Searching for a Remnant in Pixels and Static: The Fleeting Materiality of Plane Crashes
by Kathleen Williams
Abstract:
Following the disappearance of flight MH370 in 2014, citizens, national governments, and agencies searched for acoustic and visual remnants of the plane in order to make sense of the tragic crisis. By turning to the physical and discursive remnants left in the absence of a plane, I argue that planes offer an insight into the role that materiality plays in a crisis, mitigating uncontrollable relationships between humans and their environment. This paper draws upon mass media coverage of the crisis in conjunction with recordings to recreate a visual assemblage of the impact of a missing plane in a globalized world. Extending existing studies of MH370 to conceptualize what a missing plane can mean for mediated materiality, I consider the relations between movement, the ocean, sound, and pixels in order to demonstrate how the material losses of a plane crash make material the networks and methods that connect us across the globe in their failure and absence.
Keywords: plane crash, disaster, broadcast, media technologies, news media
How to cite: Williams, Kathleen. “Searching for a Remnant in Pixels and Static: The Fleeting Materiality of Plane Crashes.” MAST, vol. 1, no. 2, Nov. 2020, pp. 124-147.
Copyright is retained by the authors.
© 2020 Kathleen Williams
Issue: vol. 1 no. 2 (2020): Special Issue: Media, Materiality, and Emergency
Section: Article
Guest Editor: Timothy Barker
Published: 13 November, 2020
