Second flight recorder from China crash is found, officials say

Search crews have found the second of two flight recorders from a passenger plane that abruptly plunged to earth in southern China, killing 132 people, officials said on Sunday, nearly a week after the disaster. Flight recorders, which collect crucial information, including the pilots’ communications and data on the plane’s engines and performance, could help explain why China Eastern Airlines Flight 5735 lost more than 20,000 feet in altitude in just over a minute before crashing into a hillside in the region of Guangxi. Searchers have been digging into the muddy earth to look for evidence, and a team dug the second recorder from the hillside, after spotting a telltale flash of orange from its case, Zheng Xi, a firefighting official helping to oversee the search, told a news conference. “The other parts of the recorder have been badly damaged, but the exterior of the data storage unit appears quite OK,” Zhu Tao, an aviation safety official from the Civil Aviation Administration of China, told the news conference. Aviation officials and experts have warned that both recorders could be badly damaged from the crash, which would make it more difficult to retrieve their data. Search crews are also trying to recover debris from the plane, which could take weeks, if not longer. The recovery of structural parts could help investigators determine how the plane broke apart by using metallurgical analysis, Mike Daniel, an industry consultant and former accident investigator for the FAA, said. “They should piece as many parts as possible to try to reconstruct the aircraft,” he said, though he acknowledged that a full reconstruction would be “nearly impossible” given the impact with which the plane hit the ground.<br/>