Originally Posted by
Takwis
If I "perform[ed] a trim runaway memory item once pitch starts wandering against [my] commands", I would do so every single flight.
I think that’s the core of the issue that divides the “pilot’s fault” crowd from the “aeroplane’s fault” one.
You’ve just got airborne in a 737 MAX and the trim starts running. What are you going to do? There are multiple reasons why the trim could activate: some benign, some not so; as above, what is the trigger for performing the runaway trim checklist? OK, so not enough information to make a rational decision at this point - it would have to be a guess, something professional pilots don’t really like to do. You could say do the checklist, just in case, but you’d be doing it on every flight. Might as well disconnect the trim *before* you take off, to be sure.
This situation is confusing enough on its own; now add in UAS, stick shake, flashing lights, noises and you have overloaded sensory channels making cognition exponentially harder. This is why Human Factors play an equal or greater role here than the purely technical ones.
Fundamentally, for some time after takeoff, abnormal operation of the trim system is virtually indistinguishable from normal operation because 737 pilots (and I have been one) get used to frequent intermittent trim operation by the aeroplane systems, to the point that you’d only notice it if it wasn’t happening, like living next to a main road.