Fail safe aircraft monitoring and tracking

1. A method for monitoring and tracking an at least one exception condition aircraft under exceptional conditions, comprising:

powering a flight data recorder from an essential electrical bus which cannot be shut down under flight conditions without disabling other equipment that is essential for safe flight operations;

receiving at the flight data recorder a data stream from a flight data acquisition unit specifying values for a plurality of flight data parameters while an aircraft is in flight;

storing one or more of the values from the data stream in a memory unit;

determining an occurrence during flight of an exception condition based on an evaluation of at least one exception parameter;

responsive to determining the occurrence of the exception condition, wirelessly communicating selected aircraft data to a remote location external of the aircraft using a wireless transmitter; and

preventing actions intended to disable or prevent said wirelessly communicating by (a) exclusively controlling operations of the wireless transmitter with the flight data recorder and (b) only allowing the wireless transmitter to be powered down when the flight data recorder is powered down;

wherein the determining the occurrence during flight of the exception condition comprises receiving, at an antenna of the flight data recorder, a wireless coded message from an authorized person within the aircraft, wherein the wireless coded message is configured to trigger the wirelessly communicating, wherein the antenna is mounted within the aircraft.

2. The method according to claim 1 , further comprising preventing interruption of the monitoring and tracking by powering the flight data recorder and the wireless transmitter using an essential electrical bus of the aircraft.

3. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the determining the occurrence during flight of the exception condition further comprises determining an occurrence of the exception condition based on the receiving the wireless coded message, and one or more additional exception parameters.

4. A flight data recorder system which facilitates aircraft monitoring and tracking under exceptional conditions, comprising:

a system interface of a flight data recorder, wherein the system interface is configured to receive a data stream from an aircraft specifying a plurality of flight data parameters while the aircraft is in flight;

a crash survivable non-volatile memory unit in which one or more of the plurality of flight data parameters are stored after being received at the system interface;

a wireless transmitter that is under exclusive control of the flight data recorder system, which can be powered down only when the flight data recorder system is powered down, and configured to communicate with a remote receiving device external of the aircraft during flight;

a processing system which determines an occurrence of an exception condition based on an evaluation of at least one exception parameter, and in response to determining the occurrence of the exception condition causes the wireless transmitter to wirelessly communicate selected aircraft data to the remote receiving device; and

an antenna mounted within the aircraft and configured to receive a wireless coded message from an authorized person within the aircraft, wherein the processing system is configured to operate responsive to the coded message.

5. The flight data recorder system according to claim 4 , wherein at least one exception parameter corresponding to the exception condition includes one or more of the plurality of flight data parameters contained in the data stream which has been received at the flight data recorder.

6. The flight data recorder system according to claim 4 , wherein the exception condition comprises receipt of a wireless trigger signal from a remote control point.

7. The flight data recorder system according to claim 4 , wherein an exception parameter corresponding to the exception condition specifies one or more of a position, a heading, and a deviation from a pre-determined flight plan for an aircraft in which the flight data recorder is disposed.

8. The flight data recorder system according to claim 4 , further comprising a GPS unit under exclusive control of the flight data recorder which provides information concerning a geographic location of the flight data recorder.

9. The flight data recorder system according to claim 8 , wherein the flight data recorder includes a power coupling for the GPS unit which serves as a primary source of electrical power to the GPS unit.

10. The flight data recorder system according to claim 8 , wherein the selected aircraft data includes a geographic location of the aircraft on which the flight data recorder is disposed.

11. The flight data recorder system according to claim 4 , wherein the flight data recorder includes a power coupling for the wireless transmitter that serves as a primary source of electrical power to the wireless transmitter.

12. The flight data recorder system according to claim 4 , wherein the processing system determines an occurrence of the exception condition based on an evaluation of two or more exception parameters.

13. The flight data recorder system according to claim 4 , wherein the processing system includes in the selected aircraft data one or more flight data parameters provided to the flight data recorder in the data stream.

14. An aircraft with a fail-safe tracking system, comprising

a flight data acquisition unit;

a flight data recorder; and

an essential electrical bus configured to supply power to the flight data recorder, and which can only be shut down under flight conditions when other equipment that is essential for safe flight operations is also disabled,

wherein the flight data recorder includes

a system interface which is arranged to receive a data stream from the flight data acquisition unit specifying a plurality of flight data parameters while the aircraft is in flight,

a crash survivable non-volatile memory unit in which one or more of the plurality of flight data parameters are stored after being received at the system interface,

a wireless transmitter that is under exclusive control of the flight data recorder, which can be powered down only when the flight data recorder is powered down, and configured to communicate with a remote receiving device external of the aircraft during flight,

a processing system which determines an occurrence of an exception condition based on an evaluation of at least one exception parameter, and in response to determining the occurrence of the exception condition causes the wireless transmitter to wirelessly communicate selected aircraft data to the remote receiving device, and

an antenna mounted within the aircraft and configured to receive a wireless coded message from an authorized person within the aircraft, wherein the processing system is configured to operate responsive to the coded message.

15. An enhanced monitoring and reporting (EMR) system which facilitates aircraft monitoring and tracking under exceptional conditions, comprising:

a system interface which is arranged to receive a data stream from a flight data acquisition unit of an aircraft specifying a plurality of flight data parameters while the aircraft is in flight;

a memory unit in which one or more of the plurality of flight data parameters are stored after being received at the system interface;

a wireless transmitter that is under exclusive control of the EMR system, which can be powered down only when a flight data recorder is powered down, and configured to communicate with a remote receiving device external of the aircraft during flight;

a processing system which determines an occurrence of an exception condition based on an evaluation of at least one exception parameter, and in response to determining the occurrence of the exception condition causes the wireless transmitter to wirelessly communicate selected aircraft data to the remote receiving device; and

an antenna mounted within the aircraft and configured to receive a wireless coded message from an authorized person within the aircraft, wherein the processing system is configured to operate responsive to the coded message.

16. The EMR system according to claim 15 , wherein at least one of the processing system, the wireless transmitter and the memory unit are disposed internal of a housing which defines an avionics equipment tray.

17. The EMR system according to claim 16 , further comprising a flight data recorder removably disposed on a shelf defined by the avionics equipment tray.

18. The EMR system according to claim 17 , further comprising a first electrical connector disposed on the avionics equipment tray which receives the data stream from the flight data acquisition unit, and a second electrical connector disposed on the avionics equipment tray which communicates the data stream from the first electrical connector to the flight data recorder, which is removably disposed on the shelf.

19. The EMR system according to claim 18 , wherein primary electrical power for the EMR system is coupled from the aircraft to the EMR system through the first electrical connector, and primary electrical power for the flight data recorder is coupled from the first electrical connector to the second electrical connector.