What And How Does The Airplane Black Box Work So That It Can Reveal The Cause Of The Sriwijaya Air SJ1 832 Accident

Airplane Black Box (Pinterest @howstuffworks)

Basarnas Operations Director Rasman revealed that his party had deployed 2,600 personnel to search for the Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 accident incident. Apart from being tasked with finding victims and plane debris, Basarnas personnel are also looking for the Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 black box

"Approximately 2,600 personnel are involved directly or indirectly in search and rescue activities," said Rasman, Monday, December 11.

In every aircraft accident incident, the black box is one of the most sought after and important components. From this black box the joint team and investigators were also able to reveal the cause of the Lion Air accident with flight code JT 610 which occurred in 2018.

Then, why is an airplane black box important to reveal the cause of the accident?

What Is An Airplane Black Box?

Launching the Australian Ministry of Defense, Black Box is a recording tool created by Dr. David Warren. This tool was created when Warren was still a researcher at the Aeronautical Research Laboratory (ARL) in 1953.

When Warren developed the Black Box, the public was mourning the mysterious incident that befell the first jet flight, the Comet. And for Warren, the presence of a device capable of recording events in the cockpit, so the cause of every accident can be easily identified.

David and the team - Kenneth Fraser, Lane Sear and Dr Walter Boswell - spent the following years developing this technology. Until a demo model was produced in 1957.

Although initially this device did not receive approval from the Australian aviation authority, the British government welcomed it. Until then the UK Ministry of Aviation developed the tool and announced that all aircraft must be equipped with this tool.

When it was first developed, the Black Box was bigger and heavier. After further development, the current average size of a black box is as big as a shoe box. It weighs 4.5 kg.

There are four main components that make up a black box. Among other things, the chassis, the ULB underwater location beacon), the core containing the Crash Survivable Memory Unit made of stainless steel, the fingernail-sized recording chip inside the circuit board that can help determine the cause of the Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 plane crash.

How it Works Black Box

In every plane crash, there are many questions that cannot be solved without referring to the black box. All answers are neatly stored in a black box.

To quote FlightRadar24's explanation, black box is a popular term used in the aviation industry. The function of this orange device is to record flight data. The data consists of CVR (Cockpit Voice Record), FDR (Flight Data Recorder) or a combination of the two.

The two types of data have different functions. CVR only records conversations on the aircraft deck as well as other sounds generated during flight - such as radio transmissions, conversations between pilots, engine sounds, to automatic alarms.

Meanwhile, FDR records data about aircraft. These include altitude, airspeed, flight direction, acceleration, vertical, pitch, roll, and autopilot status. In addition, the black box is also equipped with a location beacon that functions to send signals and can last up to 30 days.

How to Read Black Box

Pangkoarmada I Rear Admiral TNI Abdul Rasyid Kacong explained that the joint team had caught the black box signal of the Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 aircraft this morning.

"The signal today we can get a pretty clear signal (black box)," explained Rear Admiral Abdul Rasyid to reporters.

He revealed that he had asked KRI Rigel to mark the location points that were thought to be the points where the black box was.

Later, when the black box is secured, it will be read further by the analyst team in order to uncover the cause of the Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 plane crash. In Indonesia, the party authorized to open and analyze Black Boxes is the National Transportation Safety Committee (KNKT).

As an illustration, this is more or less the process of reading an airplane black box.

The technicians will remove the protective material and clean the joints carefully. The goal is that there are no more incidents where the recorded data is even deleted.

After that, the airplane audio or data files must be downloaded and duplicated. Initially, the data downloaded was still raw. Therefore, it must go through the process of decoding and then converted into a graphic.

Sometimes investigators also apply spectral analysis - a measure used to test sound so that scientists are able to choose which sounds to hear or mark the first alarm that goes off until the explosion.