I don't want to derail the thread here.....but its STILL a cost to the taxpayer!!
I don't think the investigation would have been complete without the black box. That gave them insight into details like the water might have been entering from the fire fighting equipment, that it was too dangerous to go into Hold 3 because cars were floating around....that they shifted ballast from one side to the other, and so on. Without it, all we would have had would be the information from the sat call to headquarters.
I was totally stunned to hear that there was no high water alarm panel on the bridge. If there was, they would have been able to respond to the incoming water earlier, and the outcome might have been very different.
I was also surprised that the guys supervising the loading had no official training in cargo loading and were unfamiliar with the software that was used.