How much has been spent, so far, searching for Flight MH370?

[MannyGoldstein]

Last edited Sun Apr 6, 2014, 07:16 PM - Edit history (1)

Could that money have been used for something else? Could lives have been saved by it?

Thoughts?

Edit: to be clear, I'd love to find the victims, and to find out what happened. But at what point does it become too expensive given the odds of finding survivors and/or actionable information.

[femmocrat]

1. I just wonder who will pay for it?

Passengers' families are already suing the airlines.

[Lurks Often]

22. No single country pays for it all.

Each country pays for those assets that they are using in the search.

[Blue_Tires]

2. How much is spent going into space?

How much is spent for aggressive military actions?
How much was spent to map the bottom of the Challenger Deep?
How much is spent by Barcelona on player wages each season?
How much was spent trying to uncover the cause of SAA 295?

Were any of those "worth it" for the price tag?

[DrDan]

3. I think worrying about how much money has been spent is heartless

it's pretty easy to second guess these decisions . . .

and pretty easy to spend the money elsewhere if you are not a friend/relative . . . . .

[darkangel218]

4. +1

240 people died. +thousands of family members who need closure.

[DrDan]

5. yep - agree

money should not be an object right now

[oldhippie]

15. Money should never be an object .....

... when doing the things we approve of.

[MannyGoldstein]

18. What if it cost $1 trillion?

Would that be OK?

As in most things, it's a matter of degree.

[DrDan]

20. well - that is extreme - and counter-productive in terms of potential results

throwing reasonable resources at the search should not be questioned or monetized (is that a word?)

no . . . I am not going to debate what "reasonable" would entail . . . going beyond that has yet to happen

[840high]

33. +100

[Ex Lurker]

57. The marginal cost is less than you might think

If those ships and aircraft weren't searching for the black boxes, they'd be burning fuel on training exercises. This is probably more costly than standard ops in terms of resources, but they wouldn't have been sitting idle for the past month if they weren't doing this.

[onenote]

89. +1

.

[treestar]

60. +1

[Nye Bevan]

6. You're not interested in finding the wreckage so they can try to figure out what went wrong?

You know, to see if any lessons can be learned from what happened that will make other air travelers safer in the future?

[csziggy]

11. ^^this^^

For instance, it cost a lot of money to recover the black boxes from the Air France crash site, but without those the cause of the crash would never have been known. The ACARS data that had been retrieved remotely while the plane was going down did not show the real cause.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_447

While locating this crash may not tell us what happened, if the black boxes can be recovered, investigators may be able to tell us if it was a result of equipment failure so that problem can be solved.

[MannyGoldstein]

13. I am! But at what price?

When is enough, enough?

[joshcryer]

23. When hundreds of people disappear with no explanation you search until you find one.

The likely reason things have ramped up is because the window to find the black box is closing.

If it is not found then they will still search, it will just be exponentially harder... could take decades.

[zappaman]

7. Would you feel that way if your loved one went missing?

Doubt it.

[dionysus]

52. he'd blame obama first, post bad satire second, *then* demand an exhaustive search of the ocean.

[MannyGoldstein]

59. Nothing else screams "I got nothing"

like a personal attack.

[treestar]

72. +1

[GeorgeGist]

8. $3.99

[oneofthe99]

9. How much is spent on one rescue at sea for a small boat in trouble

How much is spent on a single small child missing during a search


If human life is to be judged by only dollar value then we really have fallen into the abyss

[Separation]

54. For the MH-60 Jayhawk

It's about $11,250 an hour. That's whether there are burning babies on the boat, or some snot nosed daddy's rich kids who thinks its funny to throw a mayday out there at 2am.

[Raine1967]

10. Probably not enough for the families of the lives lost.

I suspect that you have never lost someone you loved in such a fashion.

I haven't, and as thus, I think I'd be incredibly insensitive to ask such a question.

Actual people are missing and presumed dead. People who were loved. Parents, children -- grandparents...

I think their families deserve to know what happened.

[idendoit]

12. I don't know.

How much would you want spent looking for a plane that went down with you in it?

[zappaman]

14. It too bad Dick Cheney isn't a DUer...

Then this crap would have a REC.

[Skittles]

16. I feel it is important to know what happened to that plane

[nadinbrzezinski]

17. This is also a training exercise

and I mean that. So the experience the crews are getting can be used in the future for actual rescues. This was the logic behind my crews doing body recoveries from the bottom of cliffs

[MannyGoldstein]

42. Good point.

Thanks.

[Ms. Toad]

73. They are also developing two other things

One tangible, one less so -
New techniques (the new satellite tracking technique to narrow the search zone)
International cooperation for good (not just working side by side on the same things, but sharing information and engaging in cooperative problem solving)

[madinmaryland]

19. Are you SERIOUS?? This country spends upwards of $1trillion a year on the MIC,

and you are worried about the "millions" being spent to find an airplane that may have crashed in the ocean.

[MannyGoldstein]

43. Hundreds of millions.

I read today that it's more than $50 million so far, and that's only counting *some* of the costs.

We should slash MIC spending of course.

[onenote]

91. And you accept that number without any idea how it was calculated?

Most of the time estimates of the "cost" of the deployment of existing military resources is essentially pulled out of thin air and does not reflect the fact that those "costs" are close to what they would be if those resources were being utilized for other, more routine purposes.

[MannyGoldstein]

92. Well, I assume that they're being truthful

Maybe a bad assumption.

[onenote]

94. Not so much a question of truthfulness as methodology

More often than not, these cost estimates are based on some calculation of the daily cost of operating a ship or a plane, which is then divided by the number of days. But it is not as if those costs, or a very large percentage of them, wouldn't have been incurred anyway. The military doesn't pay overtime. The "sunk" (no pun intended) cost of a ship or an aircraft is essentially that and varies only marginally whether the ship is on a particular mission or simply being used for routine maneuvers, etc.

[joshcryer]

21. It's important to know what happened.

The value to aviation safety research cannot be underestimated.

[WillyT]

24. Manny My Man... I Understand What You're Saying... But...

They all, we all, would like some sort of answers...

Yet as it becomes summer here, it becomes winter there. And the search will get more and more difficult/impossible. The weather will get worse... the seas will get worse... and they might have to call the search off until the seasons change back.

MY question is why submarines aren't being used, and I'm sure they are, it's just that that sort of information is generally "not shared"...

And for future flights... a whole lot of people (flying public/Airlines) would like for this to have some reasonable explanation... otherwise more and more people will start looking for alternatives to flying.

So... for resolution, closure, fascination, anti-terrorism, catastrophic in-flight disaster, on-board fire, rapid decompresion... whatever.

And we may NEVER get the info on what it was... we may Never even get to the actual aircraft.

My prediction is that they will keep working on the search, until Winter makes it impossible.

Then they will halt, and wait for the next southern hemisphere summer.

[nadinbrzezinski]

27. HMS Tireless, a Trafalgar class British Sub

is part of the search.

[WillyT]

28. Thank You For That !!!

[nadinbrzezinski]

29. I am not exactly where I heard it, but the LA Times has it

http://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-malaysia-plane-20140403,0,274792.story#axzz2y9ioY4Kw

[WillyT]

31. Yeah... A Buddy Of Mine Had An Encounter With A U.S. Nuclear Sub That Wasn't Supposed To Be There...

[nadinbrzezinski]

32. Except that if you have a US sub playing on this one

it will be very, and I mean this, VERY public.

At this point national pride is involved.

[JI7]

25. nobody is being harmed because of this search , we spend money on all types of shit

[CFLDem]

26. Don't worry, manny!

More money can always be printed if we ever run low.

[longship]

30. No rec for you! nt

[zappaman]

34. Your edit didn't help.

You may want to consider a self delete for this garbage.
Or maybe this is a new persona?
Always a hoot, eh?

[MannyGoldstein]

36. So you believe we should spend infinity to possibly save one life.

If not, you're basically in agreement with me.

Sorry to break the news.

[zappaman]

38. You're not as clever as you think.

Sorry to break the news.

[MannyGoldstein]

39. I'm not clever - just correct in this instance

Unless you have a reasonable argument to the contrary.

On another note for future use: personal attacks are an instant giveaway that you can't argue on the merits.

[HangOnKids]

49. BINGO!

But but but those attacks and the rolling smiley are so clever!

[CJCRANE]

65. This encompasses many areas: air safety, potential terorrism, geopolitics etc.

The Chinese government and the Chinese people want to know what happened to their citizens.

The air lines and air manufacturers want to know what happened to make sure there isn't a technical issue and also to find out how it *did* happen despite all the checks and monitoring.

Intelligence agencies want to know what happened to make sure there isn't something they've missed.

So it isn't just a few missing people. The Australian Prime Minister called it an unprecedented event.

[MannyGoldstein]

67. I don't *think* you're saying we should spend infinity

Are you?

[CJCRANE]

69. No one can or would spend an infinite amount of money. That possibility doesn't exist.

That's an argument ad absurdum.

Let's see how this pans out. It looks like they're getting close.

[MannyGoldstein]

70. It demonstrates that we both agree, in principle

My original question was whether there's some way to establish a cut point.

[CJCRANE]

71. When do you stop digging for gold?

The gold might be only a foot further in, is it worth giving up now?

Or you might keep digging indefinitely and never find it.

That's a decision we all have to make in one way or another.

[Niceguy1]

35. iT is entirely up to the people

Organizations spending ths money as it is theirs to spend on what they wish to.....

[Recursion]

37. The sailors and airmen get paid no matter what

No overtime in the military, unless they've changed things since I got out. The marginal cost is whatever fuel they used that they wouldn't have used otherwise. Which isn't nothing. But a lot of those ships would have been steaming somewhere anyways, just because.

The biggest cost is that several squadrons' readiness levels get degraded as this goes on.

[MannyGoldstein]

41. You and Nadin (upthread) have good points.

Thanks.

[customerserviceguy]

40. The answer

will tell us whether we're facing a new terrorist threat, or in the alternative, something that was considered one of the safest aircraft in the world can suddenly go rogue on a crew in such a way that they're completely unable to communicate the fact that they're having trouble for several hours.

Isn't that answer worth knowing?

[The Straight Story]

44. In a civilized society dollars are a piece of paper. You keep going so long as others are willing

to keep looking. You work an extra ten minutes to contribute to the cause of helping others and collectively that ads up (for example, putting 10 min worth of your pay into an overall fund to pay for fuel/etc).

In a country where you can sink a trillion into killing thousands upon thousands for no real reason you have a lot of capital to spend before your question even breaks a sweat.

[darkangel218]

45. +1

Well said.

[Logical]

46. It is too prevent future disasters, if they find a flaw! nt

[Cali_Democrat]

47. Manny, I'm gonna go ahead and be the first to rec this thread...

because I think you need some serious help. Nobody should go through life being this callous. What if your family was on that plane? Should there be a maximum price tag when it comes to searching for them?

This is a typical conservative mentality. It reminds me of the Obamacare fight. A lot of the folks whining about the ACA, like yourself, have insurance but they don't understand what the uninsured to through and they don't care. There's just no empathy.

Please get help.

[HangOnKids]

50. Mirror

Please get one. Thanks!

[Cali_Democrat]

74. I know your secret

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4026920

[MannyGoldstein]

75. No bludgeoning, bro!

http://sync.democraticunderground.com/10024620281#post301

[Cali_Democrat]

85. Reagan or Obama?

For you, Reagan!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x761367



You also said McCain's policies would be no different than Obama's.

[MannyGoldstein]

87. Didn't Obama say that he's basically a 1980's Republican?

Although I think he's more like a 1990's Republican.

In any case, Obama has arguably been to the right of Reagan. For example, Obama boasted mightily of his austerity during a deep, deep recession.

[Cali_Democrat]

88. You'd rather overturn the election of Obama than the election of Reagan

I love that you will never be able to escape from that comment. It still haunts you to this day and I'm always happy to post it.

[MannyGoldstein]

90. I'm flattered by your personal vendetta

Creepy, but flattering nonetheless.

[JI7]

98. now i see why that "new" poster seems to have a grudge against so many

posting personal attacks against them even when the convesation has nothing to do with them.

[dionysus]

53. this is time and money that could be used to trash democrats, god dammit! get your priorities

straight, buster!

[MannyGoldstein]

58. So you're in favor of spending *infinite* money

whenever there's even the tiniest hope of helping anyone, ever?

Because otherwise, you're fundamentally in agreement with me.

What we definitely *don't* agree on is the appropriateness of personal attacks.

[CJCRANE]

97. Should we (the world) spend more than $zero?

[MannyGoldstein]

101. Of course. nt

[Demonaut]

48. cost versus return......mmmm

[dionysus]

51. well, you've found something new to complain about. maybe you can find a way to blame Obama or the

Democrats while you're at it!

[Violet_Crumble]

55. Here's a bit of a breakdown so far...

For example, HMAS Success, the Australian navy replenishment vessel that was deployed two weeks ago, costs about $550,000 a day to operate, a Defence spokesperson said.



HMAS Toowoomba was diverted a week ago to join the hunt for MH370 and has direct costs - fuel, supplies, crew wages - of $380,000 per day.

Combined, the two vessels have cost more than $10 million while in the Indian Ocean, although Defence cautioned they were scheduled to be at sea anyway, so the additional expense to taxpayers of being re-routed was ''estimated to be negligible''.

<snip>

It is also known that the US Navy has allocated $US3.6 million for the deployment of a pinger locator and underwater drone on the vessel that will search for the plane's black box recorders.

On Wednesday, the Pentagon revealed that - aside from the black box locators - it had spent $US3.3 million on its ships and aircraft during operations to locate MH370.

Vietnam, reportedly, spent more than $US8 million searching for the plane in the South China Sea.

Another major expense is the cost of as many as 12 aircraft which scour the seas for plane debris each day.

Geoffrey Dell, an air crash investigation expert from Central Queensland University, said the the daily cost of the aircraft flying 10-hour sorties each day would easily amount to $1 million a day.

Over four weeks, a conservative estimate of the cost of the airborne search - excluding the US planes - would be $25 million so far.


Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/national/costs-reveal-search-for-mh370-to-be-most-expensive-in-aviation-history-20140404-36479.html#ixzz2yBPvr1BN

I think it's fine to throw everything they've got at it while there's still a chance of finding the black box while it's giving off a signal. I expect that after that window expires things will start to wind down. There's some things where money shouldn't be a question, and finding the wreckage is one of those things...

[onenote]

93. most of those costs would have been incurred anyway

If they're based on the daily cost of "operating" a ship or aircraft, those costs are incurred whether the ship or plane' (and its crew) are in the Indian Ocean searching for 370 or are doing something else (including doing pretty much nothing).

[Hoyt]

56. As long as Obama doesn't "slash" Social Security to pay for it, I'm OK with it.

I think the expansive search is close to ending.

[maddezmom]

61. I have no problem with the amount of money the US is spending on this

The black boxes need to be found in order to find out what happened and to insure it wasn't a problem with the plane.

Do you have a cut off $$$ amount?

[CJCRANE]

62. It's not just the US, it's China, Australia, Singapore, Britain, France etc. etc.

all chipping in advice and practical help.

[maddezmom]

63. Yeah, Violet Crumble has a link up thread that. Reads down some of the costs

Money well spent, IMO.

[MannyGoldstein]

66. No $ amount

As I said upthread, as an example, most would agree that $1 trillion would be too much. But where to cut it, I don't know.

[tazkcmo]

64. I guess it depends.

Are we looking for your family members or mine?

[MannyGoldstein]

68. Hopefully it doesn't depend. nt

[tazkcmo]

86. Exactly.

It doesn't matter. Considering that money is the root of all evil with worship of invisible deities a very close second, the sooner we are rid of both the better, so I say, spend away. How about you? Do you have a cut off point in terms of money spent?

[MineralMan]

76. I saw this yesterday, and didn't comment.

You're not getting your usual positive reaction from this thread. Why is that, do you suppose? Yes, money has been spent, and by many nations, to try to find the crash site of this plane. Who benefits?

Everyone who flies on airliners; that's who. Every plane crash means that something failed, either machinery or people. In both cases, figuring out why 200+ people died while travelling is of interest to everyone who flies. Every crash results in information that may save many other lives. But only if the crash site is discovered and investigated.

When does it become too expensive? Probably never. Today, we're learning that the pingers from the plane's "black boxes" may have been located, or at least their general location. Next, they'll use submersibles to locate and photograph the crash site. After that, they'll send down deepwater manned submersibles and try to recover those black boxes. It will all cost a great deal of money.

Will you continue to decry the search for the reason this plane crashed? If you do, you will find the same negative response.

[MannyGoldstein]

78. I'm not *decrying*. I'm *questioning*.

I think that your stated position, that no amount is too much to spend on this endeavor:

When does it become too expensive? Probably never.

is extreme. Honestly, I don't believe that you truly believe that. I think that you'd agree that, say, spending the entire US GDP on this effort would not be wise.

So in the end, I suspect that you and I agree in principle, although we may not agree on where to draw the line. And I don't know where I'd draw it.

As to positive reactions... I don't post for positive reactions. I post because I have an opinion, an observation, or a question.

[MineralMan]

83. There is no line.

Once the decision is made to try to find the crash site, the work will continue until it is found. And the decision to find crash sites is always one that is made. Several countries are contributing to that search. They're all financially committed to it.

I do not believe there is a limit to this. And the search is now paying off. More money will be spent in the process, and should be spent.

I don't know why you post what you post. That's none of my business. I was just pointing out that you're not getting support for your contention that there should be a limit on expenditures for these searches. There is a reason for that. People understand why the search is important, and support it. I know that I do.

Appropriate-Way MineralManny

[LanternWaste]

77. As long as that number, whatever it is, is smaller than defense spending, it's not enough...

Tough for me to put an absolute number on it, as human life is itself, priceless. However, as long as that number, whatever it is, is exponentially and vastly smaller than defense spending, it's not enough-- as I think we should be spending more to ensure the general welfare than on ensuring we can blow the planet up seven times over...

[Dreamer Tatum]

79. If you weren't on it, I'm in favor of spending to find it. nt

[NCTraveler]

80. Multiple nations are chipping in.

I don't care of the cost, keep looking. I am actually surprised to hear this from you. Thought I was going to see the third way manny tag at the end of your post.

[randome]

82. It's Mirror-Manny. Kind of like the third Doctor. Interesting but...

[hr][font color="blue"][center]Don't ever underestimate the long-term effects of a good night's sleep.[/center][/font][hr]

[IDemo]

81. The solution to this entire fiasco

Would be to require all commercial aircraft to carry an EPIRB which would be mounted near the tail assembly and float free in a crash at sea. Additional smarts could be used to advise the unit that a put-down on water was at hand and to eject the device just prior to impact.

An Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon or EPIRB is used to alert search and rescue services in the event of an emergency.It does this by transmitting a coded message on the 406 MHz distress frequency via satellite and earth stations to the nearest rescue co-ordination centre.

Some EPIRBs also have built-in GPS which enables the rescue services to accurately locate you to +/- 50 metres.

Who uses EPIRBs?
EPIRBs are generally installed on boats and can either be operated automatically after an incident or manually. In most countries they are mandated to be used in all commercial shipping. However, they are also used on yachts and leisure boats.

http://www.epirb.com/

How does an EPIRB work?

406 MHz EPIRBs work with the Cospas-Sarsat polar orbiting satellite system, giving true global coverage. There is an alert delay of about 45 minutes dependant on when the satellites come into view on the horizon.

The satellite can determine the position of your EPIRB to within 5km (3 miles). The coded message identifies the exact vessel to which the EPIRB is registered. This information allows the rescue services to eliminate false alerts and launch an appropriate rescue.

GPS-enabled EPIRBs have a built-in transmitter which will typically alert the rescue services within 3 minutes and to a positional accuracy of +/- 50 metres (updated every 20 minutes) given a clear view skywards.

Some EPIRBs also have a secondary distress transmitter. This transmits on 121.5 MHz and is used for "homing" purposes. When the rescue services get close, this allows them to direction find on the signal. Some EPIRBs also have a high brightness LED flashing light that aids final visual location.

http://www.epirb.com/how_does_an_EPIRB_work.php

[randome]

84. But...but...the cost!

Should be well worth it.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]I'm always right. When I'm wrong I admit it.
So then I'm right about being wrong.[/center][/font][hr]

[Corruption Inc]

95. The corrupt media loves a "Still searching" story, it never ends, just like commercials

Ka-ching! They love money and nothing is above exploitation.

[JI7]

100. so you think the reason so many nations are lookiing for it is because of the Media ?