There should be an easily calculable track of the missing aircraft. .....
Easily calculable? ...... The map shows a nice sharp red line. I rather suspect it should be a very wide fuzzy line. Perhaps hundreds of kilometers wide.
Well, I've finally found a link from a source who actually has some real expertise in this technology, and what kind of accuracy might be expected:
Understanding "satellite pings"It is a rather long article, but well worth reading in it's entirety. Regarding the accuracy of the now famous red line on the map, it says:
We can see that the search locations are based on exactly these curves at a given distance from the sub-satellite point. However, it is unlikely that the measurements are more accurate than within say 100 miles.
Note that "100 miles" works out to about 160 km, so my wild guess regarding the accuracy wasn't too far off.
The author Tim Farrar is the founder of
TMF Associates which "....is a consulting and research firm based in Menlo Park, CA. We focus on business planning, technical analysis, financial and spectrum valuations and expert witness services in the satellite and telecom sectors and have particular expertise in Mobile Satellite Services (MSS), where we have worked for almost all of the leading operators over the last decade..."
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