QUESTION - He he came up with the idea for the Cockpit Voice Recorder while investigating a crash of the world's first production commercial jet airliner - The de Havilland DH 106 Comet in 1953 . Incidentally his father had died in a 1934 Bass Strait air crash ?
ANSWER -
Australian Scientist David Warren .
Best known for inventing and developing the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder (also known as FDR, CVR, and "the black box").
A flight recorder, colloquially known as a black box, although it is now orange-coloured, is an electronic recording device placed in an aircraft for the purpose of facilitating the investigation of aviation accidents and incidents.
The term has its origins related to photography. Processing of photographs is often done in a room known as Darkroom. The very first flight data recorders, used photographic film to record basic flight parameters like altitude, heading etc.
A mirror used to direct light into this scrolling photographic film and this mirror would change position based on the data which needed to be recorded.
Now, since it was a photographic film, it was present in a box which was devoid of any light. In a sense, it was pitch black inside. And that is considered to be the origin of this term for flight data recorders. Over time, technology changed, but the name kinda stuck.
A mirror used to direct light into this scrolling photographic film and this mirror would change position based on the data which needed to be recorded.
Now, since it was a photographic film, it was present in a box which was devoid of any light. In a sense, it was pitch black inside. And that is considered to be the origin of this term for flight data recorders. Over time, technology changed, but the name kinda stuck.
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