Co 61
 

my question that has not been addressed is how did CNN, Foxnews and the rest of the media find out about the situation while the jet was still enroute - the passengers didn"t even know until they landed - leaked to them from Air Traffic Control, Continental ?? someone else? or are the newshounds listening in to our ATC transmissions for something to happen?

More than likely it was by listening to ATC.

I was wondering the same but I think ATC spread the news, does CO 777's have TVs so the pax had to see the coverage, but then Fox News said pax were calling people once they got reception

I doubt ATC told anyone, although it's possible that some controller went on break and called his pet reporter.

More likely some ham operator was monitoring ATC freqs and called the media.

Also, somebody could have been on a UAL flight ahead of them in the track with channel 9 active.

Ham operators have better things to do.

I think it had to come from ATC or Continental. Would the pilots on the airplane really have given the details of him being dead on the radio, or would they have referred to it as a "medical emergency".

Really? Do tell.

Here's my guess:

ACARS - Free ACARS decoder for Linux & Windows - acarsd

Take the ACARS feed and setup a script to autonomously search for keywords in real time. That's how I'd do it.

I'd imagine that on the tracks, communications of that nature would be SAT. Nav reporting would be ADS/CPDLC. I have no idea how CAL equips the 777 though.

Wow I had no idea ACARS was that easy to intercept.