PlainBillCongress, translated.Legislation. Context. Public interest.Referred to the Subcommittee on Aviation.
Congressional Research Service
Version 00 · Introduced in House · May 24, 2023
Safe Aviation and Flight Enhancement Act of 2023
This bill directs the Federal Aviation Administration to issue regulations requiring all newly manufactured commercial aircraft used in certain extended overwater operations to have additional data recovery features.
Specifically, commercial aircraft that are required to have a cockpit voice recorder (CVR) and a flight data recorder (FDR) must be equipped with
Showing the opening paragraphs of the official summary.
a means to recover flight data that does not require underwater retrieval,
a tamper-resistant method to broadcast to a ground station sufficient information to establish the flight termination location within six nautical miles of the point of impact, and
an airframe low-frequency underwater locating device that will function for at least 90 days and that is detectable by current search and rescue systems.
Further, the commercial aircraft must be equipped to retain at least the last 25 hours of recorded information.
Commercial aircraft that are ordered by an air carrier on or after January 1, 2027, must have the additional recorder system installed.
The bill specifies that a third combination CVR/FDR recording mechanism is not required to satisfy the bill's requirements. Compliant technologies may include (1) an automatic deployable flight recorder system (i.e., a CVR, FDR, and emergency locator transmitter housed in one crash-protected, floatable unit), and (2) transmission of flight recorder data (i.e., a system capable of providing satellite transmission of critical flight data that can also assist in identifying the location of a downed aircraft).
People & committees
Rep. Cohen, Steve [D-TN-9] · D–TN
Legislative record
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Referred to the Subcommittee on Aviation.
Referred to the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.
Introduced in House
Introduced in House
Primary sources
Text links open the official source. We currently store references to these documents.
No related bills are listed in this snapshot. This does not establish whether the proposal has appeared in earlier Congresses.
Source last updated: Jul 24, 2024. Consult Congress.gov for the current record.
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