On Tuesday morning, Germanwings Flight 9525 crashed in the French Alps en route from Spain to Germany. Prior to the incident, the plane reached a cruising altitude of 38,000 feet—but only stayed there for one minute. The plane’s speed didn’t change, but the aircraft began to descend over the next eight minutes before crashing into the Alps.

During those eight minutes, there was no distress signal. This issue may not be of serious concern to investigators. Pilots are trained to control the plane first, and then try to communicate. In this case, the pilots may not have had enough time or the ability to communicate.

To find out what internal and external influences may have caused the plane to crash, investigators need to obtain the Flight Data Recorder as well as the Cockpit Voice Recorder.

Flight Data Recorder

The Flight Data Recorder tracks plane performance, and will provide investigators with at least 15 different parameters of what happened with the aircraft. This includes information about icing, temperature, wind, speed, and engine performance. If there were speed or angle-of-attack sensors, these can also provide the investigators with more data.

If the pitch of the plane was frozen, that would give the computers the sense that the plane was about to stall. If that happened, the computer would force the plane to descend, in which case the pilots would have to fight or try to override the computer. If this were the case, it could explain the aircraft’s controlled descent.

Cockpit Voice Recorder

The Cockpit Voice Recorder of Germanwings Flight 9525 is damaged, but it has been found. It will not only include the voices of the pilots, but also any alarms or other background noise.

There may have been background audio warnings of a potential stall or other alarms that might have gone off inside the vessel. In addition to the actual voices of the pilots, these sounds may help investigators get a better sense of the factors that may have contributed to the plane crash.

Once investigators obtain both recorders, they can perform a real-time, second-by-second analysis of what happened to the plane and within the cockpit.

Watch my report for CBS News to learn more about the Germanwings crash and what investigators are hoping to find.

For more information about plane crashes and flight safety, check out:

• Germanwings Flight 9525: What We Know Right Now
• Afraid to Speak Up? Cockpit Politics & Asiana 214 Crash
• Do You Know the Most Dangerous Airports in the US?

By Peter Greenberg for PeterGreenberg.com