This is bad
Double plane crash over Russia. Posted 20 minutes ago. Mike, you know the probability of two planes crashing within 3 minutes of each other?
I'm guessing the odds are much higher when terrorists are aboard . . .
Who would have done this? Does Russia have troops in Iraq? If it turns out to be terrorism, I'm thinking it's probably Chechens.
Anyone have thoughts on this? Who else hates Russia?
UPDATE: Hmmm, the Herald-Sun is the only place I could find that doesn't quote Reuters. Their correspondents in Russia say the Russian Tass news agency is putting the number of people on board at 62 and 54 respectively
UPDATE MK II: From some Canadian Radio Station or something:
The plane that crashed was headed to the southern city of Volgograd, while the plane that disappeared was flying to the Black Sea resort city of Sochi, where President Vladimir Putin is vacationing, ITAR-Tass reported.
posted by Luke @ 4:27 PM
9 comments
9 Comments:
Hmm, probability of two planes crashing within three minutes of each other ... I'm going to go ahead and say 'low.' I guess that's obvious, but, seriously, think about it. There are only a few hundred planes in the air over the US, and we know that air travel is --statistically -- *much* safer than auto travel.
Now, consider that Moscow is, what GMT +3? We're on daylight savings time, so that means that they're about 7 + 3 = 10 hours ahead. The story was posted around 8PM, so, if the crash happened right before the story was published, then ... oh, wait, scratch that. It says 2256 Mosow time. The point is that it was *late* and it was in *Russia,* which means that there were *way* less planes in the air than there are, on average, in the US, which means that it is *INCREDIBLY* unlikely that the two would go down so soon together.
Still, unprobably things happen all the time. Plus, the data on plane crashes isn't simply 'natural causes' or mechanical failures or anything like that. It's everytime a plane hits the ground and wasn't meant too, including foul play. So, who knows? I guess we'll see when the news reports come in.
End note: The Reuters article author showed -- in my opinion -- immeasurable restraint in not mentioning 'terrorists' in the article. It's not like that idea wouldn't occur to people (at least, US readers) on its own.
--Mike Sheffler
I haven't read any of today's news stories because reading Luke's and Mike's blogs are about the only non-productive activity I allow myself these days. Well, OK, that right there is a blatant falsehood, but let's move on.
Suffice it to say that there is near-zero likelyhood that, without some sort of timed sabotage, two planes leaving the same airport within 5 minutes of each other would both crash at the same time, when apparently it's been YEARS since any plane has crashed leaving that airport. Additional note that the Chechen president was recently assassinated, the Chechen rebels have vowed repeated attacks on Russian central authority, and there is another election coming up there. The Chechens operate just as easily via terrorism, within Moscow, as they do via "conventional" guerilla warfare, if there is such a thing. I'll check the news in about 5 minutes and see if this post is utterly moot.
Oh by the way, actually over the U.S. at any given moment there are roughly 5000 flights in the air. Amazing,eh? Don't know about Russia.
Don Sheffler
The official death toll is still up in the air. The NY Times has reported "at least 89 from the two crashes":
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/25/international/europe/25CND-CRAS.html?hp
Russian officials are still leaning away from terrorism as the cause...
Who posted just then ---^
Anyway it's definitely fucking terrorists, despite what the official word from Russia is. One of the planes was heading toward Putin's vacation spot.
It'll be interesting to see who was on board that plane
Don, about the hundreds vs. thousands thing, I just meant jet liners and not prop planes. Still, I probably drastically understimated the air traffic.
--Mike Sheffler
So why will no one tell me what Don does?
Hmm, seems your hypothesis was correct. CNN reports that the planes were definitely downed: http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/europe/08/27/russia.planecrash/index.html, while another CNN article at Netscape (I can't find it on the normal CNN site for some reason) implicates Chechens with possible links to Al-Queda: http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/story.jsp?floc=NW_1-T&oldflok=FF-RTO-PLS&idq=/ff/story/0002/20040827/0506330815.htm&photoid=20040825MOSB121. Super.
--Mike Sheffler
Yeah I read that earlier at Wizbang (which I don't recommend reading if you have a stitch of objectivity and are anything but a rank and file right wing zealot--I cover the news so you don't have to)
That's fucking shitty, but really, who doesn't the government suspect to have "ties to al qaeda"? We know how well that hunch panned out with Saddam.
If their skin were darker, we'd be hearing of meetings betwixt Bin Ladin and the IRA . . .
Luke, when I turned 18, Mike was two weeks old.
Three months later I started at UC San Diego where I spent the next 83 years.
I tore through engineering and physics and chem for 3 years before u-turning and getting degrees in Visual Art and Communications. I am just a liberal arts guy at heart and I still can't get enough of history and culture and science. And baseball.
I have a small family and a small business and a small amount of time left over.
And right this minute I'm loopy on vicodin because I had a ROOT CANAL this morning!
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
Don Sheffler
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