Air France black boxes located in Atlantic

Participant · 6 May 2010 at 11:26

Le_Petit_Lapin said:
Yeah, but you're expecting a plane, which in in the process of crashing to maintain its transmission dish trained on a stationery sattellite, to keep the information flowing? Where exactly are you intending on putting the dish anyway? You cant exactly put it externally, that would play hell with the aerodynamics, and internally is going to take up valuable space.

Satellite data transmission isn't some kind of manual process whereby you need a guy in a hi-vis jacket and gloves constantly adjusting the thing depending on the angle of the plane. Do you have to keep moving your SatNav around as you drive round the country?

lookitsjonno · 6 May 2010 at 11:29

Le_Petit_Lapin said:
Yeah, but you're expecting a plane, which in in the process of crashing to maintain its transmission dish trained on a stationery sattellite, to keep the information flowing? Where exactly are you intending on putting the dish anyway? You cant exactly put it externally, that would play hell with the aerodynamics, and internally is going to take up valuable space.

well the awacs wouldn't have a problem I suppose

Le_Petit_Lapin · 6 May 2010 at 11:31

Robbie G said:
Satellite data transmission isn't some kind of manual process whereby you need a guy in a hi-vis jacket and gloves constantly adjusting the thing depending on the angle of the plane. Do you have to keep moving your SatNav around as you drive round the country?

My SatNav doesn't transmit data, only recieve. At sattellite on a moving plane transmitting data to a geostationery satellite is going to need constantly re-aligned.

platypus · 6 May 2010 at 11:32

philtorrens said:
They are actually painted Orange but still called black boxes for some reason. lol !

Media ignorance mostly. Aviation calls them Flight Recorders.

In scientific terms a black box is a device which has an observable input and output, without any knowledge of its inner workings.

Participant · 6 May 2010 at 11:37

Le_Petit_Lapin said:
My SatNav doesn't transmit data, only recieve. At sattellite on a moving plane transmitting data to a geostationery sattellite is going to need constantly re-aligned.

Satellite phones?
Satellite internet?

Not all satellite data transmission requires directional antenna alignment. Google iridium phones.

Vulcan · 6 May 2010 at 11:42

Gaygle said:
Is there any reason why the black boxes can't be automatically "ejected" when it's obvious that the plane is going to crash?

Perhaps have two - one that stays on board and one that ejects?

EDIT: Beaten

But it may not be obvious when the plane is about to crash.

Also adding floating devices would be hard. You can't have something that durable and fire resistant whilst somehow having flaps that open up revealing some kind of balloon/parachute system.

Le_Petit_Lapin · 6 May 2010 at 12:01

Robbie G said:
Satellite phones?
Satellite internet?

Not all satellite data transmission requires directional antenna alignment. Google iridium phones.

I dunno, Sattellite internet needs a directional antenna, so thats out. These sattellite phones that dont need a directional dish only allow a bandwidth of 9600 bit/s. Would that be enough? How many uplinks can the sattellites handle simultaneously, apperantly its only a few, so its going to require a launch of a lot of sattellites to accommodate all the planes. Who's going to shoulder the cost of that?

Participant · 6 May 2010 at 12:10

Le_Petit_Lapin said:
I dunno, Sattellite internet needs a directional antenna, so thats out. These sattellite phones that dont need a directional dish only allow a bandwidth of 9600 bit/s. Would that be enough? How many uplinks can the sattellites handle simultaneously, apperantly its only a few, so its going to require a launch of a lot of sattellites to accommodate all the planes. Who's going to shoulder the cost of that?

I have insufficient technical knowledge to answer that. All I was doing was confronting your incorrect assumption that satellite data transmission technology requires constant correct alignment in order to function.

PhillyDee · 6 May 2010 at 18:10

Longbow said:
But it may not be obvious when the plane is about to crash.

Also adding floating devices would be hard. You can't have something that durable and fire resistant whilst somehow having flaps that open up revealing some kind of balloon/parachute system.

Why have flaps?

Just weld a lump of steel on the side with a shackle on it. Attatch said aid to that