A Malaysian plane has been shot down in the Ukraine.

[WeAreEternal]

The flight mh17 from Amsterdam to kuala lumpor with 295 people on board, it was a boing 777.
It was shot down with a buk ground to air missile.
They say there are no survivors.

It's awful.

It could be that some nations have asked that figures are not released until relatives have been contacted.

As far as the Passports surviving go, random things do survive these catastrophic incidents. Look at items found amongst the a World Trade Centre debris.

merde I doubt their police response teams are up to Western standards. It's a village in the middle of nowhere (except it's a war zone which makes it even more chaotic). I'd think a lot of places around the world would react in a similar manner.

Yes but that is the route they would take from Malaysia to the UK.

Another a week, another plane and that could easily have been one of my loved ones so it has shaken me up. I hope that is acceptable to you!

Yes, it would not have burnt up in the sky. The missile would have hit the plane, making it drop, not exploding the whole thing. Debris was scattered for 15 km.

That plane did not explode in the sky, those people were aware and knew exactly what was happening to them. the pictures are horrific. I can't believe I have to watch my mother board a plane next week.

Radio 2 broadcast a piece by a New York Times journalist who is on the scene during one of their news bulletins. I won't repeat what she said about the crash site but it was very upsetting

Passports aren't shatterable, small enough that they wouldn't rip and they probably aren't very flammable either so it makes sense they would have survived.

I also hope that it would have been immediate - I guess if the cabin was ruptured then the air would have run out very quickly.

I would hope that the sudden depressurisation, at such a high altitude, of the cabin would have led to the passengers and crew passing out very quickly.

You can hope all you want, the faces of the victims speak a different story.

Well thankfully I have not seen any pictures of the victims.

A conference in Sydney has been told there were 100 HIV researchers on the flight according to Twitter reports.

I imagine passports are designed in part to survive such events.

Caution - you cannot unsee that awful video.

DH says that they probably had 90-120 seconds of knowing :( not immediate explosion in sky he thinks

I'm not watching the video. There is no need.

mabs that upsets me greatly and I hope your DH is wrong. It is my worst nightmare if I am travelling with the DCs.

if this has happened in error the wrong people are getting hold of these missiles.

The passports survived because they were inside bags. The bystanders rummaged through the bags to get them out.

Well thankfully I have not seen any pictures of the victims.

Caution - you cannot unsee that awful video.

I'm usually robust about disasters and such like but I'm going out of my way to avoid looking at any photographs, and certainly watching any videos, showing the aftermath of this tragedy. I won't gain any valuable insight or understanding from seeing such things.

Here is the link for an intercept of apparently two Rebels discussing the downing of the plane. This was posted by the Ukrainian Intelligence agency.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=VnuHxAR01Jo&feature=youtu.be

2 possibilities

1. Genuine
2. Simulated/Manipulated or spliced from previous intercepts

Having listened to it I would say that if it is a fake it is an exceptional one.

Whole thing runs just l

The hawk McCain, who was a hawk on Syria as well, has been speaking

'There's going to be hell to pay and there should be!': John McCain warns of 'incredible repercussions' if Russian forces or pro-Russian separatists downed MH17

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2696668/Theres-going-hell-pay-John-McCain-warns-incredible-repercussions-Russian-forces-pro-Russian-separatists-downed-MH17.html#ixzz37o5VuAmn

Live press conference on BBC News channel right now.

why were some of the dead naked or semi naked? How did their clothes come to be removed?

upsets me too :( but he is fairly senior in the industry so should have an idea sadly

why were some of the dead naked or semi naked? How did their clothes come to be removed?

When clothed passengers suddenly get exposed to windspeeds of hundreds of miles an hour as a plane disintegrates, clothes get ripped straight off. It's been seen many times before in other crashes.

Blast can remove clothing. Heat can cause it to burn or melt off.

thanks nauticant, didn't know that.

It has been updated again.

173 of the passengers were Dutch.