So-called black boxes carry the real answer to what happened on LATAM flight 800

Running to the tail of Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner is an umbilical cord carrying a rapid play-by-play of virtually every flight feature. The data, which totals more than a thousand parameters, is swiftly saved electronically into the flight data recorder (FDR), one of the so-called black boxes that aviation safety investigators say offers critical facts when piecing together an incident, like the mid-air plunge on LATAM Airlines flight 800 earlier this week that injured 50 people. The FDR and cockpit voice recorder from the LATAM flight should provide evidence to prove or refute the pilot’s initial explanation, as relayed by a passenger who spoke to CNN: that cockpit displays briefly went blank and the pilot lost control of the plane. It could also show whether the yoke was pushed forward, sending the plane rapidly downward — a scenario The Wall Street Journal reported the investigators are probing, and which may have involved a flight attendant hitting a switch while serving pilots a meal. “There’s absolutely no way this will be a mystery,” said Peter Goelz, who led investigations as managing director of the National Transportation Safety Board, and is now a CNN aviation analyst. “The recorder will indicate if something was starting and what happened.” Regardless of what the FDR shows, the contents of the orange steel box with reflective tape typically mounted in the rear of the plane, which is meant to reduce the risk of damage in a crash, have proven pivotal in past airplane investigations.<br/>