to work with. It saddens me even relatives will have to settle for the video as anything to hold onto to.

Inconceivable to think 133 souls and a mid-size airliner are now a littered smudge on a slope, looks like a horrible scene to investigate

[Raffles]

At least one wingtip near the main wreckage.

China_Eastern_wingtip.jpg

[ACE MAN]

I can’t recall but seem to remember a B737 incident/accident where the rudder trim was held in full deflection (it was mistaken for the flight deck door) till the point that the automation could no longer hold the desired path and let go. Imagine that is the case to the point the aircraft enters a hard rudder over and the vertical stab subsequently snaps off. Whatever it was it will be a hell of a ride. I do find these types of accident , that If it is a result of a pilot action , that the manufacturer takes the blame.

[Raffles]

I can't verify the accuracy of the source of the image

[V5 - LEO]

I can't verify the accuracy of the source of the image

....saw a program last night where a retired NTSB accident investigator alluded to this, his words, "though the footage is not clear, the image looks more like a missile than an airplane going in near vertical"

[SimplyFly]

My first reaction was similar to Jim's "planes don't do that". Having thought about it, however, that statement relies much on the normal pitch axis stability due to the forward CoG and down force (negative lift) produced by the horizontal stabilizer.

What happens if you loose the horizontal stabilizer completely? Or the complete 'tail feathers' section? Structural failure or missile, for instance.

Simpli

[Vincent]

I can't verify the accuracy of the source of the image

If thats a true image, is it just me or does the vertical tail fin (rudder stabiliser) look a bit shorter than it should be???

[wingnutzster]

I can't verify the accuracy of the source of the image

that image does not add up with what we know the crash aircraft looked like, no winglets visible, not the colors of China Eastern and there's a suspicious haze about it, I know a little bit about photo editing and image manipulation and this is very suspicious to me.

Screenshot 2022-03-22 at 09.39.50.png

[wingnutzster]

Something YouTuber Juan Brown said is that this bears resemblance to the Prime Air crash not too long ago but that was a 767 and a bizarre chain of circumstances, if there was some sort of catastrophic failure or technical issue that lead to this it almost certainly had to do with the pitch controls or trim, the apparent attempt at recovery seems to make intentional unlikely, Boeing will be watching very very closely.

[ddevos]

I can't verify the accuracy of the source of the image

If thats a true image, is it just me or does the vertical tail fin (rudder stabiliser) look a bit shorter than it should be???

Apart from that, where are the wing tips (as wingnutzster also mentioned)? If they came off on the way down, how did one end up right where the aircraft hit the ground? It seems to have been taken from the opposite side from where the video was taken. Also, a Google search on this image does not deliver any results, neither does it feature in a search on this crash. Where did this image come from, UD?

[opsmike]

I can't verify the accuracy of the source of the image

If thats a true image, is it just me or does the vertical tail fin (rudder stabiliser) look a bit shorter than it should be???

Apart from that, where are the wing tips (as wingnutzster also mentioned)? If they came off on the way down, how did one end up right where the aircraft hit the ground? It seems to have been taken from the opposite side from where the video was taken. Also, a Google search on this image does not deliver any results, neither does it feature in a search on this crash. Where did this image come from, UD?

There is a video of it doing the rounds on Facebook, this could be still from that video, i found it under Commercial Plane Lovers

[Deanw]

The video was posted earlier on this thread, but I have my doubts about that image.

[wingnutzster]

If that image turns out to be verified and true (unlikely IMHO) it shows almost the entire vertical and horizontal tailplane missing! If this was the case the separated parts will be found mostly intact away from the impact site. The colors of the aircraft in the infamous image seem closer to Atlas 767 3591, perhaps composited in an animation or recreation of that incident.

In my diagram, the solid magenta indicates approximately the areas missing from the submitted image assuming a 737-800:

Screenshot 2022-03-22 at 10.50.14.png

[V5 - LEO]

....when was last maintenance checks?

[Gandolf]

I can’t recall but seem to remember a B737 incident/accident where the rudder trim was held in full deflection (it was mistaken for the flight deck door) till the point that the automation could no longer hold the desired path and let go. Imagine that is the case to the point the aircraft enters a hard rudder over and the vertical stab subsequently snaps off. Whatever it was it will be a hell of a ride. I do find these types of accident , that If it is a result of a pilot action , that the manufacturer takes the blame.

There have also been a couple of earlier B737 aircraft that had un-commanded full rudder deflection that caused hull losses.