China Eastern 737 Down in Guangxi

[thor]

if ntsb and boeing insist there were no signs of mechanical problem during the flight after reading the black box data, could china still insist there are mechanical faults which caused the crash?
because obviously they wont admit their pilot deliberately crashed the plane, as this would mean the eastern airlines(state owned company) will face huge compensation claims from the families on board the plane.

[flashcrash]

i'm basing it on the fact that they've had the cvr for more than long enough to determine what went on in that cockpit. knowing that the chinese are, well, the chinese,.

Wait ... aren't the CVR and the FDR in Washington DC? And haven't they been there for several weeks?

Black boxes from China Eastern crash sent to US for analysis - ABC News (go.com)

[TeeVee]

maybe so. i dont know the ins and outs of crash investigation rules. perhaps there is some arcane rule that only the responsible country can release the info. but your question only strengthens my point, assuming that china still controls the investigation and the release of info...

[thor]

maybe so. i dont know the ins and outs of crash investigation rules. perhaps there is some arcane rule that only the responsible country can release the info. but your question only strengthens my point, assuming that china still controls the investigation and the release of info...

may result in 2 final reports which contradict with each other. china authority report said root cause is mechanical failure, while ntsb report said root cause is pilot deliberate controled dive.

[Gabriel]

maybe so. i don't know the ins and outs of crash investigation rules. perhaps there is some arcane rule that only the responsible country can release the info. but your question only strengthens my point, assuming that china still controls the investigation and the release of info...

The other agencies and accredited representatives cannot release information. Agency in charge of the investigation is the only one that can release information.
That said...
- That is true only until the final report is out. The NTSB will still have the report they provided to China regarding the content of the black boxes and can release the information after the report is out. While there have been cases where the information was interpreted differently by different agencies, it never happened (as far as I know) that an agency simply fabricated or ignored information produced by another party in the investigation. That would be a short-lived lie, as the NTSB (in this case) will simply make public the report they provided to China.
- There are other ways to "release information" without actually releasing it. Just leak it and then very offended claim that you are going to open an internal investigation for this misconduct. Like it just happened with the FDR in this accident.
- While one party is charged with doing the investigation for an accident, ANY party can do an investigation on anything they want. It happened a few times that a country/agency, not happy with the official investigation, did their own. The NTSB can do just that especially if the Chinese ignore, conceal, or lie about the information that the NTSB has.

Finally, take into account hat the recorders were severely damaged. That they already got the FDR data doesn't mean that they also already got the CVR or that they ever will. Chances are that they will eventually recover it, but as the extent of the damage increases techniques to recover the information become more complex and lengthy.
Not an expert in this field, but from what I read the techniques scale goes more or less like this:
1- Plug the recorder in a reading device and read the information.
2- Dismantle the memory module from the damaged recorder, install it in a new recorder and do 1-.
3- Unsolder individual memory components (chips) from the memory board, repair them if needed (for example reconstruct broken leads), solder them on the board of new board of a new memory and do 2-.
4- open up the individual memory chips to visually scan the bits in the physical memory using an electron scan microscope and then reconstructing the information bit by bit (and I don't mean piece by piece, but from individual 1s and 0s that were visually observed as features on the semiconductor). The NTSB has this technology, I don't know if it was ever used in a real case, but it takes months, and that's after you exhausted 1, 2 and 3.

[Evan]

Correct me if I'm wrong Gabriel but I believe the NTSB can request to issue an Emergency AD via the FAA during the investigation if they find evidence of an unsafe condition. Obviously, if there were a design issue in the 737NG that caused this crash, that would warrant an immediate grounding as well. So, with that in mind, the cause is most likely human in nature.

[Gabriel]

Correct me if I'm wrong Gabriel but I believe the NTSB can request to issue an Emergency AD via the FAA during the investigation if they find evidence of an unsafe condition. Obviously, if there were a design issue in the 737NG that caused this crash, that would warrant an immediate grounding as well. So, with that in mind, the cause is most likely human in nature.

The NTSB doesn't issue requests but recommendations to any entity or person and for any reason related to highway, aviation, railroad, maritime and pipeline safety, not necessarily one specific accident investigation. And as far as I know there is not specific rule that says in what case they should or shouldn't issue one. And there is no requirement that the party receiving a a recommendation from the NTSB does zilch about it (not even answering "no I won't do that").

Additionally, that a design flaw is discovered doesn't necessarily mean that the NTSB will recommend, or that the FAA will implement, an immediate grounding until the design flaw is fixed. Take as example the rudder hardovers in the 737-classics.

At this point in the product life cycle of the 737 NG, it is very unlikely that a significant design flaw is discovered, one that has a measurable probability of causing a fatal accident. With dozens of millions of flights performed already, anything that has a significant probability of causing a fatal crash should have happened already, and everything that didn't happen yet (or until a couple of months ago) has a probability of less than the 1-in-10-million-flights standard to cause a fatal accident.

[Gabriel]

Instead of using the word "standard" in my previous post, I used another word that I can't post but that starts with bench and ends with mark.
Boy I had to do some trial and error to find out which one was the offending word.
And why would such a word be not allowed?

[Evan]

Instead of using the word "standard" in my previous post, I used another word that I can't post but that starts with bench and ends with mark.
Boy I had to do some trial and error to find out which one was the offending word.
And why would such a word be not allowed?

There is a definite whatsitdoingnow factor with this new(er) forum framework.

[flashcrash]

maybe so. i dont know the ins and outs of crash investigation rules. perhaps there is some arcane rule that only the responsible country can release the info. but your question only strengthens my point, assuming that china still controls the investigation and the release of info...

43 pages of arcane rules in fact. Called ICAO Annex 13. And you're right, the "State of Occurrence" controls the investigation, appoints the investigator-in-charge and controls the release of information. However, I find the language of rule 5.11 rather interesting:

5.11 If, in the course of an investigation it becomes known, or it is suspected, that an act of unlawful interference was involved, the investigator-in-charge shall immediately initiate action to ensure that the aviation security authorities of the State(s) concerned are so informed.

(emphasis is mine)

[thor]

once the cvr and fdr data have been read by the ntsb, it would be very difficult for the Chinese authority to cover up the cause of the crash, considering the nature of this particular incident. imho.

[Gabriel]

The fact that the Chinese civil aviation accident investigation agency delegated in the NTSB the recovery of the FDR and CVR is inconsistent with an intention to cover up the cause of the accident. I don't understand why so much paranoia.

[TeeVee]

The fact that the Chinese civil aviation accident investigation agency delegated in the NTSB the recovery of the FDR and CVR is inconsistent with an intention to cover up the cause of the accident. I don't understand why so much paranoia.

maybe because the chines are not good at innovating. maybe they can't/haven't developed the technology to read/recover the data, and can't copy those that do.fail

i'm not at all paranoid. but when state actors like indonesia and china /refuse to disclose important, albeit, self-damaging information to the rest of the world, it certainly gives me pause about trusting them for even the most mundane thing like commercial air travel...

[flashcrash]

2 years on, still no answer(s):

https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/2-years-answer-china-eastern-boeing-737-crashed-108304259

[Bluefalcon]

Sadly, it seems like this could be another case of pilot suicide...the 'training pilot' had just recently been demoted from captain to first officer. China just doesn't want to admit it because they're afraid of the public's reaction.