Findings

Congress finds the following: (1)Flight data recorder (referred to in this Act as an FDR) data and cockpit voice recorder (referred to in this Act as a CVR) data, often referred to as black box data, on commercial passenger aircraft is crucial in all aircraft crash investigations, providing vital information to determine the cause of an accident and to prevent future recurrences. (2)Underwater locating device (referred to in this Act as a ULD) beacons generate a low operating frequency to increase signal detection range and improve signal transmissibility through aircraft structures to aid in the identification of aircraft wreckage. Airframe-mounted ULDs with a minimum operating life of 90 days will improve the underwater search for aircraft wreckage. (3)Aircraft equipped with a tamper-resistant method to broadcast to a ground station sufficient information to establish the location within 6 nautical miles (referred to in this Act as nm) of where an aircraft terminates flight will facilitate a quicker identification of an accident location, a faster search and rescue response, and a more effective search effort in remote locations and overwater accidents. Use of an emergency locator transmitter (referred to in this Act as an ELT), whether as a stand-alone unit or as part of an automatic deployable flight recorder, can transmit the location of an accident and provide a homing capability for search and rescue personnel. In addition, more frequent broadcasts from data link communication systems are capable of reporting an aircraft’s position every minute to reduce the search area to a radius of less than 6 nm. (4)As the aviation environment grows more complex, to include a surge in air traffic, the integration of new manned and unmanned aerial and space vehicle activity, an increasingly dynamic national security environment, and the growth of extended overwater and remote location flight routes, it is imperative for air safety investigators to quickly locate a downed aircraft and survivors, and to have rapid access to secure black box data to enable and support the early identification of safety and security issues, and the quick implementation of appropriate preventative actions to address potential risks to the commercial aviation fleet. (5)Air crash victim families deserve assurances that search and rescue teams will have rapid access to a crash location’s site to speed survivor recovery efforts, and that victim families will have access to timely and factual information regarding the cause of an accident and the fate of their loved ones. (6)Hundreds of millions of dollars are unnecessarily expended, and significant time is wasted in efforts to locate and recover traditional fixed black boxes in underwater crash investigations. (7)Existing, advanced flight recorder technologies are available today that will aid in the rapid location of an aircraft and potential survivors, while also providing safety investigators with timelier recovery of FDR/CVR data by avoiding accident investigation delays caused by prolonged underwater and remote location search operations. (8)Recent commercial passenger aircraft crashes involving United States and international manufactured aircraft have demonstrated the significant challenges and unnecessary delays safety investigators face in trying to locate and recover traditional fixed black boxes from the bottom of the ocean, including the following: (A)On March 8, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, B–777–200ER, disappeared with 239 passengers and crew. International search and recovery efforts for the aircraft and black boxes have involved 29 nations and hundreds of millions of dollars in resources, becoming the most expensive search and recovery mission in aviation history. Nine years later, the aircraft is still missing, and the cause of the crash is still unknown. (B)On June 1, 2009, Air France Flight 447 crashed into the Atlantic Ocean with 216 passengers and 12 crewmembers. Despite locating aircraft wreckage within 5 days, it still took nearly 2 years and an estimated cost of over $160,000,000 to recover the FDR and CVR from the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean at a depth of 12,000 feet. (C)On October 29, 2018, Lion Air 610 became the first of two fatal B–737 Max 8 crashes. Despite being in only 100 feet of water, it took investigators 77 days to locate and recover the CVR, which provided critical information. (D)On July 2, 2021, Transair Flight 810, B–737–200, crashed off the coast of Mamala Bay, Oahu. While investigators knew the location of the aircraft, it took 4 months to recover the FDR and CVR from the bottom of the ocean. (E)On January 9, 2021, Sriwijaya Air Flight 182, B–737–500, crashed into the Java Sea in a depth of only 89 feet, yet the recovery of the CVR still took 81 days. (F)On June 30, 2009, Yemenia Airlines IY626 crashed off of the coast of Comoros, with 152 passengers and aircrew. The sole survivor, a 12-year-old girl, was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours. Her accounts shared that more passengers survived the crash but succumbed to hypothermia due to the delay in locating the downed aircraft. The FDR and CVR were not recovered until nearly 2 months later, at a depth of 3,900 feet. (G)On January 1, 2007, Adam Air Flight 574, carrying 102 passengers and aircrew, crashed off the coast of Indonesia. The FDR and CVR were located within 1 month, but could not be recovered until 7 months later due to the difficulty of the underwater environment. The FDR and CVR were found at a depth of 6,600 feet and 4,600 feet apart. (9)In 2012, the International Civil Aviation Organization (referred to in this Act as the ICAO) adopted a standard requiring all aircraft with a maximum certificated takeoff mass over 15,000 kilograms (kg) for which a type certificate is issued on or after January 1, 2016, and which are required to be equipped with both a CVR and FDR, to be equipped with two combination FDR/CVR recorder systems. (10)In 2016, ICAO issued an additional ruling that as of January 2021, all new commercial aircraft types must be equipped with a means to recover flight recorder data in a timely manner. The intent for this standard is to enable authorities to recover at least one set of FDR/CVR data without the need for underwater searches or prolonged terrain searches. (11)On October 7, 2014, following the disappearance of MH370 and the nearly 2-year search and recovery effort required to retrieve the black boxes from Air France Flight 447, the National Transportation Safety Board (referred to in this Act as the NTSB) convened the Emerging Flight Data and Locator Technology Forum. The forum included government, industry, and investigative experts to discuss technologies that could be used to improve the location of aircraft wreckage and the timely recovery of flight data following accidents in remote locations or over water. (12)The NTSB has stated its highest concern is for aircraft that fly extended overwater operations outside of radar coverage because timely response and recovery of data are more challenging when an accident occurs in a remote area. Currently, aircraft that fly extended overwater operations must carry additional survival equipment, such as liferafts and survival-type emergency locator transmitters to mitigate the risks, and would benefit from the addition of safety technology outlined in this Act. (13)As a result of the 2014 safety forum, the NTSB formally issued safety recommendations to the Federal Aviation Administration (referred to in this Act as the FAA), aligning with the ICAO regulations, to require that all newly manufactured aircraft operating extended overwater operations and operating under part 121 or part 135 of title 14, Code of Federal Regulations, that are required to have a CVR and a FDR, be equipped with a tamper-resistant method to broadcast sufficient information to establish the location where an aircraft terminates flight within 6 nm (A–15–001), an airframe low-frequency ULD that will function for at least 90 days (A–15–002), and a secondary FDR/CVR system that enables the recovery of mandatory flight data parameters without the need for an underwater retrieval (A–15–003). (14)In support of commercial passenger safety and national security, it is in the public’s best interest that the FAA initiate a formal rulemaking process to implement the NTSB’s Safety Recommendations A–15–001 through A–15–003 in order to— (A)provide aviation safety investigators with critical FDR and CVR data without the delays and cost of underwater search and recoveries; (B)achieve redundancy and maximize survivability of the most important crash investigation tool equipped on commercial passenger aircraft; (C)ensure rapid recovery of the FDR and CVR data for timely safety and security analysis in all crash scenarios; and (D)improve timely location of the aircraft, accident site, and survivors. (15)The NTSB safety recommendations do not dictate the technology that must be used to achieve these safety goals but does cite at least two acceptable technologies to meet the requirement, to include automatic deployable flight recorder systems and transmission of flight recorder data systems. (16)Automatic deployable flight recorder systems combine a FDR, CVR, and ELT into one crash-hardened, survivable black box, which releases from the aircraft upon crash impact with land, or water, and in the event of in-air explosion, enabling it to avoid the crash impact site and float indefinitely in overwater accidents. The floating deployable recorder sends a distress alert tracking signal to the free, global constellation of Search and Rescue (SAR) satellite transponders known as COSPAS–SARSAT, immediately providing the position of the downed aircraft at point of impact to assist in the location of survivors and the location of the floating deployable FDR and CVR black box for rapid recovery and analysis. (17)Transmission of flight recorder data involves monitoring aircraft flight parameters and triggering satellite transmission of critical flight data when the parameters deviate from their normal operating envelope and can also assist in identifying the location of a downed aircraft. (18)Use of either the automatic deployable flight recorder or transmission of flight recorder data technologies, when used to supplement the current mandatory onboard fixed FDR and CVR, will provide investigators more timely access to information, offering valuable insight into the circumstances at the end of an accident flight while helping to focus an investigation during the search for survivors, and recovery of traditional fixed recorders and wreckage from underwater crash sites. (19)CVRs provide unique information with which the NTSB can conduct more thorough investigations to target safety recommendations more effectively. The current 2-hour CVR standard recording duration has hampered safety investigations because relevant portions of the recordings were overwritten. In 2018, the NTSB issued Recommendation (A–18–30) calling for the CVR recording requirement to be extended to 25 hours, which will bring the U.S. into compliance with European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) standards.

Regulations requiring additional flight recorder system and other purposes

(a)

In general

Not later than 1 year after the date of enactment of this Act, the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration shall issue such regulations as are necessary to require that all newly manufactured aircraft used in extended overwater operations and operating under part 121 or part 135 of title 14, Code of Federal Regulations, that are required to have a CVR and a FDR— (1)be equipped with a means to recover, at a minimum, mandatory flight data parameters that does not require underwater retrieval; (2)be equipped with a tamper-resistant method to broadcast to a ground station sufficient information to establish the location where an aircraft terminates flight as the result of an accident within 6 nm of the point of impact; and (3)be equipped with an airframe low-frequency ULD that will function for at least 90 days and that can be detected by equipment available on military, search and rescue, and salvage assets commonly used to search for and recover wreckage. (b)

25-Hour requirement

Schedule for compliance

In issuing regulations under subsections (a) and (b), the Administrator shall require the installation of the additional recorder system required under this section on commercial aircraft that are ordered by an air carrier on or after January 1, 2027. (d)

Compliant additional flight recorder system

Compliant technologies must enable safety investigators to recover mandatory flight data parameters without requiring underwater recovery of the recording device. This requirement does not require a third combination FDR/CVR recording mechanism to satisfy the regulation. Compliant technologies can include an automatic deployable flight recorder system, transmission of flight recorder data, and other technologies. (e)

Definitions

In this Act: (1)

Automatic deployable flight recorder system

The term automatic deployable flight recorder system means a flight data recorder, cockpit voice recorder, and emergency locator transmitter housed in one crash-protected, floatable unit that meets the performance specifications for a deployable recorder system under United States Federal Aviation Administration Technical Standard Order 123c (CVR), Technical Standard Order 124c (FDR), and Minimum Operational Performance Specifications for Deployable Recorders under EUROCAE ED–112A, and all subsequent updates to such requirements. (2)

Commercial passenger aircraft

The term commercial passenger aircraft means all airplanes of a maximum certificated takeoff mass of over 27,000 kg and authorized to carry more than 19 passengers as referenced in ICAO Annex 6, Part I, Chapter 6, Paragraph 6.3.6.1. (3)

Transmission of flight recorder data

The term transmission of flight recorder data means a system capable of monitoring aircraft parameters and providing continuous satellite transmission or the triggering of satellite transmission of critical flight data when the parameters deviate from their normal operating envelope and can also assist in identifying the location of a downed aircraft. Data should be captured from a triggering event until the end of the flight and for as long a time period before the triggering event as possible.