Society Talk

The flydubai drop numbers might both be right, and here's why

Following on from the GONOM post, I spent far too long on this. 14,000ft in under 30 seconds (Israeli officials, via the Guardian and Korea Herald) versus about 17,000ft in around two minutes (Al Jazeera, from Flightradar24 data).

These measure different things. One is the steepest part of the dive over a short window; the other is the whole descent over a longer one. A plane can drop 14,000ft in the worst 30 seconds and 17,000ft overall across two minutes. Also, public tracking data is based on what the aircraft broadcasts, which can have gaps or lag during unusual manoeuvres.

Not saying either outlet got it wrong. Just that 'different numbers' doesn't always mean 'someone's lying'.