China Eastern crash: Boeing 737's 'severely damaged' black box found, but may keep its fatal secrets

At the time of the crash, the plane carrying 132 people on board was reportedly traveling at more than 640mph

UPDATED MAR 23, 2022

Screenshots showing the tragic crash (Twitter)

A “severely damaged” black box has been recovered on Wednesday, March 23, from the site where a China Eastern Airlines Corp. jet crashed Monday, March 21. However, it is apparently difficult for the investigators to tell if the recovered device is the flight data recorder or the cockpit voice recorder. Also, it has been said that it’s not currently possible to say if data can be recovered from it or not.

The Boeing 737 was reportedly traveling at more than 640mph while carrying 132 people on board when it nosedived and “evaporated” into a crater. John Hansman, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology astronautics and aeronautics professor who examined a Bloomberg News review of flight-track data, said: “The preliminary data indicate it was near the speed of sound.” Bob Mann, president of R.W. Mann & Co. consultancy, noted: “It was an exceedingly high-energy crash. It looks like it literally evaporated into a crater.”

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Black boxes are reportedly considered to be great evidence to determine what caused the accident. They can apparently live through a jolt of 310mph but the Boeing 737’s speed was close to the speed of sound before it slammed into a mountainous area in Wuzhou in southern China, and this can make the investigation complex. China's Civil Aviation Authority added that the search for the second black box is still going on.

The jet plane reportedly took off at 1:11 pm (0511 GMT) from Kunming with nine crew members and 123 passengers on board and was scheduled to land in Guangzhou at 3:05 p.m. (0705 GMT). But before reaching the destination, the flight began to sink between 06:20:43 and 06:20:59 from an altitude of 30,000 feet. The Sun reported that “the plane is understood to have then dropped to just 7,400 feet in a matter of minutes before pulling up - climbing 1,200 feet. It then nosedived and smashed into the ground.”

The crash has left people shocked with Li Xiaojin, a Chinese aviation expert, saying: “Usually the plane is on auto-pilot during cruise stage. So it is very hard to fathom what happened. From a technical point of view, something like this should not have happened.”

Another aviation expert Arthur Rowe noted: “It looks most likely a loss of control event, possibly following a high altitude stall of the aircraft. There are multiple possible causes. Jammed or unresponsive control surfaces, especially on the tail are one. An inappropriate combination of autopilot settings is another. Sabotage - that's probably unlikely on a domestic Chinese flight given the Covid restrictions on entering the country. It's unlikely to be engine related as aircraft can fly perfectly well with no engine power - for a limited time.” Engineering professor Tao Yang of Nottingham University added, “The plane was completely out of control and at this stage it is very difficult to say what has happened.”

China’s President Xi Jinping has also expressed his “shock” over the incident and demanded “all efforts” towards the rescue operation and to determine the “cause of the accident as soon as possible”.