Re:The Search for MH 370 (Inmarsat)
by melling on Thursday October 16, 2014 @09:15PM
(#8468893)
Well, if we assume that we're looking for an aircraft with a few large pieces, and it's only a matter of time before cheap autonomous submersible vehicles become common, then it probably will be found some day. Might take a decade or two, but at some point we'll extensively map the rest of the oceans.
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I guess the question becomes who is going to pay for these robots? They'll need the ability to dive deep, explore, and then come up for "air" (a recharge). Those aren't going to come cheap. Perhaps the undersea cable conglomerates but it's hard to imagine the use-case for mapping inaccessible areas.
Extend past a few decades. A post-scarcity society would almost certainly search every square metre of the ocean for this airplane, assuming humans are still making decisions.
You say "post-scarcity" like it's an inevitable scenario. Resources are finite. Energy is finite. Exponential growth doesn't last forever.
Re:The Search for MH 370 (Inmarsat)
by toomuchtodo on Friday October 17, 2014 @12:29AM
(#8469424)
> Energy is finite.
With enough renewable energy from the sun, there is very little we're constrained by
http://www.sandia.gov/~jytsao/Solar%20FAQs.pdf
"All together, the technical potentials can be estimated to be: Solar electricity: 89,000 TWc · (1-0.708) · (1-0.0345) · (0.3) = 7,500 TWc Solar fuels: 89,000 TWc · (1-0.708) · (1-0.0345) · (0.1) = 2,500 TWc Solar thermal: 89,000 TWc · (1-0.708) · (1-0.0345) · (0.225) = 5,600 TWc
These are huge potentials, dwarfing by many orders of magnitude those of the other."
Extend past a few decades and you're beyond the lifetime of the black box, sadly. It would be really frustrating to finally find the plane only to never actually find out what happened.
Well, the U.S. Navy for one. Just like the air force uses drones, I expect underwater drones to come in quite handy. Submarine tracking, for example.
Re:The Search for MH 370 (Inmarsat)
by exhilaration on Thursday October 16, 2014 @09:19PM
(#8468908)
It might be covered by sediment by then.
Obviously there will be huge differences between different parts of the huge oceans, but as a single data point: I've seen photographs taken of the Titanic wreck, where still single shoes can be seen laying uncovered on the ocean floor in the vincinity...