By Tim Hepher and Ahmed Aboulenein

PARIS/CAIRO, May 23 (Reuters) – Teams trying to find the black field flight recorders of a lacking EgyptAir jet that crashed with 66 individuals aboard face technical constraints that aviation consultants more and more blame on a sluggish regulatory response to earlier disasters.

As a three-year deep-sea seek for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 attracts in direction of a detailed within the Indian Ocean with out discovering the airplane, one other is beginning within the Mediterranean Sea the place the teachings of earlier crashes have but to be utilized.

Rescuers have barely 30 days till the batteries die on two underwater beacons designed to information them to the black field flight recorders as they scour 17,000 sq. kilometres of sea north of the Egyptian port metropolis of Alexandria.

After earlier crashes at sea, regulators agreed to extend the transmission time and vary of such beacons to extend the probabilities of discovering proof and stopping future accidents.

The adjustments, trebling the lifetime of the ‘pingers’ to 90 days, have been first really helpful by French investigators in late 2009, six months after the crash of an Air France aircraft within the Atlantic.

But they don’t come into impact till 2018: too late to assist discover EgyptAir 804.

French investigators say the Egyptian jet despatched warnings indicating that smoke was detected on board. The indicators didn’t point out what prompted the smoke, and aviation consultants haven’t dominated out deliberate sabotage or a technical fault. Egypt has despatched a robotic submarine to hitch the hunt.

It is the second time in little greater than a yr that sea search operations have been compelled to depend on decades-old black-box expertise after an AirAsia aircraft crashed into the Java Sea.

Delays in implementing the adjustments to the beacons to increase their battery life and enhance the probabilities of discovering the black containers have been criticised by quite a lot of consultants together with the previous head of the French BEA company, which helps the seek for Egyptair.

“PRETTY SCANDALOUS”

“The battery situation is pretty scandalous,” Jean-Paul Troadec, who headed the French authorities BEA air accident investigative company throughout a lot of the Air France probe, advised Reuters.

“It hardly costs anything to install new batteries. There was no reason to wait until 2018.”

In the primary days after a crash at sea, the precedence is to make use of passive units able to listening for the pinger’s clicking pulse. Once these die, searchers should use sonar units and robots, that are pricey and time-consuming. It took two years to seek out Air France 447 within the Atlantic this fashion.

“You can imagine the pressure this 30-day deadline creates,” Troadec mentioned.

Manufacturers say that implementing the suggestions to increase the lifetime of a beacon is not only a easy swap.

“Industry does not develop technology overnight and for the aircraft manufacturers to be ready, two years seems reasonable,” a spokesman for the European Aviation Safety Agency mentioned.

The seek for EgyptAir’s Airbus A320 is very difficult as a result of its wreckage lies in one of many deepest components of the Mediterranean, at a depth of two,000-3,000 metres which is on the sting of the vary for listening to pinger indicators.

That could imply towing hydrophones greater than a mile under the floor, utilizing specialist units which might be in brief provide.

This process might have been made simpler by different still-pending security proposals. In 2009, the BEA advised black-box makers add a brand new, decrease frequency that carries additional and is less complicated for navy vessels – usually first on the scene – to identify.

European regulator EASA has ordered airways to suit the longer-range units from the beginning of 2019, virtually a decade after the crash that first impressed the change.

To many, such sluggish progress highlights the regulatory issues going through the aviation trade which is struggling to adapt to a collection of accidents together with the lack of MH370 with 239 individuals on board, the taking pictures down of one other Malaysian plane over Ukraine in 2014 and final yr’s crash by a Germanwings pilot who flew his aircraft into the French Alps.

Despite the high-profile aircraft crashes, regulators say flying stays exceptionally secure, thanks partially to a singular system of standardised guidelines overseen by the United Nations.

LENGTHY APPROVALS

But the duty of sustaining international requirements by consensus requires prolonged approvals.

And critics say reforms have been held up earlier than by paperwork and a scarcity of assets on the United Nations’ aviation company, the place a particular panel on black containers didn’t meet between 1998 and 2006 as a result of it had no secretary.

A spokesman for the United Nations’ International Civil Aviation Organization declined additional remark past a press release in March asserting enhancements to flight recorders and higher methods of monitoring jetliners over distant areas.

Experts say the delays additionally replicate a tussle between regulators, airways and producers over how security {dollars} must be spent. Planemakers, airways and pilot unions are represented at ICAO due to the trade’s complexity.

“The people who pay for searches are governments and the people who pay for the equipment are companies,” Troadec mentioned, requested to clarify the time it takes to use BEA suggestions.

French suggestions on black containers and proposals for monitoring have been mentioned at ICAO after the crash of Air France’s AF447 however have been solely totally embraced after the lack of MH370 made it a worldwide concern, in accordance with individuals concerned within the talks.

“After MH370 there was momentum,” the pinnacle of ICAO’s particular panel, Philippe Plantin de Hugues, mentioned in a current interview.

Still, some airways, together with Air France, have put in the longer batteries with out ready for the 2018 changeover.

“Airlines are not pushing back. They are as eager as anybody to quickly have access to the black box data after an accident,” mentioned a spokesman for the International Air Transport Association, which represents most airways.

“But we need to be sure that any change is fully thought through … and capable of being supported by reliable technology.” (Additional reporting by Allison Lampert, enhancing by Peter Millership)

(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2016.