Air France A330 - Missing over Atantic

Posted by the Economist:

Babbage said:
MODERN airliners are are not supposed to fall out of the sky. Especially if they are highly automated, fly-by-wire passenger jets such as the Airbus 330. Like the unsinkable Titanic, the Airbus 330 was considered an unstallable aeroplane. It was equipped with digital systems that unerringly corrected for pilot error as well as any buffeting caused by bad weather. Until one fatal night two years ago, the Airbus 330 had had an exemplary safety record. What caused the Airbus 330 used on Air France flight 447 from Rio de Janeiro to Paris to plunge into the Atlantic, killing all 228 people on board, remains one of the biggest mysteries in aviation history.
Click to expand...

More at: http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2011/03/aviation_accidents
 
It's a good sign that they appear to have found the main wreckage on the ocean floor... Hopefully that means the CVR and FDR will be found soon as well.
 
They were already voicing concerns that after almost two years in saltwater, they didn't want any of the press to get their hopes up that if recovered, the data recorders would have any data intact.

But agreed, I hope they find them and the learn something.
 
Everskyward said:
Pictures
Click to expand...
Wow, that's not spread out much at all. About 1800' long and 600' wide, after having sunk 14,000'? It's going to be one helacious salvage operation. I trust they'll treat the bodies with respect. I just hope they'll be able to read the data recorders after they recover them.
 
Has there been any info on how far away the wreckage is from the original search area? Was it just missed the first time or were they not even close?
 
Weren't some of the earliest pictures of the tail section? Weeks after the accident there were pictures of the recovered vertical stabilizer, IIRC.
 
jasc15 said:
Weren't some of the earliest pictures of the tail section? Weeks after the accident there were pictures of the recovered vertical stabilizer, IIRC.
Click to expand...

That was the vertical stab found floating in the ocean - this is the rest of the empenage with passenger compartment which includes the area where the black boxes are installed.
 
jasc15 said:
Weren't some of the earliest pictures of the tail section? Weeks after the accident there were pictures of the recovered vertical stabilizer, IIRC.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I missed the caption on the picture in that link which was indeed a file photo of the vertical tail recovered much earlier in time. The article speaks of the "tail section" and "where the black boxes are normally located" which probably refers to the aft portion of the fuselage, not the vertical fin which was pictured.
 
Fearless Tower said:
FDR chassis located...still looking for the guts of it though.
Click to expand...

Wonder why they would have separated.

-edit after looking at the link- Wow. I wonder why they designed the box like that. Seems like they would want to make sure the components stayed together.
 
Last edited:
Greg Bockelman said:
Wonder why they would have separated.

-edit after looking at the link- Wow. I wonder why they designed the box like that. Seems like they would want to make sure the components stayed together.
Click to expand...

I agree with Greg..... That design is totally substandard for containing the memory part of the recorder... Absolutely idiotic...:no::no::no::yikes:
 
Fearless Tower said:
FDR chassis located...still looking for the guts of it though.
Click to expand...

They found it! :goofy:

http://www.flightglobal.com/article...flight-data-recorder-found-and-retrieved.html

Search teams have located and recovered the flight-data recorder from the crashed Air France Airbus A330-200, a month before the second anniversary of the accident.
Click to expand...

attachment.php


attachment.php


Whether the data can be retrieved remains to be seen, but it sure looks like it's in decent enough shape...
 

Attachments

  • 39440.jpg
    39440.jpg
    53.3 KB · Views: 158
  • 39439.jpg
    39439.jpg
    50.1 KB · Views: 158
Man alive.

I bet they are readable. Fervently hope so, in any event - we really need to know truly what happened here.
 
Wow. I wonder why they designed the box like that. Seems like they would want to make sure the components stayed together.
Click to expand...

Here is a wag; it is designed to separate because it has too much mass as a unit. Less damage to the module if it is alone (and lightweight). Beyond a certain G force, it splits.
As I said, a wag.
 
Good for Airbus. Had they not found it, and they lose another, it would be like how the travelling public shunned the Lockheed electra in the late 50's- Game, Set, and Match lost all at once.

Good for the hands that were lost, and for the families.
 
What do the electrical engineers on the board think about the chances of getting data out of these recovered devices?

IMO the chances are pretty good if the data is recorded on flash. Sure the chip housings might be cracked and internal leads broken, but the data should be retained, no? If the data is there then it seems plausible to retrieve it by carefully placing micro-probes on the chips.

If the data is on tape or battery-backed RAM then I am less confident.
 
I don't know about the new ones, but the old units I have played with recorded on metal wire.
 
ebacon said:
What do the electrical engineers on the board think about the chances of getting data out of these recovered devices?

IMO the chances are pretty good if the data is recorded on flash. Sure the chip housings might be cracked and internal leads broken, but the data should be retained, no? If the data is there then it seems plausible to retrieve it by carefully placing micro-probes on the chips.

If the data is on tape or battery-backed RAM then I am less confident.
Click to expand...

Not an EE yet - Gimme a few months. ;)

But, I would agree with your assessment. I doubt any of those systems use battery-backed RAM, though... And as for being on tape, if water got in there I'd say the chances probably approach zero.

However, the A330 is a relatively new design and probably had newer recorders using flash-type storage. If that is the case, I'd say chances are pretty decent. They might have to go so far as to split the chip packages, but the innards could very well be OK.

We just won't know for sure until someone tells us they've got it.
 
ebacon said:
Metal wire? Suhriously? I've never heard of such a thing.
Click to expand...
Wire recorders pre-date ferrous oxide coated acetate tape for audio recording but tape was available long before the first FDR or CVR was designed. The old analog units used wire as a magnetic medium because it can survive much greater temperature extremes and other abuse without failing. I'm very certain that the CVR and FDR in any Airbus is totally digital and stores the data in flash memory. IIRC the memory units are potted in something like wax and I suspect that chances are pretty good those units are still functional but like Ed suggested as long as the packaging of the chips themselves (ceramic or epoxy) hasn't been compromised the data will still be present and readable. If the chips were exposed to seawater the leads might have corroded off but the data would still be recoverable with some extra effort.

Some news reports have made some ridiculous statements (like that's never happened before) such as comparing the fate of the memory units to a PC tossed into the ocean at high speed.
 
gismo said:
Wire recorders pre-date ferrous oxide coated acetate tape for audio recording but tape was available long before the first FDR or CVR was designed. The old analog units used wire as a magnetic medium because it can survive much greater temperature extremes and other abuse without failing. I'm very certain that the CVR and FDR in any Airbus is totally digital and stores the data in flash memory. IIRC the memory units are potted in something like wax and I suspect that chances are pretty good those units are still functional but like Ed suggested as long as the packaging of the chips themselves (ceramic or epoxy) hasn't been compromised the data will still be present and readable. If the chips were exposed to seawater the leads might have corroded off but the data would still be recoverable with some extra effort.

Some news reports have made some ridiculous statements (like that's never happened before) such as comparing the fate of the memory units to a PC tossed into the ocean at high speed.
Click to expand...

I'm feeling ya on the mag wire. It makes sense now. Mag wire would have better data retention than competing technology at high temperature, e.g. post crash fire.

This Airbus situation of cold temperature/high pressure is a statistical outlier from a perspective of engineering planning.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
Great! Now if they can just recover usable data from them both... Haven't heard any word on that yet.
Click to expand...

From the pictures, they look to be in good shape. If the pressure didn't affect them, I am optimistic that they should have usable info.
 
I personally believe that the data integrity will be unaffected.

By the way: while I appreciate all that we learn from the CVRs and FDRs, I am glad that only transcripts, and not audio recordings, are released now. This, a matter of dignity and respect.
 
Spike while the voice recordings as the plane plummeted may not be anything but voyeuristic I would think that the voice recordings in the minutes before would in fact be helpful to learn about CRM and stress or perhaps lack there of and decision making before entering what was perhaps an avoidable situation.
 
AdamZ said:
Spike while the voice recordings as the plane plummeted may not be anything but voyeuristic I would think that the voice recordings in the minutes before would in fact be helpful to learn about CRM and stress or perhaps lack there of and decision making before entering what was perhaps an avoidable situation.
Click to expand...

Completely agree; I just don't like having the last seconds of the pilots' lives played publicly.
 
I agree with Spike. You can learn what you need from the transcript. Best to leave the dead to rest.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top