One Month After China Eastern Airlines Tragedy, Many Questions Remain

Investigation focuses on black boxes as airline resumes 737-800 flights.

Meg Godlewski

Wednesday, April 20, 2022 at 03:11 PM ET

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China Eastern Airlines has returned its fleet of 737-800 aircraft to the air. [File photo: Shutterstock]

Key Takeaways:

One month after the China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737-800 crashed, killing all 132 people aboard, the cause remains unknown, with no issues found in maintenance, weather, or flight crew training.
The aircraft entered a sudden, near-vertical dive from 29,000 feet, leading to a highly fragmented crash site, and while both "black boxes" were recovered, they are damaged, making data retrieval challenging.
The CAAC is leading the investigation with U.S. assistance, but no information from the damaged recorders has been released, and the preliminary report, due within 30 days of the accident, has not been made public.

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It has been a month since the China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737-800 abruptly entered a nose dive and crashed, killing all 132 people on board—and investigators still don’t know why.

According to a statement released Wednesday by the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC), there were no issues uncovered in a review of the aircraft’s maintenance records, and the weather at the time of the accident does not appear to be a factor. In previous reports, the CAAC noted the flight crew appeared to be well-trained, and there were no issues there either.