Can you provide some sources for this information? As far as I've been able to tell, the "radar" that news services keep citing is actually the transponder. I've not seen statements that military or other organizations were actually pinging the aircraft with a radar signal from a fixed or airborne antenna.
I thought the vague (or rather clear but soon contradicted) statements about military radar were from Vietnam, which was closer to where contact was lost.
"What we have done is actually look into the recording on the radar that we have and we realised there is a possibility the aircraft did make a turnback," Rodzali Daud, the Royal Malaysian Air Force chief, told reporters at a news conference.
The problem I have with the above statement is that radar is unambiguous. Either the aircraft turned back, continued on, descended rapidly below radar coverage or broke in to bits. They all have different returns so you can't say "it may have possibly..."
> The problem I have with the above statement is that radar is unambiguous. Either the aircraft turned back, continued on, descended rapidly below radar coverage or broke in to bits. They all have different returns so you can't say "it may have possibly..."
Thanks for the specific statement.
I rather have the impression that, especially under less-than-ideal conditions (range, terrain between radar site and target, weather, etc.) radar is not unambiguous.
Also, even if it had disintegrated... Yud expect a radar (were there coverage) to pickup some of the larger bits right? Isn't a portion of 777 fuselage larger than other entire aircraft?
None of that applies here. Range at 35,000 feet for primary radar systems is over 100NM (~190km). It was a clear night over open ocean using a country's primary early warning and defense mechanism situated along the coast.
The US located the cargo door that departed from UA 811 in 1983 using radar analysis to find the part. They could see a 6meter piece of metal fall from the aircraft at 25,000 feet. 100km off shore.
The term "radar" is ambiguous, as authorities and the press use it to refer to both active sweeping radar and the passive transponder system. What they are saying above is that they were recording the transponder trace, and a change in bearing appeared to be in progress when the transponder signal ceased. But no one knows why it ceased.
