But Praises Enhancements Overall
The National Transportation Safety Board has told the Federal
Aviation Administration that many elements of its new rule dealing
with aircraft flight recorders comply with previous NTSB
recommendations... but noted that some of its recommendations were
not adopted.
The FAA issued a final rule, titled "Revisions to Cockpit Voice
Recorder and Digital Flight Data Recorder Regulations," in March
2008
as ANN reported. After reviewing the rule, the
NTSB this week classified several recommendations referenced in the
rule.
The Board was pleased to see that all larger passenger airliners
will be required to carry 2-hour cockpit voice recorders (CVRs),
greatly expanding the current 30-minute requirement. But the
rule stopped short by not requiring that older 30-minute CVRs be
replaced on existing commuter and corporate jet aircraft. The
FAA did require that newly manufactured commuter and corporate jets
come equipped with 2-hour CVRs. Recommendation A-96-171 was closed
"Acceptable Action."
The Board had asked that airliners be retrofitted with CVRs that
had an emergency 10-minute power supply in case of an electrical
interruption, such as occurred on ValuJet flight 592 in 1996 and
Swiss Air flight 111 in 1998. The FAA agreed that newly
manufactured airliners be so equipped but declined to require
retrofits. The Board acknowledged that a retrofit rule might have
posed a roadblock for regulatory approval for the rule, so
classified recommendation A-99-16 "Closed - Acceptable Alternative
Action."
The Board closed as unacceptable action A-96-89, which called
for certain configurations of microphones and dedicated channels in
airliner cockpits, and A-99-17, which called for dual combination
recorders, one in the front and one in the back of the plane.
"Flight recorders have proven themselves invaluable in providing
crucial information during accident and incident investigations,"
NTSB Acting Chairman Mark V. Rosenker said. "While I am happy to
see that some of the enhancements we've been advocating for years
are being adopted by the FAA, I again urge the FAA to act on the
Board's recommendations for cockpit image recorders, which were not
addressed in the new rule."
The new rule calls for increased flight control position
sampling rates on flight recorders, which should improve the
quality of data available to investigators. Improvements in flight
recorders has been on the Board's list of Most Wanted
Transportation Safety Improvements since 1999.