When Nepal's Yeti Airlines plane crash happened in February, Singapore's Transport Safety Investigation Bureau was roped in to help Nepalese authorities retrieve and process the data from the flight recorders – commonly called “black boxes”.
in February
A decade later, this same curiosity still drives him to uncover the larger story behind binary numbers and soundwaves.MAKING SENSE OF NUMBERS, AUDIO FILES But Mr Ng explained that investigators do not depend on the animation to piece together what may have happened. It may skew their conclusions; the fair weather conditions presented in the animation might differ from, say, a stormy night in reality.The other section in a black box – the cockpit voice recorder – contains a recording of all audio communication within the cockpit itself, said Mr Ng.
“At times when the conditions are challenging or it’s not recorded on the flight data recorder, we can actually spot specific bits of information and that may lead us to understand that certain levers were moved,” he said. In some cases, the flight recorder may be “badly damaged”, such as when the aircraft has plunged into the ocean. In other instances, investigators may be hampered by external elements, from the weather to a lack of funding.
At TSIB, digital software allows the data to be collected and processed in real time, allowing them to have a “rough idea” of where the flight recorder may be before they “zoom in” on the area. “In certain situations where there appears to be more significant damage to the memory chip itself, we will look at the chip under the microscope to look for cracks, damages or even debris that may affect or compromise the operation of the chip whenever power is being applied.”
“Our legislation does provide us with the opportunity to conduct an investigation, if there are incidents where we find that there are safety lessons to be learnt as well,” he added. TSIB – then known as the Air Accident Investigation Bureau – worked with its counterparts from the US National Transportation Safety Board to investigate the incident. Boeing was also involved in the investigation.
Drones are also used to collect photos of a crash site. This has proved"very vital" because drones may find more wreckage that investigators may not have seen, he said. After this is done, investigators analyse the cases, develop hypotheses and test them for loopholes, before drafting a report. All stakeholders involved have a chance to provide comments on the draft, before the final report is eventually published on the Transport Ministry's website.MARINE, RAIL INVESTIGATIONS
Explaining the possible challenges of investigating marine incidents, Mr Xiao said sometimes survivors could be in hospitals in “different places”. The seafarers on the ship also often come from many different nations, and only stay on the ship for a few months. This could make it difficult to conduct interviews.
Unlike aviation incidents where the usage of a flight recorder is more specific to investigations, data logged in the train recorder is used primarily for maintenance purposes. Its recorder also has “crash protected memory”, and is able to withstand shock and heat from a fire, added Mr Low.PEOPLE SKILLS, EYE FOR DETAIL
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