A story that has recently been all over the news is the search for Malaysia Airlines plane MH370. The search is now relying on an unmanned submarine as fears grow that the batteries for the black box may have failed. No signal has been received from the box since Sunday, April 6th. A 16.2 feet unmanned submarine is now being considered to look for the plane in the main search area, but it can only cover 80 miles a day, traveling at about 5 miles per hour. This will lengthen the period of the search, and it supports the idea of why a black box is important and should be improved.
What is a black box? A black box or flight recorder is an electronic recording device placed on aircrafts for the purpose of aiding in the investigation of aviation incidents and accidents that may occur. There are two common types of the flight recorder or black box, the flight data recorder (FDR) and the cockpit voice recorder (CVR). These two recorders can also be combined in a single unit. They are required to survive the conditions of a severe accident. They can withstand an impact of 3400 g and temperatures of over 1,000 °C (1,832 °F).
Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 went missing in the early hours of March 8, over 30 days ago. The box locator pinger's battery life was expected to fail after around 30 days. A black box and the plane use a radar based tracking system, which can be picked up via radio waves, but has a limited distance from the device. The radar tracks well when traveling over land or coastal areas, but over oceans radar does not work as it relies on line-of-sight tracking from a ground station.
A proposal to prevent this loss of location for the future of airline travels it to upgrade from radar to satellite. That way if a plane went off course over an ocean, it wouldn't be an issue to track it. This satellite would allow air traffic control to know where a plane is at all times. A new system named NextGen, has been implemented by U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, in which GPS signals would transmit an aircraft's precise location to air traffic controllers via ground receivers. The expense of outfitting planes with GPS is beat by the cost to upgrade from radar to satellite tracking of planes. On cnn.com/technology in a story entitled, "Why satellites didn't find missing plane," by Dean Irvine, Irvine quotes that, "According to a 2006 FAA report, it would cost $4.6 billion to change to a satellite-based system in the U.S."
It may be expensive to upgrade, but if it could have the potential to save future airlines during crisis, then it would be worth it. A black box is good for now, but good may not be good enough. In the future, it should be mandatory to have the satellite tracking system.