FAA recommends upgrading flight recorders

The flight data recorder from SwissAir Flight 111 stopped before the plane crashed

March 9, 1999
Web posted at: 9:44 p.m. EST (0244 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Federal safety officials Tuesday recommended requiring airlines to upgrade data recorders, citing a litany of airline crashes in which the "black boxes" failed to record valuable flight information in the final minutes of an accident.

In a letter to FAA Administrator Jane Garvey, National Transportation Safety Board Chairman Jim Hall said airlines that are required to carry cockpit voice recorders (CVR) and digital flight data recorders (DFDR) should be required to be equipped with two systems -- one as close to the cockpit as practical, and the other as far from it as possible -- by January 1, 2003.

Both flight recorders on TWA Flight 800 stopped when the plane exploded

Hall also said airlines should be required, by the beginning of 2005, to have cockpit voice recorders with self-contained power, capable of recording 10 minutes whenever aircraft power is lost.

Though the data boxes are commonly called "black boxes," they are typically painted orange to increase their visibility and make them easier to recover at crash scenes.

Hall said the changes are needed because there have been 52 accidents and incidents since 1983 in which information from either a CVR or FDR or both were lost. New technology, he said, has made more reliable data recorders possible.

Among the incidents in which flight data recorders failed:

• ValuJet Flight 592: Flight recorders stopped about 40 to 50 seconds before the airplane crashed on its return to the Miami airport. All 111 passengers and crew died in the May 11, 1996, accident.

• TWA Flight 800: Both flight recorders stopped when the Boeing 747-100 exploded about 13 minutes after takeoff from New York on July 7, 1996. All 230 people aboard died.

• SilkAir Flight 185: Both flight recorders stopped before the airplane's rapid descent in the Sumatran River near Palembang, Indonesia. There were 104 fatalities in the December 19, 1997, accident.

• Swissair Flight 111: The DFDR stopped nearly 6 minutes before the MD-11 hit the water near Halifax en route from New York to Geneva. All 229 passengers and crew on board died September 2, 1998.

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