Just had a scan, the pervading view seems to be that there is no way they could have missed the gear not being down. ECAM, EGPWS etc. I call BS on that. Until you have actually been affected by startle you are astounded how useless you can become.
The first thing to go when overloaded and startled is hearing. Been there in military flight training, also seen it on occasion in civil aircraft, it’s a bitch, your brain drops to fight or flight and stops processing data effectively. Having trained on the Airbus for 20 years, I have seen crews fail to lower the gear, fail to retract it even above 10,000’. It’s all about their mental model disagreeing with the actual situation.
The data from Air Bubba is pretty compelling, over 2000fpm at 1000’. With the overspeed warning and that altitude profile there is no way they could have achieved a sensible energy by the runway. Moreover, thrust would have been irrelevant in achieving a climb in the initial stages of the Go-around, they would have had plenty of kinetic energy.
The data shows 275’ and the QNH was 1006 so about 210’ error for pressure and the runway is what 100’. It all ties up, particularly with scrapes marks on the runway.
When you have removed the probable, the improbable however unlikely can be true. It doesn’t mean they were “bad” pilots but I bet they weren’t current, were probably fasting (yes many pilots do) and got themselves into a situation that overloaded them.
The lesson for us all, irrespective of the final cause, is look after yourself, accept you will be nowhere near your normal skill level and fly as conservatively as possible once released to fly again.
Blue skies to all. Eid Mubarak.