Love the focus on not recovering the recorders. However, the value in that decision is that it shows exactly what Beaker's mission at the ATSB is - get the bluddy budget under control - which, if you constrain the scope of the investigation to not look past the obvious, this accident exemplified in spades.
But I have to question what value the recorders would add to the investigation.
Firstly, what type of recorders were fitted and what were their capabilities?
Secondly, what was the serviceability state of the recorders, the sensors and the looms?
It might be very helpful for us armchair experts if someone familiar with the aircraft equipage and the maintenance status could fill in some of the knowledge gaps for us. Given that this outfit appears to have run in a familiar West Texas style of operations (minus most of the beef), what chance was there that anyone even cared about the serviceability state of the recorders? I also have little doubt that the minimum required standard of recorders is probably useless.
Certainly, it isn't a matter publicly explored by either CASA or the ATSB.
