A police diver stumbled upon the data recorder of ValuJet Flight 592 while searching for human remains in Everglades muck, a discovery that could yield clues to the cause of the crash that killed 109 people.
"He stepped on it," Robert Francis, vice chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, said Monday night, calling the find "extraordinarily fortunate."Navy sonar had failed to find either of the jet's recorders.
The 30-pound data recorder, buried in the muck under a few feet of murky water, was sent to NTSB headquarters in Washington for analysis, shipped in a water-filled cooler to ensure against drying that might damage it.
The recorder was bent but in good shape, Francis said. The box on the 27-year-old plane recorded fewer details than those on newer jets. Older recorders measure only 11 functions, such as speed and altitude.
In Washington on Tuesday, the Federal Aviation Administration announced plans to accelerate hiring of inspectors and review how they do their jobs.
The FAA had been planning to hire 300 to 400 more safety inspectors this year. FAA Administrator David Hinson said Tuesday the effort will be speeded up - with 100 hired by June.
Hinson testified before the Senate Transportation Committee that the moves are in response to Clinton's demand that the nation's airlines "continue to operate at the highest level of safety."
Also, the search at the crash site resumed Tuesday. Rescue workers began assembling at a staging site eight miles from the scene just before 8 a.m. A few people stayed at the site overnight.
Francis said Tuesday's search was focused on finding the DC-9's other so-called black box, the cockpit voice recorder, as well as human remains and parts of the plane.
"We're optimistic that we'll be able to find the recorder. We can speculate on where we think it is," he said Tuesday morning. Both recorders are in a plane's tail.
On Monday, teams of divers walked side by side, searching the swamp inch by inch and accompanied by a sharpshooter on the lookout for alligators and poisonous snakes.
The searchers filled bags with body parts, including fingers, hands, feet, but nothing larger than a knee, said Metro-Dade police Cmdr. Al Harper.
"It would be traumatic for even the most seasoned homicide detective," he said.
Retired Dade County Medical Examiner Joseph Davis, who is taking part in the investigation, said some victims might never be identified. "I don't hold any hope we'll find any recoverable large parts of people," he said.
The divers have also been selectively collecting small pieces of the jet that could be considered "significant," Francis said, "and these may be a bundle of wiring, or a particular switch, or whatever it is."
The pieces could be "early indicators of what might have happened," he added.
Francis said the jet's engines, found Sunday, would undergo a thorough examination but that an early inspection at the site showed no "catastrophic damage."
The Atlanta-bound jet crashed Saturday shortly after takeoff from Miami with 104 passengers and five crew members. The crew reported smoke in the cockpit and cabin before the tower lost contact.
Before flying from Atlanta to Miami on its next to last flight earlier Saturday, the plane was delayed by maintenance problems, according to records reviewed by investigators. A worker had to replace circuit breakers for the plane's fuel pump twice before the plane was cleared to take off.
Francis said he couldn't "start to comment" on whether there was any link between the circuit-breaker and the crash.
At the crash scene, about 30 divers in rubberized suits to protect them from skin-irritating jet fuel walked through the water in shifts that lasted only 15 to 20 minutes because of the conditions: heat in the 90s, swarms of mosquitoes and horseflies, razor-sharp sawgrass, and water 6 inches to 5 feet deep over the thick muck.
As the search dragged on, some relatives of crash victims were becoming frustrated.
"By the time they get out there, with those alligators and stuff, she'll be all ate up," said Raquel Perry, daughter-in-law of crash victim Wilhemina Perry of Miami.
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Charter flight makes emergency landing
A charter airliner with 119 people aboard made a safe emergency landing Tuesday at Norfolk International Airport in Virginia after losing cabin pressure, officials said. Only minor injuries were reported, including bloody noses and inner ear problems caused by the rapid decompression, said Fire and Paramedical Services Chief Don Haupt. One person was taken to a hospital, he said. The Miami Air Boeing 727 was on a flight from New York City to Grand Turk Island in the Caribbean when it depressurized shortly before 10 a.m., officials said. The problem occurred after the plane reached its maximum altitude.