Originally Posted by
ajamieson
Recorders were recovered from the Germanwings Airbus that was all but vapourised on a French mountainside.
Recovering the whole FDR/CVR is not important. What it is important is to recover the crash survivable memory units, which are on separate boxes, very resistant to shock, vibration, high temperatures (i.e. flames). They are based on solid state memory components. Even if these very sturdy units are damaged there is the option to open up the very chips and recover the silicon die that can be probed for data using special tools.