Originally Posted by
vilas
I said no to this. In the two cases if they would have seen the speed falling they could still be confused as to why it's falling if they don't check the mode/FMA. But the falling speed would have drawn their attention to the mode or FMA which they would have corrected. Alternately had they checked the mode first, as they must in Airbus then they would have corrected it then and there knowing that it (OP DES) won't maintain the speed. In Airbus you are not to assume anything as happening unless you confirm the FMA. If FMA was correct and yet speed starts falling that can be confusing. But that wasn't the case here. They committed first error of not getting into correct mode and checking it on the FMA, then committed the second, confirmatory error as it were to not monitor the parameter, the speed to cause the disaster.
You make a post where again I agree with every sentence, and again I can’t find what part of it disagrees with my text that you quoted.
If they saw saw the speed falling they could still be confused as to why - yes, and I said this (“
knowing something is wrong but not understanding exactly what or why”). The falling speed should have drawn their attention to the FMA, also yes (but among other things, like drawing their hand to the thrust levers). Had they fixed the mode, after checking it as required, AT would have been active - of course.
The next sentence may be a disagreement? Not sure. “If FMA was correct and yet speed starts falling that can be confusing. But that wasn't the case here.” Yes of course that would have been confusing (and not only that, but not only that, an actual malfunction). And yes that wasn’t the case here, and I hope you’re not hinging an argument that they weren’t confused by this event that didn’t happen, since there are myriad other possible confusion scenarios, one of them being the actual case.
And yeah the first error was getting in the wrong mode (compounded by lack of checking the FMA) and the second, not monitoring the airspeed. I’ll add a third, not monitoring the picture outside the window. How many thousands of hours does it take to learn what an approximate 3 degree descent over flat terrain looks like? I guess actually too many thousands, when you never use that as a source of SA due to putting all your chips in the automation. And also a 4th (Check Airman’s 3rd) and IMO the most significant of all, not flying the airplane when required. 17 seconds from “You are descending on idle open descend ha, all this time” (at 400 feet) until TOGA, in the meanwhile playing with modes and questioning each other on what switches had been flipped.