Originally Posted by
GordonR_Cape
Thanks for posting. I knew what was on the video from the text transcript on Bjorn at Leeham News, but it still makes for compelling viewing.
I wonder if Boeing's lawyers saw this last week, and said to the CEO: "If the jury ever sees this, we have lost already"...
I've nothing to do with the aviation industry, but that video is very disturbing, those guys knew it was a simulation, if your (and others) life depended on it, truly frightening. If any pilot on here cares to explain that it's not realistic, or a fair approximation of what happened, please do.
If you don't want to watch the video, the transcript is equally compelling reading...
The original sim session transcript [C=CAPT; F=FO]:
C: We have an IAS disagree.
C: So, IAS disagree memory items.
F: Autopilot if engaged, disengage.
C: Disengaged!
F: Autothrottle if engaged, disengage.
C: Disengaged!
F: Flight directors - Both up
F: With flaps up established a flight path 4 degrees and 75% N1.
C: So, 75% N1.
F: We have 77, 76,...
C: A little bit less...
F: And, there you go.
C: 4 degrees.
F: 4 degrees.
C: So I am trying to establish this now.
F: Check!
F: We are descending...?
F: We probably... Are you feeling troubled with...
F :Any trouble with the flight control?
C: Yeah, I'm trying to trim it but...
C: It continues to trim against me when I'm trimming
C: So state the malfunction, please.
F: Yeah, this doesn't look right. Looks like uh...
F: How do you feel the stabilizer, the trim system?
F: Can you control it?
C: I'm trimming it. It is responding but...
F: It's a runaway stabilizer, if you agree?
C: For every time that I trim backward, it keeps trimming forward.
F: It's trimming forward. Yeah, it's runaway stabilizer.
C: So, runaway stabilizer memory items...
C: And i'm trying to keep this thing at 4 degrees.
F: Control column, hold firmly.
C: I am...
[CAPT is holding the yoke firmly with both hands]
F: Autopilot - if engaged, disengage.
C: It's disengaged.
F: Autothrottle - if engaged, disengage.
C: It's..., if you can disengage it for me, make sure that it's disengaged.
F: It's disengaged.
F: And, do you feel that the failure stop?
F: Negative?
C: No, it's still moving.
F: Stab trim cutoff switches to cutoff.
F: OK. It stops. It looks like it stops.
C: You can see now I'm using almost full back pressure here.
F: Exactly.
C: How many degrees nose down?
F: We have 4 units nose down now
C: 4 units nose down?
F: Yup.
C: OK, I'm struggling.
C: I'm actually using almost my full force to keep the aircraft level here.
F: Do you want me to help you?
C: What I would like to do.
C: Just for the sake of exercise, can you trim this forward?
[to simulate MCAS trim AND]
C: See if we can reach even zero nose down.
C: And see if I can even hold it.
[FO is trying to crank the trim wheel to reach zero nose down, simulating MCAS AND]
C: So, now we are doing this just as an exercise!
C: Do not try this at home.
C: This...
C: We are at 300 knots now.
F: I'm fighting.
C: I'm sttrugling to to keep this aircraft flying.
F: My god!
[FO surprised at how hard it is to trim further nose down]
C: Yeah, the thing is with higher speed the force on the stabilizer will be higher and higher as well.
C: So it becomes almost impossible to move it.
C: So we are now at about 3 degrees.
F: Yup. [FO still tries to continue trimming nose down, the wheels is so difficult to spin]
C: We're still about 3 degrees away from full nose down trim.
C: And I am using everything that I have.
[CAPT still holding on to his yoke with both hands]
F: My God ! [the trim wheel barely move for the down trim]
C: This is realistic guys.
C: This is how much of effort it would take to trim the stabilizer at this kind of speed.
C: Umph...
[Capt is still trying to hold on to his yoke with his hands]
C: I'm just in control of it, though. But it's getting harder and harder.
C: And remember we're still 2.5 degrees away...
F: My God!
[FO still struggles to spin the refused-to-be-spun trim wheel]
C: It's not possible, is it?
C: All right, we stop at that.
C: The reason that we have to try...
C: The reason we have to trim this manually is because the normal trim system wouldn't do this, OK.
C: It would require manual trim to get it away from this.
C: That's fine.
C: Trim it backward.
[This time to illustrate the effort to trim the nose back up after "MCAS" brought the AC further nose down]
C: Trim it backward as you can.
F: Oh my God! I couldn't...
[FO can't spin the wheel to trim up]
C: OK.
C: Eh...
C: Juan, press the red button!
[CAPT called the sim operator...]
C: Press the red button now.
[to stop the sim session]
C: This is at 340 knots.
C: And the trim is at...It's still at almost 2.5 degrees.
F: Yeah, 2.5 degrees.
Alchad