New Flight Recorder
The report raises a problem that I, for one, hadn’t known about.
It seems that the 787 is the only aircraft so far to use a new ‘enhanced airborne flight recorder’ (EAFR). According to section 2.6.1, the 787
uses the EAFR to record CVR, FDR, and other data.
But apparently it wasn’t doing it very well, because some of the recorded data was ‘stale’ - that’s to say, not up to date. This not only hindered the NTSB’s investigations in this case, but it also has the potential to affect future investigations. In addition, it could have a dangerous effect on maintenance data.
The problem wasn’t critical this time, because the faults occurred on the ground, but an investigation after a crash could presumably be much more badly affected.
The extraordinary thing is that this new EAFR was certified under an FAA Technical Standard Order, which was based on a European (EUROCAE) document called “Minimum Operational Performance Specification for Crash Protected Airborne Recording Systems.” But the NTSB says (section 2.6.2)
The FAA took exception to this chapter of the EUROCAE …. document and removed the chapter’s requirements from the final TSO….
This meant that, for instance, airborne parts of the CVR recordings were virtually unintelligible.
The NTSB goes on to recommend that the FAA reinstate the bits it took out of the original European document, or takes other measures to mitigate the problem.
What a very strange carry-on.