Originally Posted by
FCeng84
Taking a step back it appears to me that something quite dramatic occurred to rapidly transition this airplane from relatively stable, level flight to a very steep dive that took it from 6000' to the water in less than half a minute. We can postulate all sorts of root causes - hopefully the combination of CVR, FDR, and examination of key portions of the wreckage will shed light on what actually went wrong. This event happened so quickly that I don't see how it could be associated with stabilizer motion at rates that the jack screw is capable of generating. It is possible that elevator hard over (both sides) could have led to this result. I would hope that the time histories of the tail surface positions, pitch attitude, roll attitude, and normal acceleration are made public sooner than later.
For now I think that it would be prudent for current 767 operators to make sure that they are up to date on all maintenance and inspections associated with horizontal stabilizer and elevator control. The 767 has a very extensive and solid history of safe operation so I would be very surprised to see design listed as a cause of this loss.
Take a look at post 97, some type of roll cloud or wind rotation could be the trigger to an aircraft structural failure or improper response by either the autoflight system or crew.