I was recently having an argument with an associate who used to be an aircraft mechanic. He was very critical of Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) decision to ground their 747s claiming that they were loosing more money by parking them and not flying them.
I found his reasoning to be flawed. Firstly for an airline to ground it's fully functioning planes is mostly due to lack of passengers for that airline. To use a fully functioning 747-300 with few passengers is costly. The airline could loose more profits than gain especially due to the 747 using plenty of fuel as well as maintainance costs.
Another argument thrown was that the airline will be paying heavily for parking fees. This isn't correct. PIA being the national airline of Pakistan is owned by the government has it's main hubs at Pakistan's international airports.
This simply means the airline is using government property so it would not have to be paying parking fees.
Then came his argument that PIA should get more passengers in order to be able to use it's 747s.
What people don't know is that PIA looses most of it's international passengers to airliners in the Gulf region which offer lower fares and better timings.
It's important for people to understand the circumstances before being critical of airlines or calling for the use of certain planes which are fit to serve different markets depending on what model they are.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Strange conspiracy theories surrounding Airblue Airbus 321 plane crash.
Though this post has alot of politics in it, it still is posted in my aviation blog since it concerns an aviation incident.
An strange article has been written and spread across the internet regarding the crash of the Airblue Airbus 321 on July 28, 2010.
The article is found on many websites such as this one.
The ideas in it seem to be far fetched and seem somewhat obvious from it's flawed content. Below is the linked article quoted with my comments/corrections.
Islamabad, Pakistan (Veterans Today exclusive). Informed sources in the Government of Pakistan have told Veterans Today that they are developing “hard evidence” indicating the Jet Blue Airbus 320 that crashed July 28th outside Islamabad was a terrorist hijacking tied to rogue American security forces operating inside that country.
Firstly, the name of the airline is Airblue. Jet Blue is the name of a private airline in America which has been confused with Pakistan's Airblue due to the similarity of their names.
These careless mistakes make theories like these look less credible.
Secondly the plane was an Airbus 321 not Airbus 320. The Airbus 321 is a longer, stretched version of the Airbus 320.
Sources indicate that the plane crash was an unsuccessful hijacking attempt intended to crash into the nuclear weapons facility at Kahuta, outside Islamabad. Such an attack may have been blamed on India and would likely have led to retaliation which could easily have escalated to a nuclear exchange between these two nations that have spent decades at each other’s throats.
Exactly which hijacker would sacrifice his/her own life to achieve their goals? The only hijacker I can think of to do such as thing would be a Tamil militant from Sri Lanka or a radical Islamist militant. The Tamil Tigers are known for sending their members on suicide bombing missions.
If I'm not mistaken, the cases of suicide bombings by Tamil Tiger militants outnumber the suicide attacks by Islamists worldwide, though I'm not sure.
I would rule out Islamists as they would not carry out a suicide mission against weapons that cannot be used against them by the Pakistani military due to the risk of nuclear leak as a result of such action.
The Islamists best targets are government facilities and public infrastructure.
Suspicions were raised inside Pakistan’s military and intelligence organizations when American military contractors employed by Blackwater/XE showed up on the scene immediately after the crash, seizing the black box and “other materials.” There is no confirmation that parachutes or electronic equipment had been removed when Blackwater/Xe security relinquished control of the crash scene to Pakistani investigators.
This whole Blackwater/XE presence in Pakistan is a paranoia that seems to be spread by rumors is now becoming an "explanation" for every major accident in the country.
Royal Television in Islamabad, owned by the brother of the head of Pakistan’s powerful JI (Jamate Islami), the Islamic political party, has reported that investigations are underway tying American based contractors to the planning of the attack.
Jamate Islami seems like another fundamentalist party and it's well known that the Islamists exaggerate the involvement of Western governments and agencies in incidents without evidence. If this claim is coming from them it's hard to believe.
Pakistan’s ISRP (Inter-Services Public Relations) has failed to confirm this but private sources indicate that an active investigation of these allegations is, not only underway but has established ties between an American group and the hijackers.
These private sources make these claims sound even less believable. Further more where is the evidence or proof that there was a a Blackwater/XE unit at the scene? Any photos or video clips or equipment left behind?
Military and intelligence officials inside Pakistan, in concert with the American embassy, are withholding all official details of the investigation and are likely to continue doing so.
This paragraph alone shows the bias and lack of credibility of the article. No evidence, no clues.
This same facility had been the subject of an armed penetration by American contractors, believed to be employed by the State Department, in 2009. Four Blackwater employees, armed and possessing explosives were arrested outside the Kahuta nuclear facility in 2009. The four, driving a Jeep 4×4 and possessing advanced surveillance and jamming equipment of Israeli manufacture, were intercepted 1.5 miles from the Kahuta nuclear facility.
Why was there no full coverage of this incident? This is only another unproven rumor.
The four spoke fluent Pushtu and were dressed in a manner as to resemble Taliban fighters. The order for their release, given by Minister of the Interior Rehman Malik, is an issue of considerable controversy between the civilian government in Pakistan and the powerful military.
Again why no sources? Why no evidence or documentation of this incident?
The passenger jet with 152 on board slammed into a hillside in what was believed to be Pakistan’s most serious air crash. At least 2 Americans were believed to be on board but, a month later, the US Embassy in Islamabad has left this unconfirmed. Reports received today, however, confirm that at least 5 Americans, military contractors said to be employed by Xe, may also have been on the craft but could not be identified as they had been traveling in local garb and had boarded with false identification.
Which reports? Why no citation at least if not any links? And an A320 cannot carry up to 150 passengers, that is the average passenger load for the A321.
Xe is an American based military and intelligence contracting firm formerly known as Blackwater and has been the subject of considerable controversy for activities inside Pakistan.
Which I have already covered in another post of mine linked above.
Sources indicate that the attackers stormed the cockpit in a hijacking attempt. The pilot is said to have jammed the flight controls, careening the Airbus 320 and all aboard into a hillside rather than allowing the plane to be used in a “9/11″ type attack inside Pakistan or flown into Indian air space for a repeat of the 2008 Mumbai attack.
Pakistan has, at times in error, referred to American contractors employed by the Departments of Defense, State or the Central Intelligence Agency as Blackwater. However, it is believed the majority of such employees are, in fact, members of that organization or is derivative, Xe.
Since when do American contractors sell their own lives? Since when are American contractors Islamists who are willing to sacrifice their lives for a cause they believe in?
Again where is the evidence if any? Have there been cases of XE employees carrying out suicide missions? If so which ones? And again the plane was an Airbus 321 not Airbus 320.
Here are pictures of a jetblue A320 (click on images to enlarge):
And an airblue A321:
The same group, often criticized for irregularities in Iraq, has been contracted by the Central Intelligence Agency to operate Predator drones inside Pakistan, operations that have resulted in a significant number of civilian deaths and said by political leaders of several factions to do little but recruit terrorists.
According to sources these predator drones are operated by the CIA themselves, why would they need XE to do it?
My conclusive belief of this article is that it promotes a conspiracy theory with such inaccuracy that the article itself seems to be a conspiracy theory.
By that I mean the article seems to be fabricated and seems to deliberately contain mistakes and unbelievable theories that it's almost meant to make other conspiracy theories look silly.
An strange article has been written and spread across the internet regarding the crash of the Airblue Airbus 321 on July 28, 2010.
The article is found on many websites such as this one.
The ideas in it seem to be far fetched and seem somewhat obvious from it's flawed content. Below is the linked article quoted with my comments/corrections.
Islamabad, Pakistan (Veterans Today exclusive). Informed sources in the Government of Pakistan have told Veterans Today that they are developing “hard evidence” indicating the Jet Blue Airbus 320 that crashed July 28th outside Islamabad was a terrorist hijacking tied to rogue American security forces operating inside that country.
Firstly, the name of the airline is Airblue. Jet Blue is the name of a private airline in America which has been confused with Pakistan's Airblue due to the similarity of their names.
These careless mistakes make theories like these look less credible.
Secondly the plane was an Airbus 321 not Airbus 320. The Airbus 321 is a longer, stretched version of the Airbus 320.
Sources indicate that the plane crash was an unsuccessful hijacking attempt intended to crash into the nuclear weapons facility at Kahuta, outside Islamabad. Such an attack may have been blamed on India and would likely have led to retaliation which could easily have escalated to a nuclear exchange between these two nations that have spent decades at each other’s throats.
Exactly which hijacker would sacrifice his/her own life to achieve their goals? The only hijacker I can think of to do such as thing would be a Tamil militant from Sri Lanka or a radical Islamist militant. The Tamil Tigers are known for sending their members on suicide bombing missions.
If I'm not mistaken, the cases of suicide bombings by Tamil Tiger militants outnumber the suicide attacks by Islamists worldwide, though I'm not sure.
I would rule out Islamists as they would not carry out a suicide mission against weapons that cannot be used against them by the Pakistani military due to the risk of nuclear leak as a result of such action.
The Islamists best targets are government facilities and public infrastructure.
Suspicions were raised inside Pakistan’s military and intelligence organizations when American military contractors employed by Blackwater/XE showed up on the scene immediately after the crash, seizing the black box and “other materials.” There is no confirmation that parachutes or electronic equipment had been removed when Blackwater/Xe security relinquished control of the crash scene to Pakistani investigators.
This whole Blackwater/XE presence in Pakistan is a paranoia that seems to be spread by rumors is now becoming an "explanation" for every major accident in the country.
Royal Television in Islamabad, owned by the brother of the head of Pakistan’s powerful JI (Jamate Islami), the Islamic political party, has reported that investigations are underway tying American based contractors to the planning of the attack.
Jamate Islami seems like another fundamentalist party and it's well known that the Islamists exaggerate the involvement of Western governments and agencies in incidents without evidence. If this claim is coming from them it's hard to believe.
Pakistan’s ISRP (Inter-Services Public Relations) has failed to confirm this but private sources indicate that an active investigation of these allegations is, not only underway but has established ties between an American group and the hijackers.
These private sources make these claims sound even less believable. Further more where is the evidence or proof that there was a a Blackwater/XE unit at the scene? Any photos or video clips or equipment left behind?
Military and intelligence officials inside Pakistan, in concert with the American embassy, are withholding all official details of the investigation and are likely to continue doing so.
This paragraph alone shows the bias and lack of credibility of the article. No evidence, no clues.
This same facility had been the subject of an armed penetration by American contractors, believed to be employed by the State Department, in 2009. Four Blackwater employees, armed and possessing explosives were arrested outside the Kahuta nuclear facility in 2009. The four, driving a Jeep 4×4 and possessing advanced surveillance and jamming equipment of Israeli manufacture, were intercepted 1.5 miles from the Kahuta nuclear facility.
Why was there no full coverage of this incident? This is only another unproven rumor.
The four spoke fluent Pushtu and were dressed in a manner as to resemble Taliban fighters. The order for their release, given by Minister of the Interior Rehman Malik, is an issue of considerable controversy between the civilian government in Pakistan and the powerful military.
Again why no sources? Why no evidence or documentation of this incident?
The passenger jet with 152 on board slammed into a hillside in what was believed to be Pakistan’s most serious air crash. At least 2 Americans were believed to be on board but, a month later, the US Embassy in Islamabad has left this unconfirmed. Reports received today, however, confirm that at least 5 Americans, military contractors said to be employed by Xe, may also have been on the craft but could not be identified as they had been traveling in local garb and had boarded with false identification.
Which reports? Why no citation at least if not any links? And an A320 cannot carry up to 150 passengers, that is the average passenger load for the A321.
Xe is an American based military and intelligence contracting firm formerly known as Blackwater and has been the subject of considerable controversy for activities inside Pakistan.
Which I have already covered in another post of mine linked above.
Sources indicate that the attackers stormed the cockpit in a hijacking attempt. The pilot is said to have jammed the flight controls, careening the Airbus 320 and all aboard into a hillside rather than allowing the plane to be used in a “9/11″ type attack inside Pakistan or flown into Indian air space for a repeat of the 2008 Mumbai attack.
Pakistan has, at times in error, referred to American contractors employed by the Departments of Defense, State or the Central Intelligence Agency as Blackwater. However, it is believed the majority of such employees are, in fact, members of that organization or is derivative, Xe.
Since when do American contractors sell their own lives? Since when are American contractors Islamists who are willing to sacrifice their lives for a cause they believe in?
Again where is the evidence if any? Have there been cases of XE employees carrying out suicide missions? If so which ones? And again the plane was an Airbus 321 not Airbus 320.
Here are pictures of a jetblue A320 (click on images to enlarge):
And an airblue A321:
The same group, often criticized for irregularities in Iraq, has been contracted by the Central Intelligence Agency to operate Predator drones inside Pakistan, operations that have resulted in a significant number of civilian deaths and said by political leaders of several factions to do little but recruit terrorists.
According to sources these predator drones are operated by the CIA themselves, why would they need XE to do it?
My conclusive belief of this article is that it promotes a conspiracy theory with such inaccuracy that the article itself seems to be a conspiracy theory.
By that I mean the article seems to be fabricated and seems to deliberately contain mistakes and unbelievable theories that it's almost meant to make other conspiracy theories look silly.
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