Home>>China
Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, June 18, 2002

Voice Recorder of Crashed CAL Plane Recovered

Search teams have recovered one of the two "black boxes" of the ill-fated China Airlines Boeing 747-200 that crashed into the sea and killed 225 people last month, local television report said on Tuesday.


PRINT DISCUSSION CHINESE SEND TO FRIEND


Search teams have recovered one of the two "black boxes" of the ill-fated China Airlines Boeing 747-200 that crashed into the sea and killed 225 people last month, local television report said on Tuesday.

The device -- also called a black box -- was found early Tuesday in waters deeper than 60 meters (200 feet) near the Penghu island chain, off Taiwan's western coast, TVBS cable news quoted investigators as saying.

The voice data recorder might provide important clues to why the Boeing 747-200 crashed 20 minutes into a flight from Taipei to Hong Kong on May 25. Radar showed that the plane broke into four pieces high over the Taiwan Strait.

Search teams have vowed to renew their efforts to locate the flight data recorder, a crucial item to help discover the cause of the crash, said Yong Kay, chief investigator of the Aviation Safety Council of Taiwan.

The Hong Kong-bound China Airlines flight broke into pieces in mid-air and plunged into the sea near Penghu County, one of Taiwan 's western outlying islands, soon after taking off from Taipei. The crash killed all the 225 passengers and crew members on board.

The cockpit voice recorder is in good condition and was not seriously damaged, Yong added.

"There is nothing new to report regarding the other black box, but since it is still emitting signals, if we are lucky we may be able to find and recover it today," Yong said.

The cockpit voice recorder holds the conversation between pilots in the cabin, while the flight data recorder contains the information regarding the technical aspects of the plane itself and the flight conditions.



Taiwan Air Crash
  • Accident:A China Airlines passenger jetliner with 206 passengers and 19 crew en route from Taipei to Hong Kong crashed into the Taiwan Straits off the island county of Penghu Saturday afternoon.

  • Rescue work: Taiwanese transportation authorities said that search vessels had found more than 100 bodies in the sea around 25 nautical miles north of Penghu where aChina Airlines jetliner crashed Saturday.

  • Condolences & external assistance: Soon after the crash, the mainland's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) sent a letter of condolences Saturday to the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) in Taiwan. China's Communications Ministry Sunday afternoon sent two powerful tugboats to help the rescue work in the vicinity of the crash site.




    • Questions?Comments? Click here
    		    Advanced






    Hope of Retrieving CAL Plane's Black Boxes Fading

    One of Black Boxes of Crashed CAL Flight Found



    >> Full Coverage

     


    Bill Clinton Has Unexpectedly Become a 'Sweet Cake' ( 15 Messages)

    Englishman Hired as Chief Advisor of Yunnan Provincial Government ( 16 Messages)

    Two S.Korean Girls Run Over by US Armored Vehicle ( 55 Messages)

    Uncle Sam's Policy to Cross-Straits Ties against Its Own Interests ( 5 Messages)

    Home-made Auto Sales Head for 3 Million in 2002 ( 8 Messages)



    Copyright by People's Daily Online, all rights reserved