this post was submitted on 08 Jan 2024
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The cockpit voice recorder data on the Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 MAX 9 jet which lost a panel mid-flight on Friday was overwritten, U.S. authorities said, renewing attention on an industry call for longer in-flight recordings.

National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) chair Jennifer Homendy said on Sunday no data was available on the cockpit voice recorder because it was not retrieved within two hours - when recording restarts, erasing previous data.

The U.S. requires cockpit voice recorders to log two hours of data versus 25 hours in Europe for planes made after 2021.

The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) has since 2016 called for 25-hour recording on planes manufactured from 2021.

"There was a lot going on, on the flight deck and on the plane. It's a very chaotic event. The circuit breaker for the CVR (cockpit voice recorder) was not pulled. The maintenance team went out to get it, but it was right at about the two-hour mark," Homendy said.

The NTSB has been vocal in calling for the U.S. to extend its rule to 25 hours. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) a month ago said it was proposing to extend to 25 hours – but only for new aircraft.

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[–] [email protected] 97 points 10 months ago (9 children)

Why the fuck would they have only hours of recording? Even my cheap voice recorder can go for hundreds of hours

[–] [email protected] 90 points 10 months ago (1 children)

An example of a corporation doing the bare minimum required by law.

Laws which they've lobbied and used regulatory capture to slow any updates.

Regulations are important.

These regulations were written a long time ago when physical tape was used. Boeing has since captured the American regulatory system.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It's an example of engineers being handed a requirement and meeting it.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago (1 children)

No. If an engineer were to design this system today, it'd have hundreds of hours of recording.

This is either a mandate from management, a relic from old systems that haven't been updated, or a combination.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago (1 children)

The FAA reqs are the relic. You don't just get to go nuts and add whatever you want to a product - especially on airplanes. They were given the requirements and met them.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (2 children)

I'm sure the FAA reqs specify a minimum.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago

Yeah, that's my point. The minimum is 2 hours. We deal with a lot of minimums and the culture doesn't really involve going past requirements. This is something you probably buy, rather than make in house (though I may be mistaken), so you're just going to find the one that meets minimum specs.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Huh. What do I think? Let me tell you what I think, Stan. If you want Boeing to have 25 hours of audio like your pretty boy EASA over there, then why don't you just make the minimum 25 hours of audio?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

I agree. In fact it should probably be 240 hours of audio. I was simply refuting the slander on random engineers, as though they're the ones who made the choice of only two hours.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 10 months ago (1 children)

To be entirely fair your cheap voice recorder is not expected to also survive a plane crash. That being said European planes have more without issue so yeah.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Oopsie whoopsie. Looks like I deleted the evidence against me and I'll go free now...

[–] [email protected] 17 points 10 months ago (2 children)

This isn't entirely an excuse, but a CVR has some pretty serious durability requirements. They're required to withstand physical forces, sustained exposure to direct flame, lengthy submersion in sea water...it's not a trivial device.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (1 children)

How much could a banana cost, Michael? 10 bucks?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

Here's some money, go see a Star War

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

On top of all that, you have to factor in the development and testing costs for the CVR or FDR too. These are usually off the shelf, previously developed components. A seemingly trivial change like bigger storage suddenly costs several hundred thousand dollars to retest and time to recertify by dozens with agencies around the world. If the regulations have not changed, then there is no reason for to go through that whole R&D process again when the same bought and paid for system works.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (1 children)

....which you'd think has all already been done, since Europe pretty much uses the same airplanes as the US, so compatible equipment ought to exist.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

You have to recertify the component on each aircraft you install it on. If the manufacturer doesn't have a reason to update a component they won't recertify it.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago

To be fair, your voice recorder probably can't withstand being slammed into the ground at 500mph...:P

[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago

Even my cheap voice recorder can go for hundreds of hours

Only marginally related, but I run into this a lot with "Why can't I have more space in my homedir? I can go buy a disk from BestBuy and it's only $50." The two products - a TEAM disk from BB and the media approved for enterprise (let alone emergency/recovery) work are from two different worlds.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago

Probably when these regulations were put in place in the 1960s or whenever, there were technical limitations on these recording devices.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

Yeah that’s pretty goddamned short. If you can only record two hours you’d better not have flights longer than that.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Flight recorders have a very long history with modern ones being engineered in the 1960s. They used film and magnetic tape loops, having very limited capacity. That's where we get 2 hours from. Early ones only ran for 30 minutes, so 2 hours is pretty good in comparison.

It's time to upgrade the regulations to match our current technology instead of 1990s limitations.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Modern ones are solid state and the owner can choose how long they want to record for. Most ETOPS aircraft will record for much longer than 2 hours. I believe my airline records for 25 hours, even though our aircraft are not based in Europe.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Absolutely. My comment is about why a regulation would be 2 hours when today we can get more capable, air rated parts. US regulation is lagging behind, but it was based on what was within reach 20+ years ago. Heck, I bet most craft would eventually become 25 hours voice recording as older standard recorders become no longer available.