I don't see how a 42 year old plane crash has any bearing on today's air disasters??? BTW approx 300 people died in airplane crashes last year...compare that to 34,000 killed on the roads in America alone...need some perspective here.
But anyway, back to the FDR, in these days of instantaneous data traffic a black box is old technology and something similar using HF for data packets along with locator information for real time recording back on land should be installed. The only reason it isn't, is because the number of accidents per mile travelled is incredibly miniscule.
Perspective is, how many people were pedestrians and travelling in vehicles and how many were travelling in aircraft, if your going to do a comparison of that nature you also need to realise that the number of people at risk in motor accidents was also far greater. The number of people that can cause a car crash compared with the number of people that can cause an airline crash is far greater too, there are a lot more drivers than pilots.
The relevance of an old plane crash is that we need to learn from such things, road safety and airline safety is constantly being improved, This is a simple upgrade, the FDR has not changed much but is still capable of withstanding damage in most crash scenarios and all I said is that having the improved locating device located within it and capable of sending out the aircrafts location would be a good thing as this case proves, right now they are unable to locate the aircraft, yet they did know where it was, if the device that told them where it was or a duplicate device had been located in the FDR it is possible that in any crash scenario they would still know. Nothing major just an idea.
Some interesting facts and figures from the latest briefing in Malaysia.
From the MAA (Malaysian Air Administration):-
The reports of the RR engines transmitting data for 4 hours after the loss are erroneous.
The satellite photo's from China should not have been released.
The Crew's homes have not been searched by the Malaysian Police.
One has to question why anyone would (and the Press publish) a 'fake' report on the RR engine data, which can only add to the anguish of the relatives awaiting official news.
Why would the Chinese publish satellite photo's (of suspected flight wreckage) without some form of 'official' approval? A 'mistake', I don't think so..
In any other country where an unexplained aircraft loss was reported, the Police/Accident Investigators would have searched the houses of the crew almost immediately to confirm / discount a suicide attempt by the flight crew. They were quick enough to investigate and discount the 'stolen' passports....
Boeing confirmed that this particular 777 was fitted with a EDR (Engineering Data Recorder) system but that the data from this system is only uploaded from the plane after landing to the airline engineering dept.
The aircraft was also fitted with the latest ADS-B transponder but this is only accurate over land as the system does not yet cover international waters.
And the mystery deepens..
This is either the most incompetent Air Crash investigation ever, or someone knows something that they're not releasing..
It will be interesting to see if the FAA ground all Boeing 777's in the next few days "in the interests of public safety"..
Some other snippets from 'experts':-
A physicist - At 80kmph - water is harder than concrete.
An RAF SAR pilot - A person wearing a high visibility jacket is only visible at a range of in good weather and flat seas.
A Pathologist - Bodies would not surface until day 7-8 when decomposition gases make them buoyant.
A Marine Biologist - the bodies may never be found as the South China sea is a breeding ground for Sharks and March/April/May is the main breeding season....
I just hope that this latest "find" possibility is not a wild goose chase, for the sake of the relatives of passengers who must be going through agony not knowing the planes fate and this new satellite sighting is in an area nobody would have dreamed of looking.
I just found out though that although searches have been intense and international nobody has checked the airport lounge, when I lose something it is generally down the back of a chair.
If they do find the plane in this area questions will be asked, it is so "the last place you would expect to find the plane" that we all know. that is where the search should have started because whenever we lose something it is always in the last place we think of looking and the last place we look.
Of course it's always in the last place you look. Once you have found it you stop looking don't you?
