How does the theory of a faulty AoA sensor align with eye witness accounts of smoke coming from the plane?
Also, the altitude data seems to cut out at it's peak. Was the decent so rapid it couldn't be tracked?
Also, the altitude data seems to cut out at it's peak. Was the decent so rapid it couldn't be tracked?
They don't need to align. Eyewitness accounts are so bad, it's surprising they're allowed in court.
"Why Science Tells Us Not to Rely on Eyewitness Accounts - Eyewitness testimony is fickle and, all too often, shockingly inaccurate"
> Many researchers have created false memories in normal individuals; what is more, many of these subjects are certain that the memories are real.
> In one well-known study, Loftus and her colleague Jacqueline Pickrell gave subjects written accounts of four events, three of which they had actually experienced. The fourth story was fiction; it centered on the subject being lost in a mall or another public place when he or she was between four and six years old. A relative provided realistic details for the false story, such as a description of the mall at which the subject’s parents shopped.
> After reading each story, subjects were asked to write down what else they remembered about the incident or to indicate that they did not remember it at all. Remarkably about one third of the subjects reported partially or fully remembering the false event. In two follow-up interviews, 25 percent still claimed that they remembered the untrue story, a figure consistent with the findings of similar studies.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/do-the-eyes-have-...
The problem, he said, is that witnesses instinctively try to match events with their past experiences: ''How many plane crashes have you witnessed in real life? Probably none. But in the movies? A lot. In the movies, there's always smoke and there's always fire.''
https://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/23/weekinreview/ideas-trends...
See also “Reliability of Eyewitness Reports to a Major Aviation Accident”:
https://commons.erau.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1040&co...
[1] https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2015/05/23/eyewitness-acco...
[2] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/do-the-eyes-have-...
> Although there were considerable discrepancies between different accounts, most witnesses to the accident had seen a "streak of light" that was unanimously described as ascending, moving to a point where a large fireball appeared, with several witnesses reporting that the fireball split in two as it descended toward the water.
> 258 were characterized as "streak of light" witnesses ("an object moving in the sky... variously described [as] a point of light, fireworks, a flare, a shooting star, or something similar.") The NTSB Witness Group concluded that the streak of light reported by witnesses might have been the actual airplane during some stage of its flight before the fireball developed
> In addition, 18 witnesses reported seeing a streak of light that originated at the surface, or the horizon, which did not "appear to be consistent with the airplane's calculated flightpath and other known aspects of the accident sequence."
> [T]he NTSB noted that based on their experience in previous investigations "witness reports are often inconsistent with the known facts or with other witnesses' reports of the same events."