What's in the black boxes. Aircraft black box: why is it needed and what color is it really? & nbsp

The black box of an aircraft (flight recorder, recorder) is a device that is used in railway, water transport and aviation to record information from on-board systems, crew conversations, etc. If any accident has happened to the transport, then this data is used to find out the reasons.

Story

The first operational flight information recorder appeared in 1939. The French Bodun and Hussenot designed a light-beam oscilloscope that records every flight parameter (speed, altitude, etc.). This was done by deflecting the corresponding mirror, which reflected a beam of light onto the film. According to one version, this is how the name “aircraft black box” appeared (see photo below), because its body was painted in this color in order to protect the film from exposure. In 1947, enterprising inventors organized the French Society for Measuring Instruments. Over time, this company became a fairly large equipment manufacturer and merged into the Safran concern.

New modification

In 1953, the Australian scientist David Warren, who took part in the investigation of the Havilland liner disaster, put forward the idea that having records of crew conversations would be very helpful in such a case. The mechanism he proposed combined voice and parametric recorders, and also used magnetic tape for recording. Warren's recorder had an asbestos wrap and was packaged in a steel case. Probably, from here we have a different definition of the concept of "aircraft black box" - this is an object with an unknown or unprincipled internal structure that performs certain functions.

David introduced the prototype device in 1956. He also invented the black box in the plane. Four years later, the Australian government ordered the installation of recorders on all existing aircraft. Soon other countries also followed suit.

What is inside?

The black box of the aircraft, the photo of which you can see in the article, does not belong to the category of complex devices. This is a regular array of controller and flash memory chips. It is not much different from a standard laptop SSD. However, flash memory is used in registrars relatively recently. Now most aircraft are equipped with older models, where the recording is carried out on magnetic tape or wire.

Types of recorders

There are two types of registrars: operational and emergency. The first one is not secure and is used for everyday vehicle monitoring. Railway, water and air transport personnel read information from the system's drives after each flight. Then the received data is analyzed for the presence of unacceptable actions by the crew during operation. For example:

whether the maximum pitch or roll permitted by the manufacturer was exceeded;
whether the overload was exceeded during takeoff/landing;
whether the operating time in takeoff or afterburner modes was exceeded, etc.

Also, this information allows you to track the development of the resource and perform timely routine maintenance to reduce the frequency of failures of transport equipment and improve flight safety.

The emergency recorder has a very reliable protection. In accordance with the requirements of the modern TSO-C124 standard, it ensures the safety of data for half an hour of continuous burning, with shock overloads of 3400 g, staying at a depth of 6 km for 30 days, as well as static overloads of 2 tons lasting up to 5 minutes. For comparison: recorders of the previous generation with magnetic tapes withstood a shock overload of only 1000 g and a burning time of up to 15 minutes. To facilitate searches, emergency recorders are equipped with sonar pingers and radio beacons.

What is it made of?

We will discuss the color of the black box in the plane below, but for now let's talk about the materials from which it is made. Recorders are made from alloyed iron or titanium alloys. In any case, it is a heat-resistant and high-strength material. Although, for the most part, the safety of the registrars ensures their location in the body of the aircraft.

What plane box?

Usually the flight recorder is red or orange. Now you know what color the plane's black box is, and it is quite clear that its name has nothing to do with the actual color. The bright coloration was made to make it easier to search.

What parameters are registered?

Recorders are constantly being improved. The first black boxes read only 5 parameters: speed, time, vertical acceleration, altitude and heading. They were fixed with a stylus on a disposable metal foil. The last phase of the evolution of recorders dates back to the 90s, when solid-state media were put into operation. Modern recorders are capable of recording up to 256 parameters. Here is some of them:

Remaining fuel.
Instantaneous fuel consumption.
pitch speed.
Air pressure.
Roll angle.
Mains voltage.
The position of the motor control handle.
Lateral overload.
Deviation of the aileron-introceptors.
flap deflection.
Steering wheel deflection.
stabilizer deflection.
Aileron deflection.
The course of the control traverse in pitch, course and roll.
Steering wheel travel.
Engine revs.
The number of revolutions of the engines.
Vertical and lateral overloads.
true height.
barometric altitude.
Airspeed, etc.

Where is?

The black box of the aircraft is located in the tail section of the aircraft. There are several recorders on board. Backup models are needed in case of severe damage or the inability to detect the main ones.

Previously, speech and parametric recorders were separated: the first was installed in the cockpit, and the second - in the tail of the aircraft. However, due to the fact that the cockpit was destroyed more than the tail section in the crash, both recorders were mounted in the tail of the aircraft.

Aircraft black box: decoding

This is the same myth as the color of the recorder in its name. Remember: deciphering the black boxes of crashed planes is simply impossible. You will ask why? Yes, because the recorded data is not encrypted, and the word "transcript" itself is used in the same context as for journalists processing interview recordings. They write the text while listening to the recording of the dictaphone. The commission of experts does the same, fixing the data in a form convenient for perception and analysis. There is no encryption here: data protection from strangers is not provided, the information is available for reading at any airport. There is also no data protection from modification, because the recorder is designed to identify the causes of air crashes and reduce their number in the future. In the end, in order to hush up or distort the true causes of accidents for political or some other reasons, one can make a statement about serious damage to the registrars and the inability to read information.

True, even with severe damage (about 30% of accidents), the black box of a crashed aircraft can still be reconstructed. Fragments of the tape are glued together and processed with a special mixture, and the surviving microcircuits are soldered and connected to the reader. These are rather complex procedures carried out in special laboratories and time-consuming.

Are there alternatives?

Now you know what an airplane black box is. Until now, this device is not considered 100% reliable. Are there any alternatives?

At the moment, they simply do not exist, but engineers are constantly working to improve existing models. In the near future, they plan to transmit data from black boxes in real time either to air bases or to a satellite.

Boeing 777 captain Steve Abdu believes that sending real-time data will require expensive satellite communications. But if you send at 4-5 minute intervals, this will significantly reduce the cost of the technology and increase the profitability of its application. Since the number of satellites on the planet is increasing every year, saving flight data on a remote device is the most likely alternative to long searches and time-consuming data decryption.

There are also plans to install fireable floating registrars. The collision of the aircraft with an obstacle will be recorded by special sensors, which will subsequently launch the ejection of the recorder with a parachute. A similar principle is already used in automotive

The Russian passenger plane An-148 crashed in the Moscow region on February 11. All 65 passengers and crew were killed. Rescuers reported that the debris was scattered over 30 hectares, but both black boxes were found relatively quickly. Ivbg.ru figured out what a black box is, how it looks and what it is for

What is a black box?

A black box is a flight recorder in an airplane. It captures instrument readings, pilots' conversations and sounds in the cabin. The black box data is used to analyze the actions of the crew, the performance of aircraft and air crash investigations.

Why is a recorder called a black box?

Few people know, but the so-called black box is orange or red. The recorder is specially painted with bright colors to make it easier to find after a plane crash. For the same reason, the box is made not square, but cylindrical, in order to minimize physical damage when it comes into contact with a hard surface.

The black box got its name thanks to the creators. In 1939, two Frenchmen, Hussenot and Baudouin, presented the first model of a recorder. The data were recorded using a thin beam of light and ordinary photographic film. The designers painted the box black so as not to light up the film. In the middle of the last century, recorders were not a mandatory attribute of airliners. In 1957, the orange top hat replaced the black box.

How many recorders are on the plane?

Until 1957, black boxes only recorded instrument readings. But after the hitherto unsolved crash of the world's first British jet airliner, Comet 1, in 1953, which killed 35 people, Australian scientist David Warren came to the conclusion that the pilots' conversations could help the investigation. Four years later, he presented the world with his recorder, capable of recording both instrument parameters and crew conversations.

Today there are two types of black boxes: operational and emergency. The first transmits readings to the control room on the ground. The second captures all the information cyclically - every two hours the data is overwritten. It is installed in the tail section of the aircraft, because according to statistics, the tail is less likely to collapse when it falls. For reliability, the aircraft may have several recorders.

Why is the black box not destroyed in the explosion?

The cylindrical body of the box is made of titanium or high-strength steel. Requirements for the technical characteristics of the recorder are growing in direct proportion to technical progress. In addition to the force of impact on the ground, the device must withstand 30 minutes of continuous burning and monthly storage under water at a depth of six kilometers.

What is inside the cylinder?

Electronic boards inside the case are mounted on additional shock absorbers to minimize the effects of a powerful impact on a hard surface. Microcircuits are protected by a heat-shielding layer. The drive that writes the data looks like the hard drive of a regular computer.

An ultrasonic beacon is installed on the recorder, which facilitates searches under water. Also on the body there are light and radio beacons. These devices have standard signaling frequencies so as not to confuse them with other sources.

Batteries are installed for autonomous operation of the beacons. During the flight, they do not work, and the recorder receives energy from aircraft systems. Batteries are activated after a strong impact.

What parameters does the device record?

The first models of the box recorded only speed, altitude, direction, acceleration and time. Modern instruments record 256 parameters. Among them: air pressure, fuel consumption, steering wheel travel, engine speed, barometric altitude, etc.

How is the data decrypted?

Contrary to popular belief, recorder data is not encrypted with a complex code. Recordings are made in a form convenient for perception and further analysis. After all, the main purpose of the recorder is to help in the investigation of air crashes.

It is not uncommon for data to be lost due to corruption. In this case, specialists restore the lost memory. This process takes months of painstaking work.

Where else are black boxes used?

Recorders are installed on trains, water transport and cars. The principle of operation of these boxes does not differ from a similar device in an airplane. In railway terminology, a recorder is called a locomotive speedometer, in automotive terminology, an autometer.

aircraft black boxes

The phrase "black box" sounds from the air in two cases: when the program "What? Where? When?" and when there is a plane crash somewhere. The paradox is that if in a TV show a black box is indeed a black box, then in an airplane it is not a box and it is not black. A flight recorder (that's what the device is actually called) is usually made red or orange, and the shape is spherical or cylindrical. The explanation is very simple: the rounded shape better resists the external influences that are inevitable when a plane crashes, and the bright color makes it easier to search. Let's take a look at the device of the recorders together, as well as deciphering the information.

What's in the box?

The recorder itself, in general, is a simple device: it is an array of flash memory chips and a controller and is fundamentally not much different from an SSD drive in your laptop. True, flash memory has been used in recorders relatively recently, and there are now many aircraft in the air equipped with older models that use magnetic recording - on tape, as in tape recorders, or on wire, as in the very first tape recorders: wire is stronger than tape, and therefore more reliable.

The main thing is that all this filling should be properly protected: a completely sealed case is made of titanium or high-strength steel, inside there is a powerful layer of thermal insulation and damping materials. There is a special FAA TSO C123b / C124b standard, which modern recorders comply with: data must remain intact at overloads of 3400G for 6.5 ms (fall from any height), full coverage by fire within 30 minutes (fire from ignition of the fuel in the collision of an aircraft with the ground) and being at a depth of 6 km for a month (when an aircraft crashes into water anywhere in the World Ocean, except for depressions, the probability of falling into which is statistically small).

By the way, with regard to falling into water: recorders are equipped with ultrasonic beacons that turn on when in contact with water. The lighthouse emits a signal at a frequency of 37,500 Hz, and, having located this signal, the recorder is easy to find at the bottom, from where it is retrieved by divers or remotely controlled underwater robots. It is also easy to find a recorder on the ground: having found the wreckage of the aircraft and knowing the location of the recorders, it is enough, in fact, just to look around.

The case must have the inscription “Flight Recorder. Do not open" in English. Often there is the same inscription in French; there may be inscriptions in other languages.

Where are the boxes located?

In an aircraft, "black boxes" are usually located in the rear fuselage, which is statistically smaller and less likely to be damaged in accidents, since the blow is usually taken by the front. There are several recorders on board - it's so common in aviation that all systems are backed up: the probability that none of them can be detected, and data will be corrupted on those detected, is minimal.

At the same time, the recorders also differ in the data recorded in them. Emergency recorders, which are looked for after disasters, are parametric (FDR) and speech (CVR).

The voice recorder saves, in addition to the conversations of crews and dispatchers, ambient sounds (4 channels in total, the recording duration is the last 2 hours), and parametric recorders record information from various sensors - from coordinates, heading, speeds and pitch, and ending with the revolutions of each of the engines. Each of the parameters is recorded several times per second, and with a rapid change, the recording frequency increases. Recording is carried out cyclically, as in car DVRs: new data overwrites the oldest ones. At the same time, the duration of the cycle is 17-25 hours, that is, it is guaranteed to be enough for any flight.

Voice and parametric recorders can be combined into one, however, in any case, the records have an exact reference to time. Meanwhile, parametric recorders record far from all flight parameters (although now there are at least 88 of them, and quite recently, until 2002, there were only 29), but only those that can be useful in investigating disasters. The full “logs” (2,000 parameters) of what is happening on board are recorded by operational recorders: their data is used to analyze the actions of pilots, repair and maintenance of the aircraft, etc. - they have no protection, and after a disaster, data from them can no longer be obtained.

How to decrypt the black box?

The need to decrypt data from black boxes is as much a myth as black boxes.

The fact is that the data is not encrypted in any way, and the word “decryption” is used here in the same sense as journalists use to decrypt an interview recording. The journalist listens to the recorder and writes the text, and a commission of experts reads the data from the media, processes it and writes it down in a form convenient for analysis and perception. That is, there is no encryption: data can be read at any airport, data protection from prying eyes is not provided. And since black boxes are designed to analyze the causes of air crashes in order to reduce the number of crashes in the future, there is no special protection against data modification. In the end, if the true causes of the disaster need to be hushed up or distorted for political or some other reasons, then you can always claim severe damage to the recorders and the inability to read all the data.

True, in case of damage (and they are not so rare - about a third of all disasters), the data can still be recovered - and the tape fragments are glued together, and also processed with a special composition, and the contacts of the surviving microcircuits are soldered to connect them to the reader: the process is complex, it takes place in special laboratories and can be delayed.

Why "black box"?

Why are flight recorders called "black boxes"? There are several versions. For example, the name could come from the Second World War, when the first electronic modules began to be installed on military aircraft: they really looked like black boxes. Or, for example, the first recorders, even before the war, used photographic film for recording, so they should not have let light through. It is impossible, however, to exclude the influence of “What? Where? When? ”: a device is called a black box in everyday life, the principle of operation of which (what is in the black box) does not matter, only the result is important. Recorders for civil aircraft have been massively installed since the early 1960s.

Flight recorders have room for improvement. According to experts, the most obvious and immediate prospect is video recording from different viewpoints inside and outside the aircraft. Some experts say that this will help, among other advantages, solve the problem of switching from dial gauges in the cockpit to displays: they say that old instruments “freeze” at the last readings in an accident, but displays do not. However, do not forget that pointer devices are still used now in addition to displays in case of failure of the latter.

The prospects for the installation of fireable floating recorders are also being considered: special sensors will record the collision of an aircraft with an obstacle, and at that moment the recorder will “eject” almost with a parachute - the principle is approximately the same as that of airbags in a car. In addition, in the future, aircraft will be able to broadcast in real time all data recorded by black boxes to remote servers - then there will be no need to search for and decode recorders.

With the next plane crash, the messages immediately begin to talk about the search for the black box of the plane. What is it and why is it needed? Black boxes - or flight recorders - are recording devices in a protective shell, which is made of heavy-duty material. Outside, the body can be a parallelepiped, a cylinder or a ball. It is painted in bright orange or red, which helps to detect it.

The year 1939 is considered to be the date of the creation of the first flight recorder - the "tether" (as it is called in flight circles). This event took place in France. The recorder was a multi-channel oscilloscope with a black box-like housing, hence the name "black box". Its function was to record speed, altitude and other basic flight parameters. Serial production of flight recorders began in 1947. Somewhat later, in the 1950s, voice conversations of pilots began to be recorded using magnetic tape. Later, the speech recorder was separated from the parametric one and placed in the cockpit. And the other was put in the tail of the plane. Since the cockpit is more susceptible to destruction than the tail section of the aircraft, the voice recorder was subsequently moved to the tail. Asbestos was used to protect the recorders. It was introduced in Australia in the 1960s that it was mandatory to equip airplanes used for passenger transportation with black boxes. After a while, other countries followed suit. The flight recorder is now a mandatory device on board aircraft. With its help, they establish the cause of the disaster, find out all the circumstances of the tragedy. This further contributes to the prevention of new accidents.

Flight recorder device

Black boxes with their records provide invaluable assistance in investigating the causes of plane crashes. International standards provide for each aircraft to have two recorders. How is the black box of an airplane? To keep the information, it must have a solid construction. For its manufacture, titanium or high-strength steel is used. Inside the case there is a layer of thermal insulation that protects the microcircuits from high temperatures that occur during a fire or explosion. How the black box of an airplane works (the diagram below shows this) is easy to figure out.
In modern recorders, information is stored in flash memory. In addition, the box contains printed circuits that are designed to process and compress the incoming information. The design of black boxes is constantly being improved. Each recorder periodically undergoes certification.

Modern recorders

They have come a long way of improvement and are very different from their ancestors. What is a black box in an airplane? It serves to collect various information. Black boxes record the following data:

technical - engine speed, fuel pressure and hydraulic systems, temperature;
navigation data - speed, altitude, roll, rudder deflection;
crew actions - releasing and retracting the landing gear, all actions to control the aircraft.

All modern liners have two recorders. One is used to record the conversations conducted by the crew, and is called speech, the other records all flight parameters and is called parametric. All information is recorded on optical, it is a photographic film, or magnetic (magnetic tape and metal wire) media. Recently, flash memory has become more and more popular. With the transition to it, the recording system became more reliable, as moving parts disappeared. To increase the strength of the device, the black box of the aircraft was subjected to multiple modifications and tests. Recorders save data:

up to 3,500 G effective overload;
0.5 hours when on fire;
a month in water at a depth of up to 6 km;
5 min at static overloads over 2 tons.

Black boxes in the aircraft are located in the rear fuselage. According to statistics, it is she who is least damaged in accidents. Most often, the nose of the aircraft experiences the blow.

What does a black box look like on an airplane?

The appearance of the recorder can be described as follows: most often it has a rounded shape. This is done so that when the plane crashes, there is as little damage as possible, since bodies of this shape are less susceptible to the effects of force.
The black box is always painted in a bright color, which makes it easier to notice it in search areas after a plane crash. In addition, recorders are equipped with special beacons that start working when in contact with water. When an aircraft falls into the water, an underwater acoustic beacon emits a signal for 30 days from a depth of up to six kilometers.

Types of flight recorders

As mentioned above, there are two recorders on board the aircraft: voice and parametric.

Speech records not only all the conversations of the crew members and their conversations with the controllers, but also the sounds that are present in the cockpit and keep them for the last two hours.

Parametric ones receive data from different sensors. They contain information from the coordinates of the course and ending with the speed of the engines. The indicators of each parameter are recorded once per second, and if they begin to change quickly, then the frequency of registration also increases. Recording is done in cycles, like car DVRs: old data is overwritten by new ones. The duration of the cycle is quite large and is up to 25 hours, it is enough for any flight.

Both types of aircraft black boxes can be combined into one instrument. Parametric devices record only those data that may be required during the investigation of the accident. All recordings on storage media are securely protected. They withstand temperatures from -60 to +55 degrees. The main protection is provided by the filler, which is located inside the case.

operational recorder

Everything that happens on board is recorded by operational instruments that have no protection. Personnel on the ground read the information after each flight for control purposes. The data is decoded and analyzed - whether the crew acted correctly during the flight. In addition, the data obtained help to determine the aircraft's resource depletion and carry out repairs on time. This leads to increased equipment reliability and flight safety.

How to decipher the black box

The data that is in the black box of the crashed planes is not encrypted. To take them, a commission of experts is assembled, who simply read the information available on it from the carrier and write it down in a report in a form convenient for reading and analyzing. The procedure for collecting data is not difficult. This can be done at any airport. There is no information protection from outsiders.
According to statistics, recorder damage occurs quite often. Information can often be read by gluing separate fragments of the tape and restoring the surviving parts of the microcircuits. This process requires special laboratory conditions and takes a lot of time. The main purpose of recorders on board an aircraft is to obtain data to determine the causes of a crash and prevent the recurrence of similar situations. The black box information is analyzed by the dispatcher, pilots, navigators and technical experts.

Prospects for the development of recorders

Every year more stringent requirements are imposed on black boxes. One of the immediate prospects is to record the external surface of the aircraft and its internal part on video media. Scientists hope that this innovation will lead to a complete replacement of instruments in the cockpit with displays that will provide more reliable information in the event of an accident. Although the pointer instruments can be used to determine what he recorded at the last moment before the accident.

In some cases, black boxes after a disaster cannot be detected. This mainly happens when the plane falls into the water to a great depth. Therefore, in the future, it is planned to install recorders, which during the accident could eject and stay afloat. And they are also working on the possibility of rewriting all the data from the black box to servers located on the ground. In this case, there will be no need to search for a recorder. An undamaged device stops working when there is no power, and this can happen during an explosion. With power available, the black box records data under all conditions. Therefore, in the future it is planned to make autonomous power supply for recorders in order to save as much information as possible.

It is interesting

To record data in the first black boxes, a steel tape was used, which was placed in a durable case. Recording was carried out using a cast-iron tip. The amount of information was limited, since the foil deteriorated and was used only once.
Magnetic tapes have been in use since 1965. At first, only sound was recorded on them, and then they began to be used to record data.
Microcircuits became a carrier of information only in the nineties.
Over 40 years, black boxes have been installed on nearly 100,000 aircraft, each costing between 10,000 and 20,000 dollars.
The service life of recorders has increased after the introduction of certification.

Conclusion

Thanks to technological progress, black boxes have become much lighter and more compact, more reliable in operation. The recorder is not afraid of extreme temperatures and can stay in sea water for a long time, be subjected to various extreme influences, preserving information without damage.
Data taken from the aircraft's black box helps simulate the environment that preceded the accident and help find the cause of the crash. Materials after investigations are used to work in the gyms, simulating real situations for pilot training.

What are aircraft black boxes - device, description and interesting facts on the site.

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When a plane crash happens, high hopes are placed on deciphering the black box. We will tell you what a "black box" is and why it is so important to "read" it.

Why and when was it invented?

Australia is considered the birthplace of the first "black box". The credit for the invention is attributed to David Warren. In 1953, he worked in the team of the commission investigating the causes of the fall of the first jet passenger airliner "Kometa-2" and thought about the fact that it would be nice to have a device on board each aircraft that could record all the processes occurring during the flight.

Four years later, the first flight recorder was made. David assembled it with colleagues at the aeronautics laboratory in Melbourne. A year later, the head of the British Aircraft Registration Agency became interested in the device. He invited Warren to England, where, with the help of other specialists, the "black box" was improved. Two years later, after the plane crash that occurred in the state of Queensland, "black boxes" were ordered to be on all Australian ships and they were distributed around the world.

Why is the box called "black"

Trite, but true - the box, of course, is not black. And not a box. Many have seen it in pictures. Usually it is either an orange ball or an orange cylinder. As to why the device is still called "black", there are two versions. According to one - the first "black boxes" really were black boxes, and they began to be painted in bright colors later; according to another, they called the "black" box for its inaccessibility to anyone except narrow specialists. Even ground crews couldn't touch the flight recorder.

What is it made of?

Traditionally, the shell of "black boxes" is made of titanium alloys or alloyed iron. In any case, it is a high-strength, heat-resistant material. Although, it must be said that the main safety of the "black boxes" is provided not even by the material from which they are made, but by their location. Usually - in the tail or keel of the aircraft.

What is inside?

The "stuffing" of the "black boxes" changed over time, but its essence remained the same. Inside the flight recorder there is a device that registers changes occurring during the flight, technical parameters, and records the conversations of pilots and air traffic controllers. In the first "black boxes" the parameters were recorded in ink on paper tape, there was no need to talk about quality, then there was a rapid development, photographic film began to be used, then wire. Today, data is typically written to magnetic and solid state drives.

What loads can it withstand?

"Black boxes" are designed for critical loads. They withstand 3400 g, and 2 tons of static for 5 minutes, water pressure at depths up to 6000 meters.

A special conversation is testing recorders for strength. Science magazine provides a list of checks that "black boxes" pass before operation. A sample recorder is fired from an air gun, beaten, crushed, kept on fire at a temperature of 1000 degrees Celsius, kept at low temperatures down to -70 degrees, immersed in salt water and process fluids (gasoline, kerosene, machine oils).

What do black boxes read?

"Black boxes" are constantly being improved. The first airborne readers recorded only five parameters (heading, altitude, speed, vertical acceleration, and time). They were recorded with a stylus on a metal disposable foil. The last round of evolution of onboard readers dates back to 1990, when solid state media began to be used for recording. Modern "black boxes" are able to control up to 256 parameters. National Geographic reports that the latest flight recorders can control the movement of all parts of the wing and landing systems.

Why are they looking for so long?

All flight recorders are equipped with radio beacons, as well as underwater search acoustic systems, which are activated only in case of danger. However, it must be admitted that radio beacons are not the most reliable devices. If the "black box" is under the rubble or at great depths, the signal is extinguished, which greatly complicates the search.

How to say it in English?

In English sources, the "black box" can be called differently: flight recorder, blackbox and flight data recorder.

Sinking or not?

Another question that is especially relevant today: do "black boxes" sink? Almost all models of flight recorders sink. Usually, buoyancy is not set in their parameters, but the parameter of being in sea water at a certain depth is set. So, for the "black box" Bars-2M, information must be stored while in sea water at a depth of 1000 meters for 30 days.

How many "black boxes" are on the plane?

The number of recorders can be different for different types of aircraft. Usually this is an on-board data drive that is used in everyday work, as well as a secure on-board drive, which is the notorious "black box". A separate block in it is a protected recorder of crew conversations and sounds in the cockpit. All technical parameters are recorded on the flight recorder relative to the time scale.

Are there alternatives?

Still falling. It is logical to assume that "black boxes" are still not the most reliable devices in the world that can break the sad statistics of air crashes. Are there any alternatives to them?

At the moment, there is no alternative to "black boxes", but developments are constantly underway to improve recorders. In the near future, it is planned to transmit all data from the flight recorders in real time either to the satellite or to services at air bases.

In an interview with Newyorker magazine, Steve Abdu, captain of a Boeing 777 and partner at an aviation consulting firm, commented on the prospects for such a change: "Sending real-time black box data would require expensive satellite communications, but you can send it at four to five minute intervals. Then it will reduce price and increase the profitability of the technology. Every day the number of satellites in Earth's orbit is increasing, so storing flight data on a "remote" device seems to be the most likely alternative to long searches and painstaking data decoding.