Officials: Family of El Faro crew won't hear recordings on VDR

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — No closure: That's what the families of the 33 crew members that died on board El Faro say they are dealing with after being told they will not be able to hear the recordings from the ship’s voyage data recorder.

NTSB crews recovered the VDR this week and brought it back to Jacksonvile on Friday.

“It’s been an emotional rollercoaster, these last 10 months, and it’s just one more downfall,” said Carla Newkirk.

That’s how Newkirk feels after hearing the news that she and other El Faro families will not be able to hear the audio recordings from the VDR on El Faro. Her father, Larry Davis, was on the ship when it sank back in October of 2015.

More than 10 months later, NTSB recovered the VDR that might explain what happened with to the 33 crew members on board.

Brian Curtis with NTSB said both NTSB and TOTE leaders will sit down over the next couple weeks to try and recover the audio recordings.

Action News Jax: "Will the families be allowed to hear the data, hear that information and find out what’s on here?"

Brian Curtis, NTSB: "No. By a statute, no one will be listening to that outside the personnel required to."

“There was hope that they were still alive, that crashed, now there’s hope that there’s voices we can hear and now that’s not going to come true either,” said Newkirk.

Newkirk said hearing her dad’s voice on the VDR will help bring her family some closure, but now that closure may not come after all,

“My dad was on the bridge, so I know my dad’s voice is on there, and I just want to hear it one last time,” said Newkirk.

NTSB said they will release a transcript of the audio recordings, if and once they’re able to recover the data, but they’re not sure when that will be available.

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