Airbus Redoubles Efforts to Find New Ways to Retrieve Crash Data
May 31 2016 - 7:30AM
Dow Jones News
HAMBURG, GERMANY—The challenges that accident investigators are
facing locating crash recorders from EgyptAir Flight 804 almost two
weeks after the plane went down is reinforcing efforts by Airbus to
find alternative ways to tap crucial flight data from lost
aircraft.
"This reinforces our overall approach to find solutions to get
data out of accidents as soon as possible," said Charles Champion,
Executive Vice President for engineering at Airbus Group SE's plane
making unit.
EgyptAir Flight 804 crashed into the eastern Mediterranean with
66 passengers and crew on board. The plane was flying to Cairo from
Paris.
Air-accident investigators have said the cause for the crash is
still unknown adding urgency to find the so-called black boxes that
typically provide the best clues about why a plane went down.
Investigators are in a race against time. The cockpit voice and
flight data recorders are equipped with underwater beacons to help
locate the storage devices, but the batteries on the beacons last
only 30 days.
Airbus has been pursuing a dual-track approach for alternatives
to the current problems, which have also hobbled other accidents
including the 2009 crash of an Air France flight from Rio de
Janeiro to Paris when it took about two years to recover the
storage devices.
The search for alternatives was reinforced by the March 8, 2014,
disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. The main wreckage of
the Boeing Co. 777 with 239 people onboard and its black boxes
still haven't been found.
"It is really frustrating," Mr. Champion said.
Write to Robert Wall at robert.wall@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 31, 2016 07:15 ET (11:15 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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