Any updates on the Airbus lost in the Atlantic?

I know - I've seen every single episode of Mayday and Air Crash Investigations, including
Alaska 261 (have a good friend who missed that flight). (HORRIFIC transcript for any
who have not read it or seen the recreations on Mayday and ACI)

But I still feel for the human connection. Crap data, poor designs, horrible conditions,
and humanity. Those pilots most assuredly did NOT want to die that night.

Easy to be a "monday morning quarterback" is all I'm saying

Jedi

 

They were confused, not panicked. Panic is when you are frozen by fear. They were not frozen. They were just really confused as to what was happening. All three pilots kept asking each other "What's happening?" because they did not understand the conflicting information presented. One pilot seemed to be aware of the fact that the plane was indeed in a stall, as the instruments were indicating, and pushed the nose forward. Due to the alternate law in effect, the plane did not pitch the nose down as aggressively as he wanted, since the other pilot was pulling back on the stick on his side.

But no pilot was saying "We are going to die" or "God help us" or anything of the sort. There was no panic, so far as I know. The closest they come is expressing frustration that they can't seem to control the plane. They did fail to engage in CRM, but that's not panicking.

What makes you think they panicked?

http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/aviation/crashes/what-really-happened-aboard-air-france-447-6611877-2

 

...the fact that one crew was pulling BACK on the stick virtually the entire time... I think that's panic.

 

Even when one of them realizes that a crash is imminent, there is no panic. Just more confusion.

02:14:23 (Robert) Putain, on va taper... C'est pas vrai!
Damn it, we're going to crash... This can't be happening!

02:14:25 (Bonin) Mais qu'est-ce que se passe?
But what's happening?

02:14:27 (Captain) 10 degrès d'assiette...
Ten degrees of pitch...

 

Unusual attitude recovery is a core piece of every initial and recurrent training program.

I agree that there were multiple factors involved, including very poor (IMO) cockpit design which allowed one guy to pull back on the stick without the others realized what was going on.

However, positive transfer of control ("I have the airplane") and basic attitude instrument flying should have been enough to prevent this accident. With a positive transfer of control, the poor cockpit design should not have been an issue.

 

Zack:

It is what happened. The autopilot and auto throttles kicked off, and the co-pilot increased the angle of attack. Ultimately he got to 16 degrees up, and the plane stalled. The airspeed was 60 knots at the lowest point. At one point they lowered the nose, and the stall warning started again.

Here is the source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_447

As you can see, it was poor training, and a plane full of defects that created this tragedy. When I fly commercial, I always fly either US, Brit or German, and for good reason, if I can, only Boeing.

Art

 

I have corresponded with my son and many other airline pilots regarding this incident. The major airlines have installed this scenario on their sims and tested their pilots to see if they could recover the airplane. I have been told that so far NOT ONE has been able to accomplish it. To have a set up where one pilot can "push forward" and one "pull back" at the same is insane and that is precisely why Boeing has insisted on classic old control column and wheel in its airplanes. I remember that this was a strong input from airline pilots in many meetings early on in the 777 program. "I want to see what the other guy is doing and I want to see the controls moving," were some of the loudest comments.
I still cannot imagine the pitots icing up when they are heated enough to burn the crap out of you if you touch them but, then,I haven't been in the game for a while.

 

I'm curious about this sim comment. If you mean unreliable airspeed in turbulence, I've had that scenario many times in simulators, and never crashed. Heck, I've had it in the real airplane and didn't crash!

Or do you mean the scenario where one guy is fixated on pulling back the sidestick and won't let it go? Because in that case, I suppose it could be unrecoverable, although the Airbus does have a priority button which allows the other side to take control (unless the first guy also presses it!).

 

flying over New Mexico at altitude at night ( August ) with visibility, ran into severe icing and turbulance, low level TS visible on ground, radar was not painting anything ahead or the cell was so dense that any returns / echos did not make it back to the antenna... had all the heat on... when we hit, it was like a gravel truck was unloading, the entire plane was covered in several inches of ice, side windows had limited visibility between ice streaks that flowed past, turbulance uncoupled the AP plugs, noticed the airspeed unwinding, OAT -50F, put the plane into a decent to maintain speed, called center with decending to warmer, they cleared air space, broke out of overcast at about 14,000 as the ground proximity radar was alerting that the ridge east of Albuquerque was ahead... the immediate decent stabilized the airspeed, rest of panel controlled decent, airspeed normalized, airplane controls / decent normalized... landed Albuquerque, nacels still had ice, ice melting everywhere, checked airplane for damage, found none, continued flight.... the inital incident probably lasted only seconds in real time, in the mind it lasted forever

never experienced icing like that again. I can see where there would be a lot of confusion with conflicting information and decision / control by committee further confused by the flight controls while in unusual attitude and turbulance

 

Hey, Cheesy....

Wow... what were you fllying? Bet you'll never forget that flight.



BTW, That 'Ridge' East of Albuquerque is the Sandia Mountains... over 10K ft ASL.

We're very proud of our mountain. Please don't call it a ridge.

 

Don, I understood it to be the AF447 incident that was put into the simulator to see how it was handled. I'll check back with my sources of infn the production test flights that I was on they simulated an emergency let down " jet penetration" and one would have to be stone-deaf not to hear the change in wind noise from stall to high speed.

 

Cheyenne II, all I saw was a line on the horizon after breaking out with lights behind it, that and ground proximity radar warning kept us away from that rock pile...

from what little I could see the plane had a major load of ice all over it, don't know how much we had on the tail, but it took decent and full power to keep flying, then there was the issue of chunks of ice breaking free, fortunately the attitude remained steady until the ice was gone, things could have really gone wrong as the ice was coming off...

pitots were somewhat functioning, but at unknown level... until they stabilized... the panel has enough info to cross reference to maintain flight without pitot data... the issue is to avoid unusual attitude... one needs to believe in what the panel is showing, as that is the only reference there is,

 

No surprise, we've discussed it

New Report: Pilots lacked training for 'Surprise' situation.



http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/air-france-crash-final-report-153938792.html

 

I read the report on the BBC news web site
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-18720915

Looks like they hold Airbus and Air France equally responsible.

They also make mention of 25 recommended changes to be implemented by both parties but i cannot find mention what these might be ! Can anyone shed light ?

 

Equipment and training. They stalled thebplane, and when they lowered the nose, raised it again when the stall warning nt off again. Terrible, **** poor training, defective plane. Why I avoid airbus if I can.

Art

 

I doubt if they recommended getting rid of the sidesticks, or adding a feedback system, however. That would make a huge difference, but I doubt if it's physically possible, and certainly not cost effective.

 

The one thing that bothers me the most about of all of this is this business of one pilot pushing the controls forward, the other pulling them back, and the aircraft averaging the inputs?? Sheer lunacy, and something that is undoubtedly impossible to do on a Boeing.

That's why:
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Again, in the many early 777 design meetings that we had, the loud comment from airline pilots was, " I want to see the controls move and I want to know what the other guy is doing! No " averaging", no confusion. I still don't know why the pitots iced up. That shouldn't have happened. Pushing forward on the controls produced a stall warning horn when the airplane was already stalled, that shouldn't have happened. Also the TV interview with the French official re the pilot's tardy return to the flight deck ended up with a giggle when confronted with the fact that the pilot had a " social arrangement" with an off duty flight attendant seemed to be a typical French response. The whole thing is a really sad event.

 

Please forgive my ignorance here, I'm a car mechanic and aviation enthusiast since before i could walk ( thanks Dad ) so i know just enough to make myself dangerous, and see things from a very basic practical point of view. My question is while all the pushing and pulling was going on with the flight controls because of a lack of correct air speed indication what was the attitude indicator showing ?? did it not display a nose up or down condition ? and if it also relies on computers is there not a mechanical back up ?

I'm only 10 hours into my flight training and the 172 I'm learning in has Garmin PFD/MFD and 3 nice little mechanical back-ups. Surely this airliner gave at least one of the pilots a reliable attitude reading !