The second recorder containing data from the flight that crashed in China was recovered on Sunday March 27 and could help solve the mystery of the plane’s vertiginous fall in a matter of minutes.
“The second black box of China Eastern flight MU5735 was found on March 27”the New China news agency announced on Sunday, citing the command center for relief operations.
This recorder contains flight data, such as speed, altitude and heading.
The China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737-800, which linked the Chinese cities of Kunming (southwest) and Guangzhou (south), crashed on Monday on a wooded hill in Wuzhou (south), in Guangxi province.
The causes of the disaster, which killed all 123 passengers and nine crew members, are not yet known. All the people on board were of Chinese nationality.
A first flight recorder, which contains conversations in the cockpit, was found on Wednesday and sent to Beijing to be decoded. Its analysis should still take several days.
First elements of response
On Sunday, public television CCTV broadcast images of rescuers recovering the second orange-colored cylinder covered with a little soil, which was discovered 1.50 meters deep at the level of the roots of a tree.
The two black boxes of the plane now found, the investigators should obtain within a few days or weeks the first elements of response on the causes of the accident.
After confirming the identities of the vast majority of the victims through DNA tests, the Chinese Civil Aviation Administration (CAAC) announced on Saturday evening that all of the people on board the aircraft were dead.
This is the worst plane crash since 1994 in China, where air safety is however considered very good by experts.
Hundreds of rescuers and investigators, some dressed in full white protective suits, continued their search on Sunday at the scene of the tragedy.
On this sloping and earthy hill surrounded by dense vegetation, helped by orange or yellow colored diggers, they recovered debris from the plane, human remains and any element that could be used for the investigation.
Longeon
According to the specialized site FlightRadar24, the device lost in just one minute nearly 21,250 feet (6,477 meters).
After a brief ascent, it dived again, 4,625 feet (1,410 meters), according to the plotter, to be 3,225 feet (983 meters) above the ground. There is no data for the next flight. According to several experts, these data are relatively unusual.
There are no suspicions for the moment on the captain and his two co-pilots, who respectively accumulated 6,709, 31,769 and 556 flight hours, said China Eastern.
Based on a preliminary investigation, the service records of these pilots were ” very good “ and their family situations were “harmonious”the airline said.