Improvements needed to blackbox have been obvious since AirFrance 447 and Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.

Woodland Hills, CA -- (ReleaseWire) -- 07/07/2016 -- No one is saying that aircraft tracking doesn't need an overhaul. It does. Examination of plane crash events demands it.

Aviation experts have been asking for pinger battery improvements since a month after the crash of Air France 447 on 1 June 2009, when the pinger battery ran down in July. Air France 447 was not recovered from the ocean floor until May 2011, nearly two years after it was lost. Debris from the accident was recovered in the interim, but if the pinger had been louder, or the battery designed to last longer, then there's a good chance that the plane would have been discovered sooner. One of the outcomes of this terrible event was a determination to design a pinger system with longer lasting batteries. EASA amended requirements for flight recorders and underwater locating devices in its 2013-26 amendment(RMT.0400 & RMT.0401 (OPS.090(A) & OPS.090(B)) — 20.12.2013) but implementing these requirements takes a prohibitively long time.

Aviation experts have been asking for better tracking technology since Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared on 8 March 2014 while flying from Kuala Lumpur International Airport, Malaysia, to Beijing Capital International Airport in China. Because this plane departed from its planned route, finding where it came down has been a unique challenge. Inmarsat's satellite communications network concluded that the flight continued until at least 08:19 and flew south into the southern Indian Ocean. Triangulation of Inmarsat's satellite communications has been the only credible source searchers depend on to develop the search area.

Aviation experts have been suggesting the blackbox be water-activated (or have water-activated duplicates) with flotation of some kind so the blackbox can be found faster. More recently, aviation experts have wondered about EgyptAir Flight 804 which crashed into the Mediterranean Sea on 19 May 2016. It was known fairly precisely where it came down, and yet salvage and rescue units were unable to be on the scene in time to help any survivors—if survivors there had been. We will never know because no one was there. And while tracking the location of the blackbox fell within the thirty day battery limit, if the technology had more power, it could have been located sooner. Finding the wreckage sooner means less money spent on the search, and a shorter time for the families agonizing over their losses.

So here is what is new: Inmarsat provides SwiftBroadband service for plane's inflight Wi-Fi on many aircraft. Immarsat is developing a streaming system described as a "blackbox in the cloud." This streaming system they are working on will allow crucial data to be streamed off a plane on the occasion of specified trigger events like a course deviation or disappearance from radar.

One only need consider a few factors to realize that a cloud-based system is a crucial development that current technology can easily handle. We need only to look at the cost of the search for a missing plane. According to France and Brazil, those two countries spent more than $40 million over two years to recover the black boxes from Air France Flight 447. Bloomberg reported the recovery cost of Air France 447 was $100 million. According to the South China Post, the cost of the (as yet unfound) MH370 will be as much as ten times more than AF447. Like the expense of MH370's search, the cost of finding EgyptAir Flight 804 is still ongoing.

Even when Inmarsat's streaming system will be available, the aviation industry is going to be resistant, mostly because it is going to be costly. Is this a cost that we must afford? I think it is.

Let me know your thoughts on this crucial topic at https://twitter.com/GeorgeHatcher

About Air Crash Consultants
Air Crash Consultants, a division of Wrongful Death Consultants, is a service consultancy providing strategic litigation support in U.S and International aviation cases, and various aspects of aviation-related personal injury and wrongful death litigation cases, working with top US and International law firms. We are legal case coordinators and client maintenance providers.The company is situated in California, but operates internationally.

For more information on this press release visit: http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/release-3.htm

To lock or not to lock: the burning question in the brave new world of aviation security

Woodland Hills, CA -- (ReleaseWire) -- 04/22/2016 -- To lock or not to lock, that is the question.

Anyone who has been locked out of their own house or car understands the need for some kind of solution for the crisis of being accidentally caught on the wrong side of the impregnable lock. In a "normal" situation on the ground, being locked out of a house or car means one must turn to a locksmith. Problem solved. Obviously this is not a solution for the airborne. I don't see commercial airlines adding a locksmith to their flight crew any time soon.

In many ways, the problem poses an issue not unlike the government's need to crack phone security. Both questions involved a desperately serious aspect of security. While cockpit security is not a litmus test of the honesty or the arrogance of those in power, it shares the feature of being a pressing need for those in immediate danger. It poses the same issue of the inevitable circulation of hacking methodology, once a solution exists. As a consequence of the Germanwings 9525 crash where the infamous co-pilot locked the pilot out and deliberately crashed the plane, we now have the unthinkable possibility of having to protect the passengers from the pilots. We now have a looming spectre of not only terrorism from without, but from within. We now live in a world where no one believes the cockpit door should be unbreachable, on the off chance of pilot suicide. Where now do we to draw the line? Where is the "jimmy" button in case of emergency? (I don't mean "jimmy" in the sense of that physical crowbar, but rather just a solution to getting the door open.)

Today we have the technical miracle of GPS vehicle tracking systems which are enabled to unlock a car. If such a thing were available for a plane's cockpit door, then would it make plane security less because the system would be inevitably (or maybe irresistibly) hackable? Is the answer some pilot keypad, thumb or eye print, digital or computer technology or tracking, remote GPS lock control, physical gate or tangible key technology? And how to guard that the solution will remain secure, and not become another risk factor?

I wish I had an answer. All I end up doing is coming up with more questions. As an Air Crash Consultant and frequent flyer, I do believe the best think tanks should be working toward devising solutions. Of course, this should be happening simultaneously as authorities and airlines work together on the prevention strategy of improving pilot screening. What do you think?

Let me know your thoughts on this crucial topic at https://twitter.com/GeorgeHatcher

About Air Crash Consultants
Air Crash Consultants, a division of Wrongful Death Consultants, is a service consultancy providing strategic litigation support in U.S and International aviation cases, and various aspects of aviation-related personal injury and wrongful death litigation cases, working with top US and International law firms. We are legal case coordinators and client maintenance providers.The company is situated in California, but operates internationally.

For more information on this press release visit: http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/release-3.htm

Condolences to the families who lost loved ones aboard Metrojet Flight 9268

Woodland Hills, CA -- (ReleaseWire) -- 04/19/2016 -- On October 31, 2015, Metrojet Flight 9268 crashed in the northern Sinai while en route from Sharm el-Sheikh International Airport, Egypt to Pulkovo Airport, Saint Petersburg, Russia. As of the 31st of April, the accident will have been six months ago.

Two hundred and seventeen passengers and seven crew members died in the crash: 219 Russians, 4 Ukrainians, and 1 Belarusian. The investigation into Metrojet Flight 9268 is expected to go on for over a year. A terrorist bomb secreted aboard was deemed responsible, but that conclusion was just the beginning of the investigation. The Russian Federal Security Service announced the reason the flight went down was that a terrorist attack in the form of a bomb containing the equivalent of up to 2.2 lbs of TNT detonated during the flight.

To share condolences, Air Crash Consultant's George Hatcher has posted a Metrojet Flight 9268 memorial page located at http://metrojet9268.com. Family members and concerned parties can reach George Hatcher via twitter at https://twitter.com/georgehatcher, social media and the Air Crash Consultants website.

About Air Crash Consultants
Air Crash Consultants, a division of Wrongful Death Consultants, is a service consultancy providing strategic litigation support in U.S and International aviation cases, and various aspects of aviation-related personal injury and wrongful death litigation cases, working with top US and International law firms. We are legal case coordinators and client maintenance providers.The company is situated in California, but operates internationally.

For more information on this press release visit: http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/release-3.htm

Accident to Airbus A320-211, registered D-AIPX and operated by Lufthansa's Germanwings, flight GWI18G, on 03/24/15 at Prads-Haute-Bléone

Pasadena, CA -- (ReleaseWire) -- 02/22/2016 -- According to the BEA, they will release the final report on Germanwings 9525 on Sunday, March 13, 2016 during a press briefing. I plan to be there.

Although the public has not seen the final report, and indeed, as the investigation has not yet even been completed, the world already understands what happened aboard this tragic flight. What we really do not understand—and perhaps never will—is what drove Germanwings co-pilot Andreas Lubitz to research cockpit door security and methods of committing suicide. We do not know what drove a depressed human being to impel the plane and all the lives in his safekeeping into the side of a French mountain, condemning every soul aboard that plane to death. We do not know the devils that hounded him into this cold-blooded act. We only mourn, perhaps, his loss of humanity, as we mourn alongside the grieving families who have been robbed of their loved ones and their rightful lives.

All passenger/families received a total of 8 million euros, divided equally among them. Media reports on what passengers received from Lufthansa varies.

In the German media, the Rheinische Post claimed officials of the German airline said families of the 144 passengers have obtained different compensation amounts. It is also reported that Lufthansa group has paid 11.2 million euros ($12.48 million) to the families. Additional "uncalculated" compensation in "property damages" is still coming from Lufthansa to the families.

This compensation…coming from Lufthansa, whose 2014 profit was declared "flat" at a mere $31.7 billion, announced in October of 2015 a nine-month net profit of €1.75 billion ($ 1.97 billion), up 262.7% from €482 million. The tragedy which destroyed 150 lives, and crippled all of their families appears to have left Lufthansa's bottom line untouched.

Do we also mourn and grieve and condemn Lufthansa? The depth of the ethics and principals of this many billion dollar company—the largest airline in Europe—remains to be seen. We can ask ourselves if this is a high-principled company of good repute, of sterling honor. We need not conjecture long. A tangible answer will be obvious when these decisions are made. We will see where lie their priorities when we learn how they treat the families whose lives hang in the balance in their custodianship.

George Hatcher
President
Air Crash Consultants

About Air Crash Consultants
Air Crash Consultants, a division of Wrongful Death Consultants, is a service consultancy providing strategic litigation support in U.S and International aviation cases, and various aspects of aviation-related personal injury and wrongful death litigation cases, working with top US and International law firms. We are legal case coordinators and client maintenance providers.The company is situated in California, but operates internationally.

For more information on this press release visit: http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/release-3.htm

Chasing and Facing the Human Side of Air Catastrophe

Woodland Hills, CA -- (ReleaseWire) -- 11/13/2015 -- All I know is that when you fly in fear, the sky, the air, and the distance below is immense and hostile. In the presence of air, the earth and your stomach fall away, leaving your heart racing. I sometimes think of the fear passengers felt as a plane went down—but this is not something to dwell on. Dwelling is long, painful, lingering. For most, a crash is only seconds in the making. Maybe the catastrophe is so brief, there is no time even for fear. One hopes this is the circumstance for those who are trapped in the moment of final disaster, like this most recent one, Metrojet Flight 9268 that crashed in the Sinai.

As a frequent passenger, I am accustomed to the feeling of flying. Even when going to the site of a crash across the world, I can sleep on the plane. Hope flies at night, sailing in darkness. This is after years of flying, and years of seeing the worst a crash has to offer. I don't know why it is. Maybe it is like going to a loud concert, and listening so long that the decibel levels disappear behind the ringing of the ears. Maybe it is because I have done my due diligence before getting on a plane, or because I have trusted my gut instincts about when to fly; or even because, when I do defy my gut feelings, it is in a good cause. Even when I look out and see only the runway lights and black space and an imaginary runway, I believe in the plane, the pilot, in the moment. If there is fear, it is a flash, and then gone. The pilot finds the runway; lands; it is solid earth again. Turbulence is worse on the nerves, but more commonplace. Just bumps in the road, like speed bumps, even if the road is made of air.

It takes many years to become a professional pilot, to qualify to man the big commercial jets; maybe I have put in as much time learning to fly as a passenger. It is not easy to give up control and let someone else drive the vehicle, especially when you spend as much time as I do, examining the cause of one crash and another. On land, I do the driving. I am less comfortable with someone else behind a wheel. But as a passenger on a plane, I have visited more different airports than I can even think to name. Different airports but they share some features: the presence of planes, the sound of engines; the roar overhead, the passage of time.Taxiing to the future, taking off. Always movement forward, onward, upward, and back to earth again.

It is an irony of what I do, fly across the world to meetings about a crash, fly on a plane to look at trouble on a plane. The journey ahead is always exciting, but I can't help but wonder as I step aboard, will this be the one? And the moment passes. Someone needs my help: someone in Saint Petersberg, Russia; Duesseldorf, Germany; Barcelona, Spain; Kinmen, Taiwan. Somewhere far away. I must fly.

About Air Crash Consultants
Air Crash Consultants, a division of Wrongful Death Consultants, is a service consultancy providing stratigic litigation support in U.S and International aviation cases, and various aspects of aviation-related personal injury and wrongful death litigation cases, working with top US and International law firms. We are legal case coordinators and client maintenance providers.The company is situated in California, but operates internationally.

For more information on this press release visit: http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/release-3.htm

George Hatcher: An editorial about tragic victims, senseless conflict, evasive justice for the families of 298 murdered souls, and politics making strange bedfellows.

Woodland Hills, CA -- (ReleaseWire) -- 07/20/2015 -- It has been a year and a day since the world was shocked by the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 over the Ukraine. In different places in the world, the tragedy was commemorated, as well as in the field where the plane fell, where families gathered and remembered. While no one claims ownership of the deed, either Russian separatists or Ukrainians let fly the Buk missile that took down the commercial jet that was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

It has been a year and a day since the death of 298 people innocently riding in a commercial jet, and the area is still in conflict. Fingers point at Russia, and at the separatists, and at Malaysia Airlines for choosing that flight path; but no matter what is decided based on international investigations, tribunals, or world opinion, regardless of what is fact, what is rumor, what is speculation, bias, wild guess or secret knowledge, the victims are still dead. Maybe there is a puppet master; maybe there are military puppets falling on their swords. There are dark agendas at work here; and the families are still bleeding, facing that black hole of loss and suffering.

Less time has passed since the release of a tape of a damning conversation and film of military personal at the scene of the crash that appears to indicate a senseless accident. There will be punishment, and penance. Something will be decided to satisfy the courts and the crucible of world opinion, but in the end, there will still be 298 dead. Nothing can be done to bring true justice. Nothing can be done to erase the savagery, the horror, the tragedy. Nothing will bring them back.

Politicization of the tragedy and all the finger-pointing, are an evil joke. Those who are responsible know the truth, and should come forward with it. I do not know how the families continue. I do not know how they manage to face each day, but the families of the dead are the true victims and the true heroes. What fortitude it must take to have faced 366 mornings with the knowledge of their loss, to behave as if life goes on, when it died in flames, and lies in ashes in a cold foreign field.

Air Crash Consultants

For more information on this press release visit: http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/release-3.htm

Cockpit door designed to lock trouble out locks in Suicidal Pilot

Woodland Hills, CA -- (ReleaseWire) -- 04/02/2015 -- As an advocate (not a lawyer) of fair compensation for the victims of plane crashes, I have been closely following the story behind the crash of Germanwings Flight 9525 and the now notorious 27-year-old co-pilot, Andreas Lubitz. As is always the case, a team of expert investigators will dig out the facts to determine the most likely scenario behind the crash. That careful investigation will take a year at the very least. In this Germanwings accident, the one factor that stands out already is the role played by the pilot's state of mind in what appears now to be his deliberate collision course with the French Alps. It is now common knowledge that the plane disintegrated on impact with the Massif des Trois-Eveches. Imagine how horrified the families were when the transcript of the CVR (Cockpit Voice Recorder) was quickly leaked by tabloids. Journalists have been shouldering each other out of the way to get to the front of the line, "scooping" each with another "leaked" nugget. A girlfriend's interview. A medical report here. A video there. TV commentators and newspapers from CNN and the venerable New York Times to the most scurrilous tabloids are spouting "the facts" faster than investigators can have gotten to the information. Tweeting the news as I do results in loads of source-checking, and plenty of on-going head-scratching moments while weeding out wild supposition masquerading as news in sources one would normally consider impeccable. When one source says "the plane is blue," another says "the plane is red." Sometimes I can determine which is the truth, but sometimes I have to leave it to readers to puzzle out.

I have been working Wrongful Death cases for some forty-seven years now. I am a consultant to attorneys across the globe who represent the families of Wrongful Death victims. Each investigation is exactly the same in terms of the emotional impact of the accident. Devastating. Whether the case may or may not end up in court, whether or not the accident catches the media's attention, every aspect is always impossibly difficult for the families. Some accidents seem similar because they share a factor, whether it be similar weather conditions, mechanical difficulties, or a particular flaw in a particular model of plane.

Some aviation accidents personify extremes. Consider that while there is always some degree of speculation as to an accident's cause, MH370 brought as many conspiracy theorists out of the woodwork in this past twelve months as Amelia Earhart's disappearance has in the past 87 years. Everything seems plausible when people are desperate for an explanation. Because in this age of cell phones and satellites, there is simply no explanation for a plane to vanish, MH370 has become the "poster child" for speculation. I expect MH370 will continue to spawn new theories and will endure as a mystery until, at some point, the wreckage will be found and examined.

If I were comparing MH370 and Germanwings 9525, I could write a whole piece examining the conflict of government transparency vs. individual confidentiality, but that was not my intent today. I was just thinking of aviation safety, and how 9/11 became the catalyst for upgraded multifaceted flight deck security. One outcome of 9/11 is the impregnable, indestructible cockpit door, the brain child of countless engineering hours, security and scientific research. Passengers since 9/11 have flown safe in the knowledge that no intruder could again gain entry to the cockpit and overpower the pilot thanks to redundant enhanced security precautions and a door designed to keep the dangerous people out. Now there's a cockpit voice recording that appears to show that same safe cockpit door is the barrier that kept the PIC from being able to save everyone aboard. Captain Patrick Sondenheimer died trying to get that door open.

The impregnable cockpit door, the terrible irony of Germanwings Flight 9525.

About Air Crash Consultants
A division of Wrongful Death Consultants, Air Crash Consultants was established to network between lawyers and their clients, bridging the gaps, especially in regard to International clients, freeing and enabling the lawyer to concentrate on higher priority commitments. Air Crash Consultant services might also be designated as an umbrella, because the company's functions encompass a variety of problem-solving areas in support of the lawyer-client relationship as needed. Services are not limited to finding experts, developing translation teams, client support, document handling, drafting demand letters, client interviews, etc. Visit the company websites at http://aircrashconsultants.com, http://wrongfuldeathnews.com, http://wrongfuldeathconsultants.com

For more information on this press release visit: http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/release-3.htm

Everything depends on the investigation's findings.

Woodland Hills, CA -- (ReleaseWire) -- 01/12/2015 -- George Hatcher of Air Crash Consultants believes that in order for justice to be served in the domain of wrongful death and personal injury cases, it is crucial that every claim pursues the maximum compensation possible. His input on trending aviation matters, such as the importance of timely recovery of the black boxes on Flight 8501, is frequently sought.

Hatcher explains the timing of the recovery can be crucial. "Four minutes after ATC denied Indonesia Air Asia Flight 8501 permission to climb due to six planes in the same airspace, the Airbus A320 disappeared from radar, leaving us dependent on investigators learning the rest of the story to be told by the wreckage and the black boxes. Along with family members, the world waits and watches. It should be simple because of the black box beacon, right? But the ping range of the beacon is about 4,100 meters—and only before the batteries die thirty days after the crash."

When asked to compare this accident with the disappearance of MH370 and Air France 447, he says he believes this case to be different. "It took two years to find the black boxes of AF447 in the Atlantic Ocean and the data was expected by many experts to have been damaged. As it turned out, the data was good enough to establish the missing pieces of the puzzle. Next to AF447, AirAsia the search time frame should be shorter. Compared to the Atlantic, the Java sea is a pond. Pings or not, the black boxes will be found."

One reason for the demand for Hatcher's services is that forty plus years of consulting—bridging the gaps between lawyers, clients and countries—has given him a unique perspective in providing the most comprehensive service possible to all his clients. Even lawyers frequently ask him about the feasibility of cases, to which he makes this disclaimer, "I am not a lawyer. I don't give legal advice." He admits, however, that he quotes the experts, including his own Anonymous Experts

His caution is based on having seen cases turn on a dime on the basis of unanticipated discoveries, like the well-known Hinkley case made famous in the movie Erin Brockovich. George Hatcher was consulting for Masry and Vititoe at the time Brockovich's famous case was underway.

For more information on this press release visit: http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/release-3.htm

The Air Flight Disaster (AFD) Column is a Resource of Air Crash Consultants

Woodland Hills, CA -- (ReleaseWire) -- 10/14/2014 -- Air Crash Consultants, a leading firm that advises lawyers who defend victims of aviation accidents, is pleased to announce that its news blog, Air Flight Disaster (AFD) has over 37,000 subscribers. The aviation news blog, which follows aviation disasters across the globe, works toward maintaining a high level of industry knowledge and a dedication of service to clients, crash victims and legal colleagues. Air Crash Consultants develops a relationship between lawyers and families of victims of disastrous events like Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 (MH370) and lesser events like passengers with turbulence and other injuries.

"We follow all aviation news," explains George Hatcher, president of Air Crash Consultants, "While it is not possible to cover all aviation events, we do mention some of the cases handled by lawyers we advise; but we do not limit the scope of the column to only those cases. Sometimes we do get requests to provide news regarding particular accidents like MH370 via my twitter account or the contact form on the Air Crash Consultants website." In addition to our 37,000 subscribers, our headlines go out to 110,000 twitter followers.

Several years ago, George Hatcher started the AFD column, and since then moved it to an independent site. His extensive background in consultation on legal and aviation cases goes back over forty-five years and is now supplemented by input from his database of 500+ Anonymous Experts. Aviation cases have included Tam Flight 3054, Air France Flight 447, MH370, and others.

About Air Crash Consultants
In the field of global litigation support, Air Crash Consultants' mission is to bridge the gap between United States attorneys George advises and local lawyers who represent the families. ACC is a global consulting firm headquartered in Los Angeles with affiliations across the Americas, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia, providing litigation support, accident investigation, translation services, and as-needed assistance, and where the victims' interests are always paramount. Lawyers may be interested in his other ventures like Connecting Lawyers to Lawyers.

About Anonymous Experts
George Hatcher's Anonymous Experts database includes live references who render Expert recommendations and opinions. Experts include over 500 pilots, flight attendants, mechanics, photographers, airport personnel, etc.

For more information on this press release visit: http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/release-3.htm