China Eastern Airlines flight MU5735: America’s NTSB is helping Chinese officials decipher black box clues
- US National Transportation Safety Board and black box makers Honeywell International are helping Chinese investigators read data from crashed plane
- NTSB and Boeing experts left for China on Friday and will follow coronavirus protocols similar to Winter Olympics to allow them to work on probe immediately
The US National Transportation Safety Board has been helping Chinese officials download two black box recorders that were damaged in the mysterious crash of a Boeing 737 aircraft on March 21.
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The second so-called black box is the flight data recorder, which captures hundreds of data parameters tracking an aircraft’s path and how its systems are performing. It was also brought to the US, said a person familiar with the effort.
Another NTSB spokesman, Eric Weiss, said he could not comment on any information involving the second recorder.
The work is being aided by technicians from Honeywell International, which made the recorders, according to another person familiar with the work. The people were granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive inquiry.
Both devices were damaged in the high-impact crash, Chinese investigators have said.
The NTSB, along with technical experts from Boeing and the US Federal Aviation Administration, is helping the Civil Aviation Administration of China under a United Nations treaty that allows participation by the country where an aircraft was built. The FAA team was not travelling at this time, the NTSB said.
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China notified the NTSB about the crash of the China Eastern Airlines 737-800 the day it occurred, triggering American participation. But restrictions because of the coronavirus delayed travel arrangements, according to earlier NTSB tweets.
The investigators will follow similar safety protocols to those used by participants in the Beijing Olympics earlier this year, limiting interaction with those not involved in the probe, the NTSB said in a tweet. The measures will allow them to begin working immediately without quarantining. The NTSB did not specify how many people on the team were bound for China.
The CAAC is leading the investigation. Traditionally in such cases, the NTSB can help search the wreckage for clues about what happened to a plane and help obtain data from the two black boxes.
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Modern crash recorders store data on computer chips that have proved highly resistant to impact and fire, but sometimes they must be repaired before the information can be retrieved.
China Eastern Airlines flight MU5735 from Kunming to Guangzhou was flying about 8,800 metres (29,000 feet) when it suddenly dove at high speeds. It slammed into a forested hillside about 160km (100 miles) from its destination, according to the CAAC.
