US helps China investigate the cause of the plane crash

On April 2, the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said it was assisting Chinese investigators with downloading data from the cockpit voice recorder of the China Eastern plane that crashed on March 21.

Representative of the US National Transportation Safety Board said they are helping the Civil Aviation Administration of China “download data from the cockpit voice recorder of flight 5735 China Eastern in our lab in Washington”. The US also sent an investigation team to China.

Beijing’s decision to send a key piece of evidence to Washington for help underscores the urgency of the investigation at a time when the two countries are at odds on a number of other issues. The cockpit voice recorder is expected to provide investigators with details of communications between the three pilots of the flight.

The Boeing 737-800 crashed into a mountainside in southern China on March 21, killing 132 people on board. It was mainland China’s deadliest air disaster in 28 years. So far, both of the plane’s black boxes have been found.

The NTSB said more about the US investigators who have visited China. “They will limit interactions with people outside of the investigation, apply the same safety protocols as the Beijing Olympics, allowing work to start immediately without the need for COVID-19 quarantine- 19”, this unit said.

It is not clear how long the US investigation team will be in China, but it could be several weeks, according to an NTSB spokesman.

CAAC News, the newspaper of China’s aviation regulator, said the NTSB’s investigation team consisted of seven people. Under international agreement, the NTSB has the right to participate in the investigation because the aircraft is designed and built in the United States.

A small team from Boeing is also traveling to China to assist with the investigation.

After the meeting of the Standing Committee of the Politburo of China, state media reported that the cause of the accident should be confirmed as soon as possible, and that the information should be publicly, timely and publicly disclosed. transparent. If an accident is caused by negligence, not only the personnel in charge but also the top officials involved will be investigated.