The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said an initial review of the Atlas Air Boeing 767F crash in Texas on 23 February has found crew communications were “consistent with a loss control” of the aircraft which began approximately 18 seconds prior to the end of the recording.
NTSB engineers have examined the cockpit voice recorder and recovered the flight data recorder which were both recovered over the weekend from the accident site about 40 miles from Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport.
The Atlas Air B767F aircraft Flight No. 3591 was operating on behalf of Amazon from Miami to Houston and carrying a full payload of cargo when it crashed into the water in Trinity Bay, Anahuac, Texas, on Saturday (23 February) killing three on-board.
The NTSB said the condition of the accident site made locating the recorders challenging and their director from the Office of Research and Engineering and the Office of Aviation Safety conducted an audition of the CVR as part of the NTSB’s ongoing investigation of the accident.
The audition revealed that the length of the recording is approximately two hours and was obtained from a download of a solid-state type cockpit voice recorder, but the recording included the final portion of the flight; however, the quality of the audio is poor.
The NTSB said the crew was in communication with air traffic control and were being provided radar vectors for the runway 26L approach into George Bush Intercontinental Airport.
NTSB recorder investigators are currently verifying and validating the FDR data, and said it plans to provide a summary in an investigative update in a few days.
Technical experts in the CVR group will also convene in the coming week to review the entire recording and produce a transcript of the accident recording which will be a time-consuming process to complete the transcript.
The CVR group is one of the seven investigative groups established by the Investigator-in-Charge for the accident investigation.
