All airplanes of this calibur have a certian degree of stress that it's body can go through, we call it the G loading, before seperation occurs. They are tested for conditions that we usually don't operate in.
I had a look at the radar shot this morning when I heard about this, and it was not pretty. A line from South America to Africa of thunderstorms, some severe cells associated. What you get with thunderstorms is a high updrafts and downdrafts wich will cause the airplane to either climb or drop at high rates, up to 6,000 feet per minute and higher. This is severe turbulance and will lead to a high G Loading on the wings of the airplane, and may cause inflight seperation. Now the airplane flew through some turbulance and reported it to controllers, then the airplane's ACARS system, sent an automated message to Air France headquarters advising of a maintenance issue. This issue dealt with electricity onboard. Airplanes generate their own electricity, and have backups, either APU (auxilary power unit), or batteries. Now this could indicate that it got struck by lightning, which sometimes has minimal effect on the flight, and othertimes may cause significant issues to the airplane.
Having to ditch in the Atlantic ocean, blind (no electrical power), in the dark, and ditching in severe weather in the ocean is not a scenario that can have a high survivability rate.
I know I drew a dark and gloomy picture, and my hopes are for a miracle.
p.s. I don't want people thinking that turbulance = crash. Let's make it clear that every flight goes through bumpy weather, so don't be afraid of flying, and next time you fly and hit a bump, don't start screaming and yelling. Air is like water, when you're riding a boat in the water, you will hit waves. Similarly, when flying in the air, you will hit waves as well. So next time you're flying, think of it as riding a boat. It's all fluid.
Aren't airplanes supposed to be shielded by a farady cage type of shield and even if lightning hits it, there is no passage to earth so why would lightning affect it?
Older airplanes are made of alunimum, which will form a faraday cage and protect the occupents of the vessel. These newer airplanes are made up of composite material, yet they will also protect the passengers and crew using the same theory.
There are several factors that have to be met for the occupents of the vessel to be protected by the electrical charge.
Lighting does not usually bring an airplane down. You can lose an engine, or electrical power, however not structural damage.
What's associated with lightning is the issue. Lightning is associated with thunderstorms, and as stated above, thunderstorms bring with them turbulance. When you look at the sky and see clouds that are of vertical shape and not horizontal form, you can be assured that if you go flying, there will be turbulance. Clouds of vertical shape suggest vertical flow of air. Thunderstorm cells are called CB cells, i.e. cumulo-nimbus. They can be as high as 40,000 feet high and in the shape of a mushroom cloud. A small droplet of water can ride the vertical lift from the base of the cloud, and by the time it reaches the top of the cloud at 40,000 feet and gets spat out once it reaches the jetstream, it can be the size of a basketball moving at a few hundred kilometers per hour. As the small drop rides the vertical lift inside the cloud, it coalesce with other droplets of water, gets high enough that it now freezes, and further coalesces with more of its buddies, and now you've got a big a$$ frozen basketball coming at you.
As you can see, thunderstorms are to be avoided like the plague.
the cage will protect from electromagnetic interference for a given range of frequencies, but if the plane was hit by a direct bolt of electricity, the discharge could cause some serious damage to the electronics on board mainly due to a current surge, the discharge will reek havoc onboard if the paratonnaire's design is flawed.
Airplanes fuselage is made of Alumunium, Alu is a good conductor so when a lightning hits a plane it keeps flowing around the fuselage until it slowly dissipates in the air. Airplanes are regularly hit by lightning even when there is no storm, airplanes flying hitting constantly particles of airs will form enough static charge to create its own lighting, however since airplanes are far from earth and corona effect is quasi-absent, then there is no passage to ground there shouldn't be a discharge into electronic equipment. In fact the only danger from lightning should be when plane is departing, arriving or still on the ground. In fact I've never heard before of a plane that went down because it was hit by lightning.
This is a normal occurance when flying through given parameters. These are not lightining, but St. Elmo's Fire. It's a long topic for those who are interested in this field.
Inside the cockpit you can see two weather radars. Green and yellow are ok, but red you avoid. If it's purple or pink, expect to see cow's flying by.
PARIS (AFP) - Les 228 personnes qui se trouvaient à bord du vol Rio-Paris d'Air France, disparu lundi au-dessus de l'Atlantique, appartenaient à 32 nationalités, dont 73 Français, 58 Brésiliens et 26 Allemands, a annoncé lundi à l'AFP le ministère français des Transports.
Selon le ministère, outre 61 passagers, les 12 membres de l'équipage sont tous français.
Le directeur général d'Air France, Pierre-Henri Gourgeon, a expliqué que différents décomptes ont pu être établis jusqu'à présent en raison de plusieurs cas de passagers dont la double nationalité a dû être vérifiée.
Voici le décompte par nationalité des 216 personnes à bord de l'Airbus A330:
1st June 2009
God be with her, parents and family 
