Engineering:List of unrecovered flight recorders

Flight data recorders (FDRs) and cockpit voice recorders (CVRs) in commercial aircraft continuously record information and can provide key evidence in determining the causes of an aircraft loss. The greatest depth from which a flight recorder has been recovered is 16,000 feet (4,900 m), for the CVR of South African Airways Flight 295. Most flight recorders are equipped with underwater locator beacons to assist searchers in recovering them from offshore crash sites, however these beacons run off a battery and eventually stop transmitting. For various reasons, a flight recorder cannot always be recovered, and many recorders that are recovered are too damaged to provide any data.

Crash date	Flight	Airline	Plane	Presumed location	Notes
1965-08-16	389	United Airlines	Boeing 727-22	Lake Michigan, off Chicago, Illinois	FDR fragmented by the impact; parts of the outer cover were found but the foil tape containing the data was not.
1966-11-15	708	Pan American World Airways	Boeing 727-21	Near Dallgow in former East Germany	The plane crashed in Soviet territory; only half of the wreckage was relinquished by Soviet authorities. The fate of the CVR and FDR is unknown.
1970-05-02	980	ALM	Douglas DC-9-33CF	Caribbean Sea	Resting in 5,000 ft (1,500 m) of water; neither recorder found
1972-06-29	290	North Central Airlines	Convair CV-580	Lake Winnebago, near Appleton, Wisconsin	One of two aircraft involved in the 1972 Lake Winnebago mid-air collision. An estimated 50% to 60% of the wreckage was recovered from the shallow, muddy water. FDR found in good condition; CVR not found.
1973-07-22	816	Pan American World Airways	Boeing 707-321B	Pacific Ocean, off Papeete, Tahiti	Resting in 700 m (2,300 ft) of water; neither recorder found
1974-09-08	841	Trans World Airlines	Boeing 707-331B	Ionian Sea, near Greece	By the time the main wreckage was located, conclusive evidence of a bomb explosion had been found, and it was decided that whatever additional information the recorders held would not justify the cost and difficulty of recovering them.
1974-12-04	138	Martinair	Douglas DC-8	Maskeliya, Sri Lanka	FDR completely disintegrated by impact. Small fragments of the foil tape from the unit were recovered from the crash site, but all of the fragments were from the supply spool of the recorder, and thus did not contain any flight data. The aircraft did not carry a CVR.
1975-09-30	240	Malév	Tupolev Tu-154	near the Lebanese shoreline	Resting in between 600 and 1,000 m (2,000 and 3,300 ft) of water
1977-09-02	3751	Transmeridian Air Cargo	Canadair CL-44	2.5 Nautical Miles east of Waglan Island	Recovery was hampered by bad weather and poor visibility. Undersea cables in the area precluded the use of dredging equipment, making salvage operations very difficult. Only 25% of the wreckage was recovered after an extensive effort; the CVR and FDR were not found.
1979-01-30	967	Varig	Boeing 707-323C	Pacific Ocean, around 200 kilometers East Northeast from Tokyo, Japan	The aircraft debris were never located and thus, neither the CVR and FDR was found and the cause of the crash was never determined.
1981-05-07	901	Austral Líneas Aéreas	BAC One-Eleven	Río de la Plata, near Buenos Aires, Argentina	Neither flight recorder was ever found.
1985-01-01	980	Eastern Air Lines	Boeing 727-225	25 nmi (46 km) from La Paz at the 19,600 ft (5,970 m) level of Andean peak Mt. Illimani.	Due to the extreme high altitude and inaccessibility of the accident location, the FDR and CVR could not be recovered. A team of three mountain climbers attempted to find the recorders in 2016, recovering part of the recorder mounting rack and a magnetic tape which they believed may have come from the CVR. The NTSB determined that the tape was not from a flight recorder.
1987-11-28	295	South African Airways	Boeing 747-244B Combi	Indian Ocean, near Mauritius	CVR located at a depth of 4,900 m (16,100 ft); FDR not found.
1987-11-29	858	Korean Air	Boeing 707-3B5C	Andaman Sea	Neither flight recorder was ever found.
1988-07-03	655	Iran Air	Airbus A300	Persian Gulf	Neither flight recorder was ever found.
1989-03-10	1363	Air Ontario	Fokker F28-1000	Dryden, Ontario	CVR and FDR destroyed by post-crash fire.
1990-09-11	Ferry flight	Faucett Perú	Boeing 727-247	Atlantic Ocean, 350 miles southeast of Cape Race, Newfoundland	Plane and all sixteen aboard missing, along with the CVR and FDR. Aircraft was being returned to Peru after lease to Air Malta. Crew reported a low fuel notice and that they were preparing to ditch. 16 occupants were on board
1992-10-04	1862	El Al	Boeing 747-258F	Groeneveen and Klein-Kruitberg flats in the Bijlmermeer, Amsterdam Zuidoost	FDR found but severely damaged, with the tape broken in four pieces; CVR not found.
1992-11-24	3493	China Southern Airlines	Boeing 737-3Y0	12.5 miles south of Guilin Airport, China	FDR found but severely damaged, with the tape being exposed to the post crash fire; CVR not found.
1994-04-06	9XR-NN	Rwanda Government	Dassault Falcon 50	1 Nautical Mile East of Kigali Airport, Kigali, Rwanda	The whereabouts and even the existence of the CVR and/or FDR has been disputed. Multiple independent investigations have been unable to determine the location of any flight recorders the aircraft may have carried. A proper examination of the crash site was not conducted until 15 years after the shootdown, by which time a majority of the wreckage had been displaced or scavenged. The manufacturer performed maintenance on the airplane a year before the crash, during which they documented that no recorders were installed (though mounting racks were in place for the operator to install them if they later decided to). Rwandan aviation laws at the time required all airplanes used for transporting the head of state to carry both a CVR and an FDR. The possibility that recorders were installed at some point between the work performed by Dassault and the shootdown has not been ruled out.
2001-09-11	11	American Airlines	Boeing 767-223ER	North World Trade Center, New York City	Due to significant impact and fire exposure, no trace of CVR or FDR could be found.
2001-09-11	175	United Airlines	Boeing 767-222	South World Trade Center, New York City	Due to significant impact and fire exposure, no trace of CVR or FDR could be found.
2003-05-25	N844AA	Aerospace Sales & Leasing	Boeing 727	Luanda, Angola	Aircraft stolen, current whereabouts are unknown.
2004-10-14	1602	MK Airlines	Boeing 747-244(SF)	Halifax Stanfield International Airport, Halifax, Nova Scotia	FDR recovered; CVR mutilated in post crash fire
2005-02-03	904	Kam Air	Boeing 737-200	Pamir Mountains, Afghanistan	Crash site located at a near inaccessible area of the Pamir Mountains. Most of the wreckage was buried in deep snow, and specialists had to clear landmines from the area before it could be accessed. FDR found with extreme difficulty (though it did not contain data due to a pre-existing fault in the data acquisition unit). The CVR was never found, and at least one investigator was killed during the search.
2005-10-22	210	Bellview Airlines	Boeing 737-200	Lisa Village, Ogun, Nigeria	Neither recorder found.
2011-07-28	991	Asiana Airlines	Boeing 747-400F	Korea Strait	Neither recorder found.
2012-12-09	N345MC	private	Learjet 25	Iturbide, Mexico	FDR recovered but with too much damage to yield any data. CVR not found at crash site, investigators could not determine whether the airplane was equipped with one at the time of the crash.
2014-03-08	370	Malaysia Airlines	Boeing 777-2H6ER	South Indian Ocean	Plane and all 239 passengers and crew missing, along with the CVR and FDR.
2015-09-05	6V-AIM	Senegalair	Hawker-Beechcraft HS125-700A	Atlantic Ocean, west of Dakar, Senegal	Plane and all seven aboard missing, along with the CVR and FDR.

See also

• List of missing ships