Originally Posted by
Superpilot
Chipping into the why cannot we track airliners reliably in the 21st century argument. I have a back of the cigarette packet idea that is in no way validated so be gentle...
How about a switch which forces FDRs and CVRs to start bleeping? They could even begin audibly/digitally broadcasting positional data on some defined frequency.
Better still, have a telemetry system where FDR and CVR data gets transmitted to a ground based station via satellite as soon as a master caution warning gets activated. Surely such a system wouldn't be that difficult to implement given that many aircraft these days including advance turbo-props eg (ATR -600) have ACARS capability.