Presuming they lost the battle, instrumentation/ap would drop out. Eventually, the fire would burn through the cockpit (see pictures above) and depressurize the a/c. Fire would then go out. Engines would keep going.
Eventually, someone will correlate wind directions with any required in-flight cg changes (fuel tanking) not being completed and I won't be surprised if a pattern emerges.
Interesting. Except is it really possible for a 777 that just had its entire avionics destroyed by a fire and a total loss of cabin pressure at 35k feet to maintain relatively level and straight flight? If the fire is really that catastrophic, I would reckon the plane would crash soon thereafter. It would also be unprecedented (as far as I know) to have the crew aware of a fire and unable to alert the ground (either because the comms were inoperative or the pilots were incapacitated). Also, another pilot is now claiming he established radio contact with 370 at 1:30, but that it was "mumbled" and brief. I guess the radio was working and there was a butt in the seat?
I dunno. Who am I kidding, it's all circumstantial at this point.
EDIT: I'm not sure if the Cairo incident is a good example of how quickly a fire can overcome a crew. They were on the ground with the jetway still connected, so it's quite a different situation.
Well, didn't maintain level and straight flight. The damage would probably not be as bad as Egypt Air, because any small hole would immediately depressurize the a/c, whereas EA kept burning for 20 minutes.
Well it should not be too difficult to locate maintenance and build records to determine if such an issue could have existed with the this plane and if it were corrected or not.
However as someone pointed out, could it really continue to fly at this point, let alone where did the debris go?
http://www.avherald.com/h?article=44078aa7&opt=0
Presuming they lost the battle, instrumentation/ap would drop out. Eventually, the fire would burn through the cockpit (see pictures above) and depressurize the a/c. Fire would then go out. Engines would keep going.
Eventually, someone will correlate wind directions with any required in-flight cg changes (fuel tanking) not being completed and I won't be surprised if a pattern emerges.