Why the black box matters and its limitations

If and when evidence of the missing plane is found, investigators will be focusing on finding one thing - the plane's black box recorders. Wherever they are, they should be sending out tiny signals, known as "pings", to help the search crews find it. But those pings can only last for a limited time and will end in just a couple weeks, when the black box battery runs out. So the race is definitely on. The US has now sent specialist equipment to help find it.  [Special coverage]

The key to finding out what happened to Malaysian Air 370 may lie deep below the Indian Ocean.Roger Connor is a pilot and aviation expert with the Smithsonian Institution's Air and Space Museum.

"The black boxes, and they've always been orange, not black, They are designed to record critical flight data as well as cockpit conversations and sounds and that data is used to analyze aircraft accidents." Connor said.

The Black Boxes record detailed flight information including altitude, air speed, rudder pedal position and record cock pit conversation but only the last two hours of audio.

How come we all have phones that can store hours of video, thousands of songs etcetera but the black boxes, the voice recorders, only hold 2 hours of audio.

"Well one reason has to do with the labor unions of the airlines. They don't want to be taped for long periods of times because they are afraid that's going to lead to some sort of enforcement action based upon their cockpit conduct." Connor said.

Black box technology dates back to the 1930s. The technology has changed over the years, and in the wake of the Malaysian air 370 investigation more changes could be coming.

One approach: Ejectable black boxes, built to float, that would be propelled away from the wreckage as a plane crashes.

It would send this unit out that would both act as a locator beacon, satellites would pick it up and would know that a crash had occurred and where it is and it would also serve as a duplicate to some extent, of the other flight data recorders that would remain on the aircraft." Connor said.

As part of an air traffic overhaul called NextGen the US Federal Aviation Administration will require planes to be tracked by satellite, but implementation is still years away.Technology already exists to send back flight data and even live audio and video in real time. But this could cost 50 to 100 thousand dollars per plane to install.

Do you think this incident with Malaysian airlines is going to bring about some changes in the way airlines and these governing bodies approach these issues?

"If this episode follows the historical model, then I think we're going to see some pretty significant legislation come out of the process." Connor said.

Potentially making future crash investigations much less difficult than the search for flight 370.