Updates: More E-6B Mercury // Air France 447 Flight Data Recorder (FDR) is found.

Picture courtesy FlightRadar24.com

 US Navy E-6B Mercury still 'patrolling' the UK:

The US Navy are still flying long, long missions around the UK in their Boeing E-6B Mercury TACAMO aircraft.  Still nothing heard by any fellow monitors on HF or VHF/UHF.

You're probably wondering why the Boeing E-6 is flying round the UK... Common consensus amongst the collective is this is just a crew currency mission.  The aircrew seem more concerned with staying airborne as long as possible rather than flying any specific mission profile.

311.000 is one of the well published STRATCOM channels and is supposedly where you hear the E6 transmitting, but I have yet to witness this myself.  The E-6B is easily tracked using commonly available online tools, such as http://www.flightradar24.com since the E-6 is fully Mode S/ADS-B equipped (which basically means it will track with a lat/long position on radar screens, including the SBS-1 and other ADS-B receivers).




Air France flight 447 - Flight Data Recorder (FDR) recovered:

Picture Credit: BEA.

In other news, BEA (The French Air Accident Investigation Branch) have managed to recover the Fight Data Recorder (FDR, or as the media love to call it, the Black Box) from ill fated Air France flight 447 (AF447 / F-GZCP).  The flight went down off South America with the loss of all on board during extreme storm activity.  The recovery of the FDR goes a long way to hopefully discovering what went wrong, and hopefully giving some sort of closure to relatives.  For more information, visit the BEA Website.

Picture Credit: BEA