Crumpled Cockpit Voice Recorder Retrieved from the Wreckage
Familes, and the rest of us, wait from moment-to-moment to hear the latest updates in the Germanwings crash in the French Alps. Speaking personally as a family member of someone who was killed on the Egypt Air crash over the Atlantic in 1999, and as someone who has since followed just about every major air crash, I am really struck by the speed with which the French have released information from the cockpit voice recorder to the general public. This is a good thing.
Different cultures seem to handle information differently. Information in past plane crashes has sometimes been released much more slowly. While it takes time to make sense of what the recordings really mean and how they should be interpreted (the Egypt Air crash is a perfect example of this), I highly commend the French for immediately releasing the information regarding one of the pilots being locked out of the cockpit during the descent.
The main thing relatives, and the rest of us, want to know is what happened, and why did it happen?
–Lynne Diligent
Intercultural Meanderings 