he crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 has been extraordinarily public. Investigators of aircraft accidents typically cordon off the scene immediately after a crash, and tightly control access for media and others to avoid disturbing the debris.
Because Flight 17 fell in a war zone —across farm fields and homes near where pro-Russia separatists are fighting the Ukraine government — control of the wreckage has been chaotic, and the comparatively sanitized photos typically released by aviation safety officials have been replaced by thousands of images distributed across wire services and social media.
Mapping that wreckage is intended to illustrate how Flight 17 may have come down and the geographical challenges of conducting an investigation in a war zone.
