Trish,
Well, you learn something every day. I must say I've never heard of "aircraft upset". I find the definition very interesting, too:
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An airplane upset is defined as "an airplane unintentionally
exceeding the parameters normally experienced in line
operations or training." Specifically, an upset occurs when
pitch exceeds 25 degrees nose up or 10 degrees nose down,
or bank angle exceeds 45 degrees.
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I realise that in normal line ops that the above are probably never going to be exceeded. It surprises me that they are not exceeded in training.
It may interest you to look at a military aviation perspective as many military types are regularly flown to greater angles of pitch and bank than that described above. I'm not talking about fast jets here, but transport and patrol aircraft such as C130 Hercules and P3 Orions. For example, a Herc pilot in normal ops will go to 60 AoB and, briefly, more nose up then 25 and nose down then 10.
In the sim, things can go even further. That said, just like the civvy jet guys, once you get past what you are used to, it gets your attention. I cannot say whether we do more UA (Unusual Attitude) recovery than our civilian counterparts or not. I do know that on pilots course (in training types rated to -4 to +7 g) that UA recoveries could see 90 nose up, down or anything in between. A good deal different to what I would expect in one of the big jets, of course, but we may have had an advantage in flying a PC9/Tucano/JPATS in ab initio flying than, say, a Warrior II in that we have been exposed to extreme aircraft upsets. Still, if I saw 90 degrees nose down in the Herc I may not be too calm about things.